This is the Way it Begins

Michael Gerson on that same old story about "disproportionate Jewish influence":

Last year, Stephen Walt of Harvard and John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago published a paper accusing the "Israel Lobby" of having "unmatched power" and managing to "manipulate the American political system" into actions that undermine U.S. interests.

Supporters praised these scholars for "prying the lid off a debate that has been bottled up for decades" -- perhaps since Charles Lindbergh let down his side of the argument in the 1940s. Another reviewer commends them for "saying the unsayable." In this case, the unsayable was punished with a book advance of three-quarters of a million dollars and turned into 350 pages called "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy."

Accusations of disproportionate Jewish influence are as old as the pharaohs. The novelty here is the endorsement of respected, mainstream academics -- [...]

There is a temptation in some academic circles to search for that mysterious key that will unlock our whole understanding of American foreign policy. George Bush is captive to the Israelis, or maybe Dick Cheney is captive to the Saudi Arabians. The real problem is the Israeli lobby on the grassy knoll, or dispensationalists covering up the Da Vinci code.

But all this is a conspiracy against the obvious. Perhaps many Americans actually prefer Israel's flawed democracy to the aging autocrats and corrupt monarchies of the region. Perhaps they root for a reliable ally that is surrounded by nations still committed to its destruction. Perhaps many Americans recall that the Jews, just six decades ago, lost one-third of their number to genocide and believe that this persecuted people deserves a secure home and sanctuary. Perhaps Americans understand that anti-Semitism was the greatest source of evil in the 20th century and is not dead in this one.

Walt and Mearsheimer are careful to say they are not anti-Semitic or conspiracy-minded. But their main inference -- that Israel, the Israel lobby and Jewish neoconservatives called the shots for Bush, Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Stephen Hadley, Colin Powell and Donald Rumsfeld -- is not only rubbish, it is dangerous rubbish. As "mainstream" scholars, Walt and Mearsheimer cannot avoid the historical pedigree of this kind of charge. Every generation has seen accusations that Jews have dual loyalties, promote war and secretly control political structures.

These academics may not follow their claims all the way to anti-Semitism. But this is the way it begins. This is the way it always begins.

Comments

[dearieme]

Hold on. I consider myself firmly pro-semitic, but to suggest that (some) Jews don't have dual loyalties seems to me plain silly, not least because I have too. You are coming perilously close to the argument that all alcoholics started off as drinkers of milk and so we must deprecate all milk-drinking.

[Fabian from Israel]

dearieme, the issue is that after the Holocaust I don't think you can use the "dual loyalty" topic as a political argument against the Jews.

In first place, because it is of course, rarely used to attack anyone else but Jews. Think about the absurdity of making a case that US citizens who can be described as "anglos" need to be suspect of double loyalty because they have strong links with Great Britain. But what is indeed the difference in the two cases? There is none. Or I could argue that while the US has never been at war with Israel, it has been at war with Britain, and therefore, sympathizers of Britain should be seen as suspects.

In the second place, Jews embraced the nationality of their adoptive countries with the emancipation, only to be in most parts of the world rejected afterwards by the majority. After the Holocaust, how can you accuse the Jews of having one step in their countries and another in Israel? Or one in France and the other in the "Goldene Medina" (United States) It would be only logical. Attacks like the one by Walt and Mearsheimer only encourage those Jewish voices that think that there will never be complete tranquility in countries where they are minorities.

I come from Argentina, and there Spain is considered "our Motherland". To be an Argentinian and have strong links with Spain is not considered to be a problem of "dual loyalty". Replace Spain with Israel and you have that old accusation coming at you with political force. Because it is only used as a stick to beat Jews and make illegitimate their concern about their own "motherland".

Best,
Fabian

[Noga]

What's "pro-semitic"?

[Eric]

This is:

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/28927

[IanCroydon]

Just remember, when it comes to influence in this era of the global village, that the Chief Technician of Yahoo, the Head of Sales at Google, the founder of eBay, the NASA designer of cellphone networks, and the chief international correspondant for CNN ... are all Iranians.

[IanCroydon]

You can add the President of Bell Labs (AT&T), the lead designer of World of Warcraft and the Head of Applications for Apple computers.