All the hype surrounding the original article that Mearsheimer and Walt published on the role of the Israel lobby in US foreign policy has continued with the publishing of this book. It is an important book, not so much because it presents new information, or even that it has definitive conclusions, rather because it is a necessary contribution that asks important questions. The book is divided into two main sections, but it presents readers with three main issues; what is the Israel lobby, how the lobby determines a great deal of discourse on foreign policy, and specific examples of how the lobby influences US policy in the Middle East.
I was delighted to read that the authors did not limit their investigation to just AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. AIPAC is the group that is usually named when people talk about the Israel lobby, but they certainly aren't the only one. Some of the other groups that make up the Israel lobby are: the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, the Anti-Defamation League, the Israel Policy Forum, the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, and the Middle East Forum. There are many more groups that make up what the authors refer to as the Israel lobby, but from just the organizations mentioned, you get the picture on how vast this lobby is.
What these groups do to influence policy is important to understand. First, they provide significant amounts of money to legislators running for office or those running for re-election. The book provides numerous examples of how the lobby functions to get people elected or unelected purely based on their political stance towards Israel. It should be understood that policy towards Israel is one of the most bi-partisan issues, in that both sides almost always take the same position. To be a candidate or elected official and take a critical stance towards Israel is almost political suicide. One of the more famous cases was the lobby recruiting Richard Durbin to run against incumbent Congressman Paul Findley in 1982. Durbin was heavily backed by the Israel lobby and beat the eleven-termed Congressman. Durbin has since gone on to become a Senator with continued backing by the lobby. In February of 2007 former President Carter had this to say about the role of the Israel lobby in electoral politics: "I don't see any present prospect that any member of the US Congress, the House or the Senate, would say 'Let's take a balanced position between Israel and the Palestinians and negotiate a peace agreement.' It is almost politically suicidal for a member of the Congress who wants to seek reelection to take any stand that might be interpreted as anti-policy of the conservative Israeli government."
This political influence cannot be understated and is the main reason that since 1976 Israel has been the number one recipient of US foreign aid. For over 3 decades the tiny state of Israel has received over $3 billion in aid--not including numerous other financial assistance, grants, loans and aid packages that the US government provides.
Another part of the broad Israel lobby are groups that are not Jewish or exclusively focused on Israel, but do have significant influence in policy are various Evangelical Christian groups, or what the authors call Christian Zionists. Some of these groups are the National Christian Leadership Conference for Israel, the Unity Coalition for Israel, Christian Friends of Israeli Communities, the Christians' Israel Public Action Committee and the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem. Individual leaders within the Religious Right have also been big supporters of the state of Israel, such as the late Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Gary Bauer, and John Hagee. Hagee is not as known as the other three but his influence is significant. Hagee is the founder of National Christian Leadership Conference for Israel. Hagee has raised a significant amount of money for Israel and has been outspoken against critics of Israel, even the most mild of critics. In December of 2006, in response to the position of the Iraq Study Group report that peace negotiations between Israel and Palestine are important for the future of the region, Hagee said that James Baker "is once again sticking the knife in Israel's back." He went on to say that "my father's generation would have bombed Iran by this time." In 2006, he told the Jerusalem Post that "I would hope the United States would join Israel in a military pre-emptive strike to take out the nuclear capability of Iran for the salvation of Western civilization."
The second area of influence that the Israel lobby has is in determining how Congress votes. The lobby does this by first proving legislative proposals that are prepared by groups like the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and secondly by traditional lobby methods - pressuring legislators to vote in favor of Israel. Often the votes in the House and the Senate are unanimous in favor of Israel or there are few dissenters. Whether these votes are for ongoing funding for Israel, policy directed at Israel, or policy directed in the region, the votes are overwhelmingly in favor of Israel. The book does provide numerous examples, but here is where they could have done more show how the Israel lobby influences votes. Maybe an appendix devoted to just that issue would have been useful.
A second major issue addressed in the book was how the lobby dictates the political and public discourse around Israel and the Middle East. This dominance of the discourse is clearly seen in how the US media reports on these issues. Numerous groups, like Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), have demonstrated the clear bias in how Israel and Israeli policy is presented in news coverage. We have seen the same sort of bias in the Grand Rapids news market with a 2004 study. Again, pressure is applied when reporting doesn't follow a pro-Israel position. One example the authors provide is a campaign that targeted NPR in 2003 for the alleged bias in reporting. The group CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting), an Israel Lobby group, targeted NPR radio stations in 33 cities with the threat of getting people to with-hold funds if NPR didn't change its coverage. In 2006, CAMERA took out full page ads in the New York Times protesting Jimmy Carter's book and advocating that people call the publisher to complain. This influence in public discourse is also felt at the university level with campaigns targeting academics who are considered enemies of Israel. The most recent example was the campaign against Professor Norman Finkelstein at DePaul University.
The last major issue that the book addresses is how the Israeli lobby impacts recent US foreign policy. The book addresses policy influences with Palestine, the Iraq War, the Second Israeli war against Lebanon and Iran. One thing that is consistent through what the authors present is that the policy hasn't changed much from the Clinton administrations to the current Bush administration. Take the case of Iran. In the 1990s, Iran made numerous attempts at promoting better diplomacy with the US, but Israel didn't want that to happen. The Israel lobby group the Washington Institute for Near East Policy presented a policy position that the Clinton administration adopted that was known as "dual containment." Dual containment was seen as a way of seeing Israel as a bulwark against Iran and as a means of preventing them from developing any nuclear capabilities. The main legislation that was proposed was called the Iran-Libya Sanction Act and it passed the House by a 415 - 0 vote in 1996. One month later the Senate also passed a unanimous vote and since Clinton was up for reelection in a few months he didn't dare delay the legislation from going through. The Bush administration has taken a different approach to Iran, they are just more zealous about demonizing Iran as part of the larger War on Terror. In March of 2007, the AIPAC conference made renewed sanctions legislation against Iran the focus. Even though the book came out before the vote, no surprise that the Congressional support for the Israel Lobby position on Iran passed overwhelmingly.
This book in some ways is a tough read and a bit dense, but for those who care to understand how power works and the role that the Israel lobby plays in US policy, then this is a book I would highly recommend. Does it answer all questions about Israel's relationship with the US....of course not, but it does provide us with an opportunity to deepen our understanding of the current politic and policy of the world's only super power, the United States.
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy, (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2007).
