July | August 2006 57

Political scientists John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt sparked a

firestorm when they raised questions about the power the Israel lobby wields

over U.S. foreign policy. Now, in an exclusive FP Roundtable, they face

off with four distinguished experts of the Middle East over whether the influence

of the Israel lobby is ordinary or extraordinary.

America’s relationship with Israel is difficult todiscuss openly in the United States. InMarch, we published an article in the Lon-

don Review of Books titled “The Israel Lobby,”

based on a working paper which we posted on thefaculty Web site at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy Schoolof Government. Our goal was to break the tabooand to generate a candid discussion of U.S. supportfor Israel, because it has far-reaching consequencesfor Americans and others around the world. Whatfollowed was a barrage of responses—some con-structive, some not.

Every year, the United States gives Israel alevel of support that far exceeds what it providesto other states. Although Israel is now an indus-trial power with a per-capita gdp roughly equal

John J. Mearsheimer is professor of political science at the Uni-

versity of Chicago and the author of The Tragedy of GreatPower Politics (New York: W.W. Norton, 2001). Stephen M.

Walt is professor of international affairs at the John F. Kennedy

School of Government at Harvard University. His most recent

book is Taming American Power: The Global Response to U.S.Primacy (New York: W.W. Norton, 2005).ILLU

STR

ATIO

NS

BY

CH

RIS

TOPH

ER S

ERR

A F

OR

FP

Unrestricted AccessWhat the Israel lobby wants, it too often gets.By John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt

The Warover Israel’sINFLUENCE

58 Foreign Policy

[ FP Roundtable ]

to Spain’s or South Korea’s, it still receives about$3 billion in U.S. aid each year—that is, roughly$500 per Israeli citizen. Israel also gets a varietyof other special deals and consistent diplomaticsupport. We believe that this generosity cannot befully explained on either strategic or moralgrounds. Israel may have been a strategic assetduring the Cold War, but it is a strategic burdenin the war on terror and the broader U.S. effortto deal with rogue states. The moral rationalefor unconditional U.S. support is undermined byIsrael’s treatment of the Palestinians and itsunwillingness to offer them a viable state. Webelieve there is a strong moral case for Israel’sexistence, but that existence is not at risk. Pales-tinian extremists and Iranian President MahmoudAhmadinejad may dream of wiping Israel “offthe map,” but fortunately neither has the abilityto make that dream a reality.

The “special rela-tionship” with Israel, weargue, is due largely tothe activities of the Israellobby—a loose coalitionof individuals and organ-izations who openlywork to push U.S. for-eign policy in a pro-Israeldirection. The lobby is notsynonymous with JewishAmericans, because manyof them do not support itspositions, and some groupsthat work on Israel’sbehalf (Christian evangelicals, for example) are notJewish. The lobby has no central leadership. It is nota cabal or a conspiracy. These organizations are sim-ply engaged in interest-group politics, a legitimateactivity in the American political system. These organ-izations believe their efforts advance both Americanand Israeli interests. We do not.

We described how the Israel lobby fosters sup-port within the U.S. Congress and the executivebranch, and how it shapes public discourse so thatIsrael’s actions are perceived sympathetically bythe American public. Groups in the lobby directcampaign contributions to encourage politicians toadopt pro-Israel positions. They write articles, let-ters, and op-eds defending Israel’s actions, andthey go to great lengths to discredit or marginalizeanyone who criticizes U.S. support for Israel. TheAmerican-Israel Public Affairs Committee (aipac)

is the lobby’s most powerful organization, and itopenly touts its influence over U.S. Middle East pol-icy. Prominent politicians from both partiesacknowledge aipac’s power and effectiveness. For-mer House Minority Leader Richard Gephardtonce observed that if aipac were not “fighting ona daily basis to strengthen [the relationship], itwould not be.”

We also traced the lobby’s impact on recentU.S. policies, including the March 2003 invasion ofIraq. Neoconservatives inside and outside the Bushadministration, as well as leaders of a number ofprominent pro-Israel organizations, played key rolesin making the case for war. We believe the UnitedStates would not have attacked Iraq without theirefforts. That said, these groups and individualsdid not operate in a vacuum, and they did notlead the country to war by themselves. For instance,the war would probably not have occurred absent

the Sept. 11, 2001, ter-rorist attacks, whichhelped convince Presi-dent George W. Bushand Vice President DickCheney to support it.

With Saddam Hus-sein removed from power,the Israel lobby is nowfocusing on Iran, whosegovernment seems deter-mined to acquire nuclearweapons. Despite its ownnuclear arsenal and con-ventional military might,

Israel does not want a nuclear Iran. Yet neither diplo-macy nor economic sanctions are likely to curbTehran’s nuclear ambitions. Few world leaders favorusing force to deal with the problem, except in Israeland the United States. aipac and many of the sameneoconservatives who advocated attacking Iraq arenow among the chief proponents of using militaryforce against Iran.

There is nothing improper about pro-Israeladvocates trying to influence the Bush adminis-tration. But it is equally legitimate for others topoint out that groups like aipac and many neo-conservatives have a commitment to Israel thatshapes their thinking about Iran and other MiddleEast issues. More important, their perspective isnot the last word on what is good for Israel or theUnited States. In fact, their prescriptions mightactually be harmful to both countries.

Israel may have been astrategic asset during the

Cold War, but it is astrategic burden in the waron terror and the broader

U.S. effort to deal withrogue states.

July | August 2006 59

Aaron Friedberg, professor of politics and international affairs

at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School, served

from 2003 to 2005 as a deputy assistant to the vice president

of the United States for national security affairs.

John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt are engag-ing in a stunning display of intellectual arro-gance. From their Olympian perch, the authors,

apparently alone, see what is truly in America’snational interest. While others cower in silence, theybrave accusations of anti-Semitism to speak truth topower. If the American people persist in seeing Israelin a positive light, it is because they have beenmanipulated and misinformed. Those who advo-cate policies with which the authors disagree areeither unwitting dupes or active agents of a foreignpower. In response to their critics, Mearsheimer and

Walt recently lamented the difficulty of having a“civilized discussion about the role of Israel in Amer-ican foreign policy.” If that is the end they trulyseek, they chose a distinctly uncivilized way to begin.

Although the authors say they believe thatthe United States still has an interest in Israel’swell-being, they do their best to demolish any con-ceivable rationale for continued American supportof that country. In their view, Israel has becomea strategic liability, provoking Islamist jihadisand stirring anti-Americanism. Morally,Mearsheimer and Walt proclaim, Israel is no bet-ter than its adversaries. That is a distortedaccounting. Israel is a democracy, and its enemiesare authoritarians of various stripes. Although theauthors choose to ignore it, there is an obviousmoral distinction between combatants who send

An Uncivilized ArgumentClaiming that the lobby endangers America is irresponsible and wrong.

By Aaron Friedberg

J

60 Foreign Policy

[ FP Roundtable ]

The Mind-set MattersForeign policy is shaped by leaders and events, not lobbies.

By Dennis Ross

John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt are troubledby the power and influence of the Israel lobby inWashington. The tone and argument of their

essay in this magazine is more reasoned than theiroriginal working paper, but it suffers from the same

flawed premise: U.S. foreign policy in the Middle Eastis distorted by this seemingly all-powerful lobby.

According to Mearsheimer and Walt, the Israel lobbyis governed by its concern for Israel, not America.They sayit drove the United States into a disastrous war in Iraqand is now pushing for a similarly dangerous waragainst Iran. Mearsheimer and Walt discuss othermaladies caused by the lobby, but it’s their concernabout U.S. policies toward Iraq and Iran that haveprincipally motivated them to “expose” the lobby.

No one questions the propriety of debating ourpolicy choices in Iraq, Iran, or anywhere else. But

Dennis Ross is distinguished fellow at the Washington Insti-

tute for Near East Policy and author of The Missing Peace:The Inside Story of the Fight for Middle East Peace (New

York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2004). He was the chief U.S.

diplomat in charge of Middle East peace under Presidents

George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton.

suicide bombers to kill civilians and those whotarget terrorist commanders.

That is not to say that everything Israel does isright or deserving of American support. For morethan a decade, Washington has sought to broker asettlement that will lead to Israel’s withdrawal todefensible borders from virtually all of the WestBank and Gaza (territories taken, it should berecalled, in a war Israel’s neighbors provoked and onwhich they had previously refused to establish apermanent Palestinian homeland) and create a coex-isting Palestinian state. Here the primary obstacle topeace has not been Israeli recalcitrance, but theabsence of a Palestinian negotiating partner willingto make agreements and capable of keeping them.

What would the authors have the United Statesdo differently? Cut off support for Israel, appar-ently. Such a move is unlikely to make Israel morepliant, and it will certainly embolden Israel’s ene-mies and empower the more radical among themwho still dream of its destruction. The jihadis whowage war on the West will not be mollified. Instead,they will rightly claim victory and use their successto rally more followers. Whatever the United Statesgains in popularity by abandoning a friend, it willlose in the more important international currency ofrespect. For all their tough-minded “realism,”Mearsheimer and Walt are surprisingly obtuse aboutthe pitfalls of appeasement.

Mearsheimer and Walt blame the distortion ofU.S. policy on “the lobby,” which in their previous

writing they deemed worthy of a capital “L.” Theyportray it as an amorphous entity, sometimes indis-tinguishable from a single organization, aipac, andat other times broad enough to include any person orgroup that seeks to “push U.S. foreign policy in apro-Israel direction.” The authors generously noted inan essay in the London Review of Books that “not allJewish-Americans are part of the Lobby, because Israelis not a salient issue for many of them.” But their def-inition is so broad as to capture the great majority ofAmerican Jews who do care about Israel. Mearsheimerand Walt say there is “nothing improper” in thelobby’s efforts to sway U.S. policy, but they go on todescribe its activities in ways that suggest otherwise.The lobby stifles debate, “marginalize[s] anyone whocriticizes U.S. support for Israel,” and, as they wrotein their original essay, convinces leaders to send youngAmericans to do “most of the fighting [and] dying” todefeat Israel’s enemies. Its members are not merely mis-taken, they are guilty of putting the interests of a for-eign country above their own.

At a minimum, this is a slanderous and unfal-sifiable allegation of treason leveled at individualswhose views on Middle East policy differ fromthe authors’. At worst, it is an ugly accusation ofcollective disloyalty, containing the most unsavoryof historical echoes. Mearsheimer and Walt havebuilt successful careers out of advocating a rigor-ous, scientific approach to the study of politics.Sadly, their argument here is not only unscientific,it is inflammatory, irresponsible, and wrong.

J

such debates should be based on reality. To say thatthe Israel lobby is largely responsible for the U.S.invasion of Iraq presumes that elected leaders, theirworldviews, and extraordinary events such as thoseon Sept. 11, 2001, don’t matter. Mearsheimer andWalt should know better. Regardless of their posi-tion on the war in Iraq, do they seriously doubtthat the mind-set of the man sitting in the OvalOffice made a big difference? Al Gore was againstgoing to war in 2002 and 2003. Yet, Al Gore wascloser to leaders of the “Israel lobby” throughout hiscareer than was President George W. Bush.

The reality is, neither the Israel lobby nor neo-conservatives convinced Bush to go to war. September11 did. Prior to 9/11, Bush’s Iraq policy was one of“smart sanctions”—the containment of the Iraqiregime, not its overthrow. His worldview changed on9/11. He came to believe that America could not waitto be hit again, and that the threat Saddam Husseinposed was all encompassing. This belief transformedhis policies. Although Mearsheimer and Walt nowacknowledge that “war would probably not haveoccurred absent the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks,”they still persist in declaring that they “believe theUnited States would not have attacked Iraq without[the Israel lobby’s] efforts.” They may want to resolvethis contradiction.

Mearsheimer and Walt’s thinking on Iran is simi-larly confused. Do they really believe that only “thelobby” cares about Iran’s acquiring nuclear weapons?They say that the United States need not be concernedabout Iranian nukes because deterrence will work.This idea ignores the possibility that Iran’s goingnuclear will trigger others in the Middle East to do thesame, and that the prospects of atomic miscalculationcould make a nuclear war in the region a real possi-bility. A nuclear Iran could also fatally undercut thenonproliferation regime, which would make the worldmore dangerous. The British, French, and Germans—none of whom are anxious for war—understand theserealities. That is why they introduced a U.N. SecurityCouncil resolution to prevent Iran from going nuclear.It isn’t the Israel lobby that is pushing the British,French, and Germans to confront Iran any more thanit is the Israel lobby that is driving U.S. policy.

The truth is, the Israel lobby doesn’t always getits way. It failed to prevent several major arms salesto Arab nations. It has failed to get the U.S. embassyin Israel moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. It failedto prevent the Clinton administration from craftinga peace proposal that would have divided Jerusalemin two. In fact, never in the time that I led the

July | August 2006 61

American negotiations on the Middle East peaceprocess did we take a step because “the lobby”wanted us to. Nor did we shy away from onebecause “the lobby” opposed it. That is not to saythat aipac and others have no influence. They do.But they don’t distort U.S. policy or undermineAmerican interests. Republican and Democraticpresidents alike have consistently believed in a spe-cial relationship with Israel because values matterin foreign policy. Policymakers know that, even ifMearsheimer and Walt do not.

62 Foreign Policy

[ FP Roundtable ]

Mearsheimer and Walt’s focus on the Israellobby’s influence on America’s MiddleEast policy is grossly overblown. They

portray U.S. politicians as being either too incom-petent to understand America’s national interest, orso undutiful that they would sell it to any pressuregroup for the sake of political survival. Sentimentand idealism certainly underlie America’s commit-ment to Israel. But so do the shared interests andconsiderations of realpolitik.

President Richard Nixon, no friend of the Jews,sided with Israel during the 1973 Yom Kippur Warnot to protect Israel fromSoviet invasion, but to serveAmerica’s national interest.Israel was just a pawn inNixon’s great game of theCold War, and it wasthanks to U.S. arms ship-ments to Israel that Ameri-ca was able to disrupt theSoviet-Egyptian alliance,eventually dismantling Sovi-et hegemony in the region.Two decades later, accord-ing to President GeorgeH.W. Bush, “thousands oflobbyists”—presumablymany of whom were Jewish—fought his policy, butthat did not prevent him from dragging then IsraeliPrime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to a peace conferencein Madrid against his will. Nor did “the lobby” pre-vent Bush’s predecessor, Ronald Reagan, from dis-tancing himself from Israel by officially recognizingthe Palestine Liberation Organization. And it didnot stop President Bill Clinton from offering uncon-ditional sovereignty to the Palestinians on the Tem-ple Mount, the holiest of Jewish sites.

The United States, Mearsheimer and Walt wouldhave us believe, has failed to force Israel to offer the

Palestinians a viable state, and it has consistentlybacked the Israeli approach to peace negotiations.These uninformed assertions misunderstand Ameri-ca’s role. The Palestinians have never really expectedAmerica to mediate, but rather to “deliver” Israel. Nordid they ever intend Camp David to be an endgame.They insisted from the start that it was one in a seriesof summits. That attitude explains why Yasir Arafatnever offered counterproposals that would haveallowed both sides to advance to a better deal. I wasat Camp David with Clinton when he made a last-ditch effort to save the summit through new propos-

als on Jerusalem, which Iaccepted and Arafat turneddown—the same way hehad rejected Clinton’s ear-lier independent proposalto divide the old city.Mearsheimer and Waltwould like us to forget thatsix months later Clintonreturned with an ambitiousAmerican plan for peace.In what the Saudi ambas-sador in Washington wouldlater characterize as a crimeagainst the Palestinian peo-ple, Arafat again declined.

By ignoring such inconvenient facts, Mearsheimerand Walt fail to appreciate how defining a momentArafat’s rejection of Clinton’s peace plan was. Hav-ing such an advantageous and all-embracing offer tothe Palestinians spurned by Arafat left PresidentGeorge W. Bush no incentive to pursue peace in hisown administration. It was Arafat, not the mytho-logical Israel lobby, who caused America’s disen-gagement from the peace process.

The United States should do more to end thehumiliation of the Palestinians. But it is preposter-ous to claim that Israel or the lobby is responsible“in good part” for America’s terror problem, asMearsheimer and Walt claimed in their originalarticle in the London Review of Books. The TwinTowers were first attacked in 1993, when Clintonand Yitzhak Rabin were in the middle of promising

Suggesting that theUnited States would be

unconcerned aboutthreatening states such asIran, Iraq, or Syria were it

not closely tied with Israel is absurd.

Shlomo Ben-Ami, the former foreign minister of Israel, is vice-

president of the Toledo International Centre for Peace and

author of Scars of War, Wounds of Peace: The Israeli-ArabTragedy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005).

The Complex TruthHijacking America’s Middle East policy is not so easy.

By Shlomo Ben-Ami

July | August 2006 63

respects anti-Israel. But an anti-Israel bias is not thesame as anti-Semitism. To argue as much is to claiman altogether unique immunity for Israel, untouch-able by the kind of criticism that is normally direct-ed at the conduct of states.

Anyone who recalls World War ii knows thatanti-Semitism is the unbridled and irrational hatredof Jews. The case made by Mearsheimer and Waltdid not warrant the hysterical charges of anti-Semitism leveled at them by several academics inself-demeaning attacks published in leading U.S.newspapers. Sadly, some even stooped toMcCarthyite accusations of guilt by association, tri-umphantly citing the endorsement of Mearsheimerand Walt’s views by vile, fanatical racists as some-how constituting proof of the authors’ anti-Semi-tism. In contrast, several of the Israeli reactions tothe Mearsheimer and Walt article were quite meas-ured and free of such mudslinging.

I do not feel qualified to judge the historicalparts of their argument. But several of the currentthemes that emerge from their thinking strike meas quite pertinent. Mearsheimer and Walt adducea great deal of factual evidence that over the yearsIsrael has been the beneficiary of privileged—indeed, highly preferential—financial assistance,out of all proportion to what the United Statesextends to any other country. The massive aid toIsrael is in effect a huge entitlement that enrichesthe relatively prosperous Israelis at the cost of the

Zbigniew Brzezinski, former national security advisor to

President Jimmy Carter, is professor of American foreign

policy at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced

International Studies and a counselor and trustee at the

Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Given that the Middle East is currently the cen-tral challenge facing America, Professors JohnMearsheimer and Stephen Walt have ren-

dered a public service by initiating a much-neededpublic debate on the role of the “Israel lobby” in theshaping of U.S. foreign policy.

The participation of ethnic or foreign-supportedlobbies in the American policy process is nothing new.In my public life, I have dealt with a number ofthem. I would rank the Israeli-American, Cuban-American, and Armenian-American lobbies as themost effective in their assertiveness. The Greek- andTaiwanese-American lobbies also rank highly in mybook. The Polish-American lobby was at one timeinfluential (Franklin Roosevelt complained about itto Joseph Stalin), and I daresay that before long wewill be hearing a lot from the Mexican-, Hindu-, andChinese-American lobbies as well.

Mearsheimer and Walt are critical of the pro-Israel lobby and of Israel’s conduct in a number ofhistorical instances. They are outspoken regardingIsrael’s prolonged mistreatment of the Palestinians.They are, in brief, generally critical of Israel’s pol-icy and, thus, could be labeled as being in some

A Dangerous ExemptionWhy should the Israel lobby be immune from criticism?By Zbigniew Brzezinski

peace talks with Syria, and Israel was engaged inpeace negotiations with the Palestinians. Osamabin Laden sent his men to train as suicide pilots inFlorida when Israel was negotiating peace with thePalestinians at Camp David. America is hated in theArab world because of what it is perceived to be (anintrusive power that supports the autocratic rulersof a dysfunctional Arab world), not because itsinterests and Israel’s sometimes coincide.

Mearsheimer and Walt display an abstruseindifference to the complex fabric of America’sinterests in the Middle East. How, for instance, wasthe Persian Gulf War to undo the Iraqi occupation

of Kuwait and ensure the flow of oil closely tiedwith Israel? The current Iraq war may benefitIsrael, but it benefits Iran as much or more. Cer-tainly no one would say that it was waged atIran’s bidding? A nuclear Iran is as much a threatto America and its Sunni allies in the Arab worldas it is to Israel. Suggesting that the United Stateswould be unconcerned about threatening statessuch as Iran, Iraq, or Syria were it not closely tiedwith Israel is absurd. The Israel lobby is certain-ly effective. But petitioning the government infavor of a given foreign policy is not the same asmanufacturing it.

64 Foreign Policy

[ FP Roundtable ]

American taxpayer. Money being fungible, that aidalso pays for the very settlements that Americaopposes and that impede the peace process.

The foregoing is related to the shift, over thepast quarter of a century, of U.S. policy in theMiddle East from relative impartiality (which pro-duced the Camp David agreement), to increasingpartiality in favor of Israel, to essentially the adop-tion of the Israeli perspective on the Israeli-Arabconflict. During the last decade, in fact, some U.S.officials recruited from aipac or from pro-Israelresearch institutions were influential in favoringthe Israeli preference for vagueness regarding thefinal shape of any peace accord, thereby con-tributing to the protracted passivity of the UnitedStates regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Incontrast, Arab Americans by and large have beenexcluded from serious participation in the U.S.policy process.

Finally, Mearsheimer and Walt also providefood for thought regarding the consequences of thegrowing role of lobbies in American foreign pol-icy, given the increased inclination of the U.S.Congress to become engaged in legislating for-eign policy. With members of congress involved incontinuous electoral fundraising, the effect hasbeen an increase in the influence of lobbies and,particularly, those that take part in targeted polit-ical fundraising. It is probably not an accidentthat the most effective lobbies are also the onesthat have been the most endowed. Whether thatproduces the best definition of the Americannational interest in the Middle East or elsewhereis open to question, and worthy of serious debate.

Of course, stifling such debate is in the interestof those who have done well in the absence of it.Hence the outraged reaction from some toMearsheimer and Walt.

Mearsheimer and Walt Respond:

We are grateful to Zbigniew Brzezinski forhis incisive defense of our article. Butone point of clarification is necessary.

Brzezinski says that we might be called “in somerespects anti-Israel.” To be clear, although we arecritical of some Israeli policies, we categorically sup-port Israel’s existence. But we believe the lobby’sinfluence harms U.S. and Israeli interests.

Regrettably, Aaron Friedberg’s commentsdemonstrate why it is difficult to have a candid dis-cussion of America’s intimate relationship withIsrael. He accuses us of a “stunning display ofintellectual arrogance,” then labels our arguments“inflammatory,” “distinctly uncivilized,” “irre-sponsible,” and “slanderous.” He even invokesthe now-familiar charge of anti-Semitism, by hint-ing that our article contains “the most unsavory ofhistorical echoes.” But he provides no evidence tosupport these charges. Friedberg does not chal-lenge our claim that aipac and other pro-Israelorganizations exert a marked influence on U.S.Middle East policy. Instead, he invents argumentsthat we do not make, claiming, for example, thatwe accuse Israel’s supporters of “treason.” Wemake no such charge and never would. Friedbergand other supporters of Israel advocate policiesthat they think will benefit both the United States

and Israel. That is neither improper nor illegiti-mate. But we believe the policies they advocatesometimes clash with U.S. national security inter-ests, and that their feelings for Israel sometimescolor their views of U.S. policy.

To their credit, Dennis Ross and Shlomo Ben-Ami focus on what we actually wrote. Both arguethat the lobby does not significantly distort Amer-ica’s Middle East policy. Ross says that we see thelobby as “all powerful,” while Ben-Ami describes ourportrayal of its influence as “grossly overblown,”referring to the lobby at one point as “mythological.”America’s unconditional support for Israel reflects,in Ben-Ami’s words, “shared interests” and, inRoss’s view, common “values.” This argument isfamiliar but unconvincing. We never said the Israellobby was “all powerful,” but anyone familiarwith U.S. Middle East policy knows that the lobbywields great influence. Former President Bill Clin-ton, for instance, described aipac as “better thananyone else lobbying in this town.” Former HouseSpeaker Newt Gingrich called it “the most effec-tive general interest group …across the entire plan-et.” And former Democratic Sen. Ernest Hollingsnoted upon leaving office, “You can’t have anIsraeli policy other than what aipac gives youaround here.”

July | August 2006 65

These comments aside, one way to gauge thelobby’s impact is to consider what America’s Mid-dle East policy would look like if the lobby wereweaker. To begin with, the United States wouldhave used its leverage to keep Israel from buildingsettlements in the occupied territories. Every Amer-ican president since Lyndon Johnson has opposedbuilding settlements, projects that many Israelisnow acknowledge were a tragic mistake. But noU.S. president was willing to pay the political pricerequired to stop them. Instead, as Brzezinski notes,the United States has subsidized a policy that direct-ly undermines the prospects for peace. OpposingIsraeli expansionism would also align U.S. policywith its expressed commitment to human rights

and national self-determination. If the Palestinianshad spent the past 40 years treating Israelis as they havebeen treated, American Jews would be outraged andwould rightly demand that the United States use itspower to stop it. Ross’s claim that common “values”lie at the heart of the special relationship is convincingonly if one endorses Israel’s treatment of its Arab cit-izens and its Palestinian subjects.

Absent the lobby, the United States wouldhave adopted a more independent approachtoward the peace process, rather than acting as“Israel’s lawyer,” to quote Ross’s former deputy,Aaron Miller. American leaders would have

offered their own plan for a final settlement andconditioned U.S. aid on Israel’s willingness toaccommodate U.S. policies. Ben-Ami understandsthis point, since he recently wrote that PresidentsJimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush “managedeventually to produce meaningful breakthroughson the way to an Arab-Israeli peace” because theywere “not especially sensitive or attentive to Jew-ish voices and lobbies” and were “ready to con-front Israel head on and overlook the sensibilitiesof her friends in America.”

If the lobby had as little influence as our criticsclaim, the 2003 invasion of Iraq would have beenmuch less likely. Ross thinks there is a contradictionbetween our twin claims that the lobby’s influence

was “critical” in the U.S. decision to invade Iraq andthat September 11 was also a determining factor.There is no contradiction. Each was a necessary, butnot in itself sufficient, condition for war. The neo-conservatives’ campaign for war is well document-ed by journalists such as James Bamford, GeorgePacker, and James Risen. It was backed by aipacand other hard-line, pro-Israel organizations. Sep-tember 11 was obviously important, but SaddamHussein had no connection to it. Still, then DeputyDefense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and other neo-conservatives were quick to link the two. They por-trayed Saddam’s overthrow as critical to winning the

66 Foreign Policy

[ FP Roundtable ]

war on terror, when, in reality, September 11 wasmerely the pretext for a war they had long sought.

It is also worth noting that if the lobby were lesspowerful, the current U.S. policy toward Iranwould be more flexible and effective. The UnitedStates would still worry about Iran’s nuclear ambi-tions, but it would not be trying to overthrow theregime or contemplating preventive war, and itwould be more likely to engage Tehran directly.The United States learned to live with a nuclearChina, India, Pakistan, Russia, and even NorthKorea. Iran is treated differently not because itthreatens America, but as President Bush has said,because it threatens Israel. Ironically, Iranianextremism might have been tempered if the lobbymattered less. Iran has sought better relations withWashington on several occasions, and it helped usgo after al Qaeda following September 11. Butthese overtures were rejected,in part because aipac andthe neoconservatives opposeany opening to Tehran. U.S.intransigence has merelystrengthened Iran’s hard-liners, making a difficult sit-uation worse. In this case, asin others, the lobby’s effortshave jeopardized both Amer-ican and Israeli interests.

We agree with our crit-ics that U.S. relations withseveral Arab states are a keysource of anti-Americanextremism, but backingIsrael at the expense of the Palestinians makes thisproblem much worse. Ben-Ami argues that anti-Americanism in the Middle East stems from supportfor “dysfunctional” Arab autocracies, and thatArafat alone is to blame for the failure of the peaceprocess. In this reading, Israel’s treatment of thePalestinians, and Washington’s unflinching supportfor it, has nothing to do with America’s deterio-rating image in the region. But that is not what anumber of objective studies of Arab public opinionhave shown. As former Under Secretary of StateMarc Grossman recently noted, “al Qaeda’s strate-gic interests are advanced by the continuation of theIsraeli-Palestinian conflict. In Arab and in otherMuslim countries whose cooperation we need …judgments about American intentions are dispro-portionately a function of their people’s views of theIsraeli-Palestinian conflict.”

Ben-Ami claims that Arafat’s supposed rejec-tion of Clinton’s peace plan “caused America’sdisengagement from the peace process.” Yet, in arecent discussion of the July 2000 Camp Davidsummit, Ben-Ami admitted that “if I were a Pales-tinian, I would have rejected Camp David as well.”More important, the historical record shows thatArafat did not reject Clinton’s December 2000proposal. The White House announced on Jan. 3,2001, that “both sides have now accepted thePresident’s ideas with some reservations,” a factClinton confirmed in a speech to the Israel PolicyForum four days later. Negotiations continued untillate January 2001, when Israeli Prime Minister EhudBarak, not Arafat, broke off the talks. Barak’s suc-cessor, Ariel Sharon, refused to resume the negotia-tions, and with the lobby’s backing, he eventuallypersuaded President George W. Bush to support

Israel’s attempt to imposea unilateral solution thatwould keep large parts ofthe West Bank underIsraeli control.

Arafat was a deeplyflawed leader who mademany mistakes. But Israeliand American policymak-ers are at least as respon-sible for the failure of theOslo peace process. IfArafat was the chief obsta-cle to peace, why has theUnited States done so littleto help Mahmoud Abbas,

his democratically elected successor? Here, again,pressure from the lobby helped persuade Wash-ington to pursue a counterproductive policy.Abbas has renounced terrorism, recognized Israel,and repeatedly sought to negotiate a final settle-ment. But his efforts have been spurned by Israeland the United States alike, thus underminingAbbas’s authority and popularity. The result? Anelectoral victory for Hamas that has left everybodyworse off.

The challenges facing U.S. Middle East policydefy easy solution, and we do not claim that amore balanced relationship with Israel is the key toresolving all of them. But these problems will notbe properly addressed if the lobby continues toenjoy disproportionate political influence, and ifAmericans cannot debate these questions freelyand dispassionately.

We agree that U.S.relations with severalArab states are a key

source of anti-Americanextremism, but backing

Israel makes this problemmuch worse.

Rome, Italy campusPrepare Yourself for the Global Arena

Picture yourself in Rome, studying to receive yourAmerican master’s degree while living in the heartof the Eternal City, one of the most historical andcultural cities in the world.

St. John’s University, the only accredited Americanuniversity offering you this unique opportunity,makes it possible for you to complete your entiredegree in Rome, whether you are interested in pursuing an M.B.A. degree or an M.A. degree.

Contact:Via di Santa Maria Mediatrice 2400165 Rome, ItalyTel +39 (06) 393-842 • Fax +39 (06) 636-901 info@stjohns.edu • www.stjohns.edu/rome

Master of Business Administration Accredited by AACSB International –The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (www.aacsb.edu)

• International Business • International Finance • Marketing Management

Master of Arts in Government and Politics Accredited by the Middle States Association ofColleges and Schools (www.msche.org)

• International Relations

M10000979