John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt - The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy

welcome to Cambridge forum with John Mortimer and Steven Walt discussing the Israel lobby and u.s. foreign policy I'm Wendy Pearlman a fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government in March 2006 John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt published an article entitled the Israel lobby in the London Review of Books it ignited a storm of controversy they argued that a group of pro-israel activists was manipulating u.s. foreign policy to benefit the State of Israel at the expense of the national interests of the United States publication of a book-length study developing their proposition has done little to calm the rhetoric of their critics or their defenders what evidence do merch heimer and Walt point to in backing up their claim that the Israel lobby is guiding policy decisions in Washington what changes do they recommend to align u.s. Middle East policy with the nation's genuine interests these are questions that john marsha mer and steven walt address as they discuss their controversial book the israel lobby and u.s. foreign policy John Marsh hi myrrh is the R Wendell Harrison distinguished service professor of political science and the co-director of the program on international security at the University of Chicago among his previous books is the tragedy of great power politics Stephen Walt is the Robert and Rene Belfort professor of international affairs at the John F Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University he's the author of taming American power the global response among other books welcome to Cambridge forum John Mortimer and Steven Wald Thank You Wendy for that very nice introduction and thank you all for coming this evening if our topic tonight were America's energy policy you'd expect me to discuss the political activities of oil companies if the subject was gun control it would not be controversial for me to examine the role of the National Rifle Association but if the topic is Middle East policy and you mention and you bring up the Israel lobby you're grabbing the third rail with both hands now this is partly because some pro-israel groups are quick to attack anyone who questions the policies that they advocate but it's also because this entire discussion takes place in the shadow of centuries of anti-semitism and that history shapes how people think about this issue if you talk about a powerful interest group that is mostly though by no means exclusively comprised of Jewish Americans or if you point out that media coverage in the United States tends to favor Israel or if you mentioned the impact of campaign contributions by pro-israel political action committees it reminds some people of bizarre conspiracy theories like the protocols of the Elders of Zion in our book John and I explicitly reject all these anti-semitic canards for us the Israel lobby is just an interest group like lots of other interest groups in the United States and most of its activities are as American as apple pie we don't question Israel's legitimacy or its right to exist in fact we believe the United States should come to its aid if it's survival is ever in jeopardy but we also think the lobby's influence on u.s. foreign policy is a subject that reasonable people ought to be able to discuss openly the same way we would discuss any other groups who are trying to influence American policy foreign or domestic now this subject is important because the special relationship between the United States and Israel affects all of us Israel is the largest recipient of US economic and military aid getting about five hundred dollars per year for each Israeli citizen even though it is now a prosperous country with a per cap but an income that is 29th in the world moreover it gets this aid even when it does things that the United States opposes and that tend to generate anti-american sentiment like building settlements in the occupied territories Israel gifts contempt it's consistent diplomatic support from the United States and it's rarely criticized by American officials and certainly not by anyone who's running for high office the questions why now the usual answer is that Israel is a strategic asset and a democracy that shares our values but those arguments can't explain why we give it so much help and with so few strings attached Israel may have been a strategic asset during the Cold War but the Cold War is now over today providing unconditional support is not making the United States more popular or making American citizens more secure so the strategic argument isn't convincing it's true that Israel's a vibrant democracy but the status of its own Arab citizens and its 40-year campaign to colonize the West Bank is sharply at odds with American values my point by the way is not that Israel acts worse than other countries only that it doesn't act significantly better and so one cannot justify unconditional support by saying that Israel's behavior is somehow exemplary there is in our view a strong moral case for Israel's existence based on the long history of anti-semitism but past crimes against the Jewish people do not justify giving Israel a blank check today so what really explains Israel's privileged position in our view it's primarily due to the Israel lobby the lobby is a loose coalition of groups and individuals that works openly to influence American foreign policy in a pro-israel direction it includes organizations like AIPAC the anti-defamation league Christian groups like Christians United for Israel think tanks like the Washington Institute for Near East policy publications like the Weekly Standard or the New Republic and this is a broad definition but if you think about it most interest groups in the United States have lots of different components to them the environmental movement is just Greenpeace or the Sierra Club it also includes think-tanks sympathetic academics and journalists just like the pro-israel movement does like other interest groups the Israel lobby is not a cabal or a conspiracy and the groups and individuals in it don't agree on every issue but they do agree on wanting to preserve the special relationship final point here the lobby is not synonymous with Jewish Americans many Jewish Americans don't support the lobbies positions and groups like the so-called Christian Zionists aren't Jewish the lobby is defined by its political agenda not by ethnicity or religion like other special interest groups the lobby works in two main ways first groups like AIPAC exert influence inside the beltway by helping get allies appointed to key positions in the government and by giving politicians clear incentives to adopt positions that they favor for example by steering campaign contributions towards pro-israel candidates and away from candidates who aren't the lobby's influence of course is no secret AIPAC was ranked the second most powerful lobby in Washington in a 2003 survey of congressmen and their staffs and Bill Clinton said it was quote better than anybody else lobbying in this town Newt Gingrich called it the most effective general interest group across the entire planet and former congressman Lee Hamilton who served for 34 years said there's no group that matches it they're in a class by themselves former senator Fritz Hollings said as he was leaving office you can't have an Israel policy other than what AIPAC gives you around here and that's why Israeli prime minister a hoot Olmert said AIPAC was quote the greatest supporter and friend we have in the whole world and Jeffrey Goldberg of The New Yorker called it a Leviathan among lobbies of course it's not just a PAC but it's also a number of other groups and individuals including as I've mentioned a subset of the Christian evangelical movement the second strategy is to try and shape public discourse and American perception so that Israel is viewed favorably by most Americans pro-israel think tanks and commentators produce a steady diet of op-eds articles books and media appearances intended to shape these perceptions and influence policy media commentary in the United States tends to be pro-israel and there's simply no equivalent in the United States to Israeli journalists like Akiva elder gideon levy or Amira Hass who are frequently critical of Israeli policy my point is not that these critics are always right and that pro-israel pundits are always wrong my point is that voices like theirs are almost entirely absent from mainstream media in the United States but even so various pro-israel watchdog groups monitor media coverage organized boycotts and demonstrations against news agencies that publish or broadcast anything critical of Israel and there's numerous examples of this taking place finally last but not least efforts to stifle criticism often include smearing critics by accusing them of being anti-semitic after former President Jimmy Carter published his book Palestine peace not apartheid last year martin peretz of the new republic said quote carter will go down in history as a Jew hater a critic in the Washington Post compared Carter's views to those of David dukes needless to say such charges were routinely leveled at us after our article was published even though there's not the slightest shred of evidence to support them pro-israel groups use these smear tactics for three main reasons first to distract people from the real issue which is American policy second to deter people from critic criticizing Israel for criticizing the lobby itself no sensible person wants to be labeled an anti-semite so some people just keep quiet and finally this tactic marginalizes people in the public arena after all what politician would want to associate with someone who's been accused even falsely of being anti-semitic this works especially well in the foreign policy community we're being critical of Israel will almost certainly get you into well professionally what's the result of all of this on this one issue there's little serious debate in the United States little serious debate about support for Israel especially in Congress even when it's obvious that American Middle East policy has gone badly off the rails and in ways that are harmful to the United States and to Israel alike to illustrate that point John is now going to describe the lobby's contribution to the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq thank you very much steve has made the case that there is a powerful lobby out there and that it influences us Middle East policy in profound ways I will take that analysis a step further and argue that its influence has been largely negative in a nutshell our argument is that the lobby working with Israel itself has pushed us Middle East policy in ways that are not in the American national interest and I might add not in Israel's interest either I will focus on one case the role of Israel and the lobby and the run-up to the Iraq war there are four other cases that we cover in the book but which I will not deal with because of time considerations number one is US policy towards Israel's policies in the occupied territories to US policy towards Iran three u.s. policy toward Syria and for US policy during the Lebanon War in the summer of 2006 let me now turn to Iraq it is manifestly clear to most Americans that the Iraq war is one of the greatest strategic blunders in American history our argument is that Israel and especially the lobby were two of the main driving forces behind the decision to invade Iraq it is hard to imagine that war happening and their absence to start with Israel it was the only country besides Kuwait where both the government and a majority of the population favored the war the Israeli government to include Prime Minister cherone pushed the Bush administration hard to make sure that it did not lose its nerve in the months before the invasion other influential Israelis like former Prime Minister's a Hood Barak and Benjamin Netanyahu also implored the United States to take down Saddam in fact Israel was pushing so hard for war it's allies in the United States warned Israeli officials to damp down their rhetoric lest it be seen as a war for Israel I might also add that President Clinton said in 2006 that every Israeli politician I knew thought that Saddam was so great a threat that he should be removed even if he did not have WMD the Israeli public was also solidly behind the war according to a February 2003 poll that's one month before the war started seventy-seven point five percent of Israelis said that they wanted the United States to attack Iraq one sometimes hears the argument as I'm sure many of you have the Israel opposed the Iraq war and actually favored attacking Iran instead there's no question that in early 2002 when the Israelis got wind that the Bush administration was thinking about attacking Iraq that key Israeli officials went to Washington and made it clear that they thought that Iran was the greater enemy and that the Bush administration should focus on Tehran not on Baghdad it is important to emphasize however that Israel was not opposed to the u.s. toppling regimes in Iraq or Syria to countries that Jerusalem considers mortal enemies Israel simply wanted the United States to deal with Iran first but once the Israelis realized that the war party intended to deal with Iran after it finished the job in Iraq the Israelis enthusiastically embraced the idea of invading Iraq thus between early 2002 and March 2003 the Israelis put significant pressure on the Bush administration to make sure it chose war over diplomacy with Iraq while reminding Washington Area point various points along the way not to forget that Iran must come after Iraq I might add that there is no evidence that Israel warned the United States that Iraq would turn into a quagmire indeed the Israelis thought that Iraq would be a cakewalk which is why they were confident that the US would be free to go after a red right after it finished the job in Iraq of course they were wrong turning now to the lobby there is no question that the neoconservatives one of the core constituencies in the lobby were the main driving force behind the war but they were supported by key organizations in the lobby like APEC now that the war has gone south it is commonplace to hear Israel's supporters say that the main organizations in the lobby did not push for war but that is not true this point is made clear in a May 2004 editorial that appeared in the foreword a weekly Jewish newspaper based in New York reading from the editorial in the foreword as President Bush attempted to sell the war in Iraq America's most important Jewish organizations rallied as one to his defense in statement after statement community leaders stressed the need to rid the world of Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction concern for Israel's safety rightfully factored in to the deliberations of the main Jewish groups one sometimes hears the claim that AIPAC took no position on the Iraq war and certainly did not advocate it this is not true either first of all this claim fails the common sense test as apec usually supports what Israel wants and Israel certainly wanted a war against Iraq second there is hard evidence that AIPAC lobbied for the war for example a PACs executive director Howard Corre told the New York Sun in January 2003 that one of apex successes over the past year was quote quietly lobbying Congress to approve the use of force in Iraq end of quote the neoconservatives of course were the main driving force behind the war they initiated the idea of using force to topple Saddam and to letters written to President Clinton in early 1998 over the next five years and especially after 9/11 they pushed relentlessly for a war against Iraq no other group or institution in the United States was seriously committed to invading Iraq over that five-year period indeed there was significant opposition to attacking Iraq even after 9/11 within the State Department the intelligence community and the uniformed military I might add that there is hardly any evidence that the oil companies and the oil-producing States were pushing for war with Iraq the neoconservatives are by their own admission deeply committed to Israel in fact many of them are connected with key organizations in the lobby like the Washington Institute for Near East peace and the American Enterprise Institute our argument here it should be emphasized is not that the neoconservatives or the leaders of the lobby were pushing a war that was in Israel's interests but not in America's national interest on the contrary they believed that invading Iraq was good for both America and Israel for the neoconservatives and the lobby more generally what is good for Israel is good for the United States and vice-versa although the neoconservatives were deeply committed to a war with Iraq they could not make it happen by themselves they failed to convince Clinton to go to Baghdad and they had little luck selling the war in the first eight months of the Bush administration it was the events of 9/11 that created the circumstances where they could help convince President Bush and Vice President Cheney that invading Iraq was a good idea but without Bush and Cheney on board there would not have been a war I might add that Steve and I believe that if Al Gore had been elected president in 2000 there would not have been an Iraq war all of this is to say that the neoconservatives were necessary to have the war but by themselves they could not make it happen one final point is in order about Iraq we are sometimes accused of saying that Iraq was a Jewish war nothing could be further from the truth we pointed out in the book as we did in the article that polls taken before the war show that American Jews were 10% less supportive of the war than the general American public our argument is that the war was due in large part not exclusively it was due in large part to the influence of the Israel lobby especially the neoconservatives within it not the American Jewish community and as Steve emphasized the lobby is defined by its political agenda not ethnicity or religion let me conclude with a brief word about what we think the us-israeli rate relationship should look like to start the United States should end its special relationship with Israel and treat it like a normal country to treat Israel the way it treats other democracies around the world like Britain France Germany Italy and India and practice this means that when Israel is acting in ways that are consistent with the American national interest Washington should back the Jewish state but when Israel is acting in ways that harm US interests Washington should distance itself and use its considerable leverage to get Israel to change its behavior the way it would do with any other country that was acting in ways that might hurt the United States regarding Israel's conflict with the Palestinians the United States should act as an honest broker in other words Washington should pursue an even-handed policy towards the two sides in particular the United States should make it clear to Israel that it must abandon the occupied territories and allow for the creation of a viable Palestinian state on those lands Jerusalem should be told that the United States will oppose not tolerate Israel's colonial expansion in the West Bank none of this is to say that the United States should abandon Israel on the contrary the United States should defend Israel's right to exist within its pre-1967 borders with some minor modifications and most importantly if Israel's survival is threatened the United States should come to its aid thank you're joining us at Cambridge forum listening to John Mearsheimer and Steven Walt discussing the Israel lobby in u.s. foreign policy so I get to ask the first question and in the book you talked quite a bit about dual loyalty so I'll ask two questions based on my own dual loyalties and one is as a student of Middle East Studies and the other is as a student of political science so as a student of Middle East Studies you discuss quite a bit in the book and in your talk as well about anti-semitism and also about anti Americanism as one harmful outcome of our own country's policies in the Middle East what you don't mention is anti Arab or anti-muslim sentiment that's so prevalent at these times in our country especially after 9/11 can you discuss how this anti-arab anti-muslim sentiment relates to the Israel lobby either how it allows it to operate or how people perceive the lobby or any of the themes that you discuss in the book related to public discourse on Middle East politics and public decision-making so that's the first question the second question which is more about the politics of it is there's a tension in the book between what you discuss is the legitimate means of the lobby and we currently say the legitimate means of interest group politics as Steve said is American Pie as American as American Pie between these legitimate means and the destructive outcomes so looking larmor large late American politics are you saying that there's something gone awry with this American Pie there's something deeply wrong with American politics in terms of the role of money in politics the failure of separation of powers the ability of small groups to dictate policy that harms the interests of a majority students of political science this is a classic question of them of the problem of collective action that what is rationale for individual American politicians obliging the lobby in order to get in office and stay there is it odds with what is best for the United States as a whole so how can these two be reconciled without some major overhaul of the American system in the role of special interests in determining put a local policy this is Steve wall I'm going to take the first question and John will handle the second Thank You Wendy for asking such easy questions with respect to the first one on sort of the role of anti-muslim or anti-arab attitudes in the United States which when you think about it aren't particularly surprising in the wake of September 11th despite the efforts that many people have made to try and dampen those down let me just say a few things about it one is I think it's important to recognize that the Muslim world is quite heterogeneous and the Muslim population in every country that I am familiar with is quite heterogeneous in much the same way that I would argue that pro-israel groups in the United States are also somewhat heterogeneous some of them say favoring a two-state solution some of them being adamantly opposed and it's important to recognize that heterogeneity that said I do think that some groups in the Israel lobby have encouraged or some individuals have encouraged us to take a much more hostile view of the Muslim world than is warranted people like Norman Podhoretz who appear to be obsessed with Islamofascism it seems to me are encouraging us to see the entire Islamic world as fundamentally hostile to us asking us to treat the entire Muslim world as though it is all just like and in full agreement with with its worst most extreme most violent elements with people like Osama bin Laden you see this also in those who argue that anti Americanism in the Arab and Islamic world is driven by some great cultural clubs that it's sort of what we are what we stand for rather than a reaction to American policy this flies in the face of numerous public opinion surveys that show that anti Americanism in every part of the world but especially in the air of an Islamic world is driven not so much by cultural differences but again by reactions to what they regard as unjust or or conflictive American policies just one final point is what we have to recognize here in the United States is that many of these reactions these conflicts that we have even with countries in those regions is not based on some deep and irrational hatred of the United States again it's based on what they regard as a real conflict of interest for example we now have a serious conflict with Iran over Iran's nuclear ambitions but Iran is not seeking control of the nuclear fuel cycle and possibly seeking to get nuclear weapons because it has some deep religious or cultural conflict with the United States or even with the West if any of us it seems to me we're in Iran's position we would be thinking seriously about wanting to have a nuclear deterrent because after all the world's most powerful country has declared that it wants regime change in that in that country if I were to run I would be worrying about my own security and I'd be thinking about getting a nuclear capability too I should just add I think Iran's nuclear ambitions are a problem and a problem we ought to be addressing but we ought to be addressing it by seeing it as a conflict of interest not by assuming that the Muslim world is fundamentally hostile to us not by assuming that there is some deep cultural clash not by assuming that they hate us for what we are rather it's much more what we do this is John Mearsheimer and I will take when the second question she pointed out that it seems to be the case that small groups using legitimate political means seem to have the ability to sometimes produce bad policy outcomes I think that's true and I think it's endemic to the American political system as she hinted in her question as most of you know interest group politics have been at the heart of the American political system since the founding of this country and in any political system where interest groups punch above their weight what you're going to discover is that small groups of smart and well-organized and well-funded individuals can have an influence on policy that leads to outcomes that would not be the outcome of the body politic at large if it could vote just take the National Rifle Association and put aside the Israel lobby if the American people could vote on gun control there's no question that we'd have serious gun control legislation in this country the reason that we don't have serious gun control legislation is because of the power of the National Rifle Association which is a small and very powerful interest group and the NRA by the way acts in legitimate ways there's nothing conspiratorial about the NRA it's not an organization that is acting in an unlawful way it's playing the game of American politics of the same way that the AARP the farm lobby the Israel lobby and the Cuban Lobby play the game but I would argue and I know Steve agrees with me that the gun control legislation that we don't have in this country is a bad policy outcome I would argue that the farm policy that we have in this country is a bad outcome and it's due in large part to the effect of the special interest groups and Steve and I are basically arguing the same thing about the Israel lobby it is pushing policies that we believe are not in America's interest or not in Israel's interest but it's not because they're behaving like a cabal or a conspiracy or any of this kind of nonsense it's because they're operating in a political system where sometimes interest groups produce outcomes that are not in the interest of the body politic as all so what can be done about it oh that's exactly that was my last point you hit the net witnesses John Mearsheimer again Wendy hit the nail right on the head again nothing could be done about it unless we fundamentally alter the nature of the political system which is not going to happen the only thing that would matter on the margins I think is campaign finance reform if we were to publicly fund all elections it would take some of the power away from all of these interest groups but I don't think that's going to happen either so this is going to be the story of the game for the foreseeable future whether you're talking about the NRA the AARP or the Cuban Lobby this is Steve wolf I would just add to what John said that we do think and sometimes you can correct policies that aren't optimal by getting a more open discussion of them in the body politic and that's why we wrote this book welcome to Cambridge forum as we continue our discussion with John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University discussing the Israel lobby and u.s. foreign policy at this point in the program we'll take questions from the audience please line up as many of you already have at the microphone no speeches please no long comments please be concise and respect for the many other people who also have questions this program as Winston Churchill said that Britain does not have permanent enemies or friend only permanent interest so the question is is this the interest of so-called code and code Empire of course it's not this is the interest of Israel that is push upon United States that if you follow us we are going to get rid of you know everyone said otherwise so what is their policy I think it should be clearly said that people don't be confused for example this a slogan of no blood for oil I think is totally wrong and the emphasis is totally wrong because what they have the interest is I have to explain a little bit you know Israel wants to to divide - to draw the map of the Middle East and the first thing is that Iran as you said they really they have in mind is Iran that device you can move it to invitee and actually excuse me I mean this is a butcher purpose oh no no no no it's okay I'm talking American people must be strong and stay opposed to this policy and ask the government to discard this policy and do not wait another war this is the of Israel okay Ezra no please will you ask your question in terms of the Israel on American expense okay okay and also but these policies no I'm afraid look at all the people behind you I'm there's lots of people behind you money no it's not it's not fair well thank you fair no well thank you thank you for your comments well we'll ask John Mearsheimer and Steven wall to comment now on on the comments you made thank you John and Steve do you would you like to comment it all on no I think we should go to the next question my question is and the question weren't in in George Washington's farewell address he devoted I think five paragraphs to admonishing the young country about entered into entangled alliances saying that we would end up abandoning our own values like maybe civil rights we would adopt the enemies of a country that we have no natural quarrel with and so my question really is are we there yet is is this an example of in your view as academics of what he was predicting thank you um yeah I think that there's there's a the question referred to George Washington's farewell address and his concern that we might become too heavily tied to any single single country and I think that this is a case where not only as the United States adopted a special relationship towards Israel it's no longer in our interests but rather one where we would be better allies for Israel if in fact we had a more normal relationship at the conclusion of the book we actually talked explicitly about having a more normal relationship that was more conditional when you think about it right that's what a friend does for its friends you don't support your friends unconditionally when you think your friends are doing something that's not in your interest and not in their own interest you tell them so and you try to persuade them to behave differently right now because in our view the political influence of these various pro-israel groups it's become virtually impossible for American politicians to criticize Israel to put any meaningful pressure on Israel or even for foreign policy elites to have much of an open discussion of this subject this is not good for the United States but more importantly it's not good for Israel because we're not able to be a good ally that it can occasionally tell the Israelis when they're doing something that's not smart for them either just one very quick addition to this tying my comment back to Wendy's original question about interest groups not only is America a country where interest groups have been embedded in the political process from the beginning but it's an immigrant culture and what we have coming into the country over time are large numbers of different immigrant groups and those immigrant groups invariably when they get to the United States form interest groups and weigh in in the political process and one of the most interesting stories that's been in the newspapers recently I'm sure many of you have seen this is how the Indian American Lobby is beginning to imitate a pack and push the United States in a pro India direction in ways that AIPAC pushes the United States and a pro Isreal direction so again Wendy I don't think this process is going to end anytime soon thank you for your book I have two questions first one is much of your analysis has been true for some decades so my question is why now are you writing this book I mean I understand that it's an overdrive now the pro-israel lobbies impact so that's my first question my second question is how do you factor into your thinking the arms manufacturers and military and security related industries and corporate interests that profit so much from ongoing violence and conflict in the Middle East and their influence on our foreign policy this is Steve Walter I'll take the first one John gets the easy question we we didn't write the book 20 or 30 years ago because we're not that old but more more importantly we began thinking about America's position in the Middle East like many other Americans in the aftermath of September 11th both of us had written on Middle East topics at various points in the past but we began to focus a great deal on it and one of the things we realized pretty quickly was that our policy was being heavily driven by the power of groups like APEC and others and that we were not going to be able to have a more effective Middle East policy that might attenuate some of the problems we were facing if we didn't start to address that and we decided that we would write this because we were in positions what we thought we could do so and actually get a reasonably fair hearing so that's why we did it that's why we did it now with regard to the influence of arms merchants or what's sometimes called the military-industrial complex and corporate interests and here we're talking about oil it seems intuitively plausible when you think about u.s. foreign policy in general and us Middle East policy in particular that the military-industrial complex and the oil companies and the oil-producing States must be driving the policy it's hard to believe that they're not at least as powerful as Israel and the Israel lobby if not more powerful but if you look at the general policy of the United States in the region it's very hard to see where the oil companies are influencing it in major ways as hard as that may be to believe and in fact I think you could make an argument that if the oil companies and the oil-producing States were driving us Middle East policy we would have a fundamentally different set of policies first of all we would not have invaded Iraq because as you know the oil companies want to jump in bed with Saddam Hussein and make money the oil-producing States save for maybe Kuwait we're not pushing for this war at all in fact they were trying to discourage the Bush administration from going to war with regard to Iran the oil companies are not clamoring for us to use military force against Iran again they just want to make money and if anything they'd be calling for ending sanctions against Iran with regard to the israeli-palestinian conflict I think if you could take away the Israel lobby and put the oil-producing States and the oil companies in charge of American foreign policy you would see that we do a 180 degree switch on our policy towards the israeli-palestinian conflict so I just don't see much interest there my final point on this is that both Steve and I are realists and we've developed all these theories over the years which are consistent with the argument that American foreign policy is based on geostrategic considerations like oil so we have a vested interest in believing that oil and economic considerations and geopolitical considerations of a broader sort are driving this not the Israel lobby but the fact of the matter is when you look at the Iraq war as I said in my formal presentation and when you look more general at us Middle East policy it's just very hard to see that corporate interests and the military-industrial complex have much influence my question has to do with what what may be a contradiction in what you said in ignoring certain realities you have stated you I'm in both of you or one of you you have stated that the United States should come to the aid of Israel Israel was in danger but to the credit of both current and the past president President of Iran they were telling the truth they were not like Hitler which are unfairly accused because Hitler tried to conceal what he intended to do both presidents of Iran stated very clearly and honestly to the credit that Israel should be destroyed moreover there was a clear a clear statement that they are willing to sacrifice 20 million Muslims to destroy Israel you ignored that question could you said if is as in danger moreover they stated one bombil finish of israel probably three bombs but anyway because you something yes so my question is do you see the contradiction between you saying America should come to us or help and this and I also had a question about the Congress which you treat as push overs of the lobby as a bunch of idiots or corrupt people who sells is America's Israel to a small little Lobby thank you with respect to the first question it is Israel it really in jeopardy first I would remind everybody that Israel has the strongest conventional army in the Middle East and it has several hundred nuclear weapons of its own this famous statement by iranian president mahmoud ahmadinejad which is frequently mistranslated as wiping israel off the map what he actually said and this is a an allusion to an old speech by Khomeini was that Israel should be erased from the page of time a nice poetic way of saying that the Jewish state in Israel should go out of existence the same way that say the Soviet Union went out of existence as a political regime or the same way that the Shahs regime fell it was not saying that Iran was going to attack Israel it's not saying that Iran was going to attack Israel with nuclear weapons if Iran ever gets nuclear weapons now I find aquaeden Ishod statement objectionable in the extreme I find his Holocaust denial even more bizarre and objectionable but we ought to be clear on what he was saying he was saying he thinks the state should go out of existence and be replaced by some other kind of government they're not that the he was not calling for the physical destruction of Israel and by the way I've seen no evidence that any Iranian even if they had nuclear weapons wants the entire Iranian society to commit suicide which is what an attack on Israel would entail given Israel's own nuclear deterrent and given the fact that we are alive with Israel and we have thousands of nuclear weapons of our own so I do not believe Israel's security and survival is in jeopardy like all countries Israel has some security problems but they are I think completely manageable security problems that if Israel's survival is ever in jeopardy as Jen and I already said then the United States should come to its aid none of those things by the way mean giving Israel unconditional support for everything it wants to do with regard to your second question about us essentially saying that Congress is a bunch of idiots or pushovers or they're corrupt that's I think not an accurate statement to what we were saying our argument is that in a system that privileges interest group politics you're often going to find cases where powerful interest groups force legislators on Capitol Hill to sign on to policies that they otherwise would not sign on to hello i'm i have been in trenton and speech highly critical of israel policy so i would like that to be known so that later on after I'm done with my question you don't assume that I'm part of the Israel lobby speaking but I would I'm speaking as a journalist and as somebody let's say who's involved in observing political science and I'm amazed by the of no other way of putting this very sloppy process of research and analysis that you have employed both in your book and here tonight which skips over volumes and volumes of research and analysis to connect a hunt the war in Iraq with a hundred million dollar Lobby that supports a four billion dollar investment on part of US government in Israel per year instead instead of let's say in the oil interest which happens to be the single biggest business in the world or the military industry industry military sorry military industrial complex in the United States use and you simply ignore that right before we went to war in Iraq women to war in Afghanistan in a which was awarded I don't didn't see in your book or in this speech tonight are you connecting with Israel OB at all and I my second question I'm sorry which is very related is that don't you feel that by so haphazardly connecting a war that has many many influences and many many repercussions for the American people so haphazardly connecting it with Israel you're very responsibly placing the entire blame on Israel and therefore contributing to anti Israeli and subsequently entered you anti-semitic feelings in this country this is John Mearsheimer I'll take this question first of all in the business coppy research it's one of the charges that's often leveled at us and Steve and I have each written three books and countless articles and nobody who has read any of those books or articles has ever accused us of sloppy scholarship do you really think that when we decided to as Steve put it grabbed a third rail with both hands that we decide at that point to let our guard down and do sloppy research second do you think that Ferriss Straus and Giroux which is our publisher and is one of the most distinguished publishing houses in the United States would allow us to produce a sloppy book don't you think that when we were producing that book Steve may and the folks at Ferris Straus and Giroux that we went to enormous lengths to get the story right because we know we'd be accused of Scott slothy scholarship this is not to say there's not a mistake or two in the book no two human beings can write a book of that length and not make a mistake or two but I think that the argument that this is sloppy scholarship does not hold water and I think if you look carefully at the reviews of the book nobody is made in a systematic and fair-minded way the case that is sloppy research that's not to say you have to agree with their conclusions but it's not sloppy with regard to the oil interests in a military industrial complex as I said before there's just not any evidence or there's just not much evidence out there that they drive us Middle East policy as hard as that may be to believe and I would invite those who doubt what I have to say to go out and research the subject yourself and if you can convince me otherwise I'm certainly willing to buy your argument because it will support my previous scholarship with regard to Afghanistan we did not argue as the questioner pointed out that Afghanistan was caused in any way by the Israel lobby that's not true not every war in American history was caused by the Israel lobby we would not be foolish enough to make any such argue and furthermore were not making the argument with regard to Iraq to use the questioners rhetoric that the entire blame for that war rests on the lobby and on Israel our argument was that the lobby by itself could not make the war happen President Bush and Vice President Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld three individuals who are not in the Israel lobby were necessary to make that war happen I want to be perfectly clear on it our argument is that nevertheless the lobby especially the neoconservatives were a main driving force behind that war they were a necessary but not sufficient condition and again look at the book if you have any doubts about this there is a lot of evidence to this effect and a good number of people including people like Philip Zelikow has worked for Condoleezza Rice and Wesley Clark and former senator Hollings have said that the war was due in large part to the efforts of the Israel lobby this is not that controversial and argument and when you take into account that most Americans especially those who were pushing for the war like the neoconservatives thought this was a cakewalk it's not hard to understand why that's the case my name's michael brauer i love to be a critic I'm sorry I haven't yet read your book so I have to be addressing your speeches tonight and I sat there and unfortunately I couldn't find anything to disagree with or to criticize or to question except your language and what I object to and I want you to start thinking seriously about changing your language in one respect over and over again you use the phrase neoconservatives and neo-cons which is their own choice of language to put respectability on what they do that inner group of 25 you spoke of I submit you don't have to buy my language but please of your own separate language they're not conservatives they're not neo-cons they're reactionaries they're radical reactionaries and worse they're imperialists so my own term for them is incompetent imperialism and radical reactionaries there's very well you we can do you say given the interest group politics United States well one thing we can do is get our language straight and not get sucked in by them one last point is why you say Cohen Powell didn't support this war I said and watched his magnificent speech to the UN and he almost convinced me thank you I'm not sure what this is a Steve Wald I'm not sure how to respond to that I'm not I don't think I'm going to abandon the label neoconservative even though I accept the fact that they are not conservative they're radicals but certainly the track record of the foreign policy they have produced to date validates the the use of the term incompetent and the most amazing thing is given the track record the results they have achieved over the last five or six years with what I find truly remarkable is that anyone is taking their advice seriously on other things like what to do about Iran just very quickly on : Powell this is John Mearsheimer speaking he clearly thought the war was a bad idea but once President Bush who was his boss decided for war in early January and told him that a war was in effect going to happen he went along as a good soldier one can argue that that's right or wrong but I think that's effectively what happened hi my name is Genevieve Amon and I know and it's written in many books that every people every country deserves their government especially here in this country which is a an elected government in the independent democracy of the United States by the way Israel not an independent democracy so are you planning or have you done asking American government it's a mammoth project but you can ask the members of the government did Israeli law be as your outline in your book was instrumental in their decision to go into war it's one question well right there once wrote if Jews would have their stake ever get their stay they would sell it so it's a you say that you are not anti-israel and you are not anti-jewish you claim but why do all anti Simmons and all anti-israel bigots are in favor of your book okay thank you thank you I'll do the second okay um I'm not sure I understood the first question but I'll give it a shot that we did talk to a number of people in Washington about this uh needless to say there is a methodological issue if you go to any politician in Washington and say did you support the war of Iraq because of pressure from a domestic special interest group you're not going to find very many people who will say out loud yes I did I thought it was a bad idea but I caved into political pressure or I was just mislead so you're not always going to find that kind of smoking gun evidence when you interview people there are a few cases where you do find it and we include those in the book but you're not going to find that many cases nonetheless I think there was considerable evidence we were able to present showing both the positions of people who were advocating for it and the effects this had on the policy-making process I think people are simply going to have to read the book and I would just emphasize by the way you don't want to just read the Iraq chapter there's lots of other cases in there that illustrate the same sorts of things that we were talking about I will let John take the second question but if you this is anything I'll come back yeah the second question had to do with why to repeat the questioners rhetoric all anti-israel bigots love our book first of all I don't know how many anti-israel bigots are out there and I don't know that they all love our book I think the good news is that there is not much anti-semitism in the United States there are not many many David dukes out there but I want to be very clear that Steve and I condemn those anti-semites and and we are troubled by the fact that they like our book but the fact is is anybody here who has written a book or an article knows you don't have any control over who likes your book or who dislikes your book but I think that it is possible that many of these anti-semites like our book not because they've been reading our book but because they have been reading the reviews of our book which misrepresent the book it's very important to understand that all sorts of reviewers of our book these are by and large people closely associated with the Israel lobby say that we are accusing Jews in America of conducting a conspiracy or a cabal now as Steve and I have made it perfectly clear we are saying no such thing but for some reason our critics keep repeating that foolish argument I can't understand why I think that these people are just having real trouble reading the book but nevertheless you could understand how someone like David Duke when he reads Abe Foxman comments on our book comes to the conclusion that we're making the sorts of arguments that David Duke loves to hear but it's very important that you go away tonight realizing that we do not make any such arguments and indeed we condemn the David dukes of the world who make those foolish arguments about conspiracies in cabal's thank you just about 15 minutes left so it's been noted elsewhere on more than one occasion that the reaction to your book comes as much not only from what you said but perhaps even more from the fact that you said it it's one of these rare occasions where someone from within the establishment is saying things that many outside the establishment have been staying all along for many years I noticed here tonight that you keep repeating that these policies are bad for the United States in Israel but you never mentioned that they're even bad are worse for Palestinians so it makes me wonder whether the doubts that are starting to creep into certain sectors of the establishment of baseball and tactical considerations than they are on moral considerations and what does it say not only about the moral turpitude of American foreign policy over the last half-century in the Middle East but of American foreign policy in general thank you I'll take a swing at that I mean John and I as he's already indicated are are thought of as realists and we're pretty comfortable talking about strategic interests that's what we were trained to do I am NOT a moral philosopher so I don't consider myself to have a seat let me finish right now that I'm so I don't consider myself to have have any enormous expertise that said I think it's clear if you read our book that we are deeply troubled by actions both by the United States and by Israel and by some of Israel's adversaries that we regard as patently immoral that we think the way the Palestinians have been treated is reprehensible we think if Israel is entitled to its own state then the Palestinians are entitled to their own state as well and they certainly don't deserve of 40 years of occupation often involving quite brutal treatment well we think that that's a policy that's indefensible for the United States to be backing and we tried to make that clear as well I'd have to think a little bit longer whether or not I wanted to sort of cast a grand moral condemnation on all of American foreign policy well I'll just say the following I think all countries including all great powers have done pretty horrible things because I think we're all flawed as human beings and the leaders of great countries make big mistakes sometimes and sometimes those mistakes are deeply immoral and Americans are not immune to that problem either so again I'm not going to say we're we're worse I think in some respects by the standards of great powers the United States has done reasonably well but we're by no means perfect can I just say a word or two because this is john mayer sherman because it's it is an excellent question as a realist i believe that sometimes moral and strategic considerations are at odds and in those cases States invariably pursue what's in their strategic interests in other words strategic interests Trump moral considerations and there are plenty of examples of that in American foreign policy over time which would be grist for your milk but what's very interesting in my opinion about this particular case and here we're talking about American policy towards Israel and the Palestinians is that it is a beautiful case where strategic imperatives and moral imperatives are aligned up it's an America strategic interest and Steve and I also believe it's an Israel strategic interests to end the occupation and create a viable Palestinian state it is also as you alluded to the morally correct thing to do both for the United States and for Israel this occupation is a strategic and moral disaster for Israel even more so for Israel than it is for the United States so this is a case yeah I was good I was going to get I was going to get that you're a hundred percent correct you're a hundred percent correct on that yes I just want to say that if I were you I wouldn't be talking about what's in Israel's interests because it sounds a bit condescending for myself I don't really care what's in an interest interest I care what's in America's interest and the thing is that why are we concerned about Iran now I mean why not just let Israel be concerned about Iran they're the one they dare claim that Iran is a threat to them why should we have any concern for that why should we have any concern for ensuring Israel's existence I don't see why that's in the United States business or why it helps the United States to ensure Israel's existence and do you favor withdrawing funding for Israel so we have more money here for own domestic needs I'll take part of that question this is Steve Walton John will take the parts I leave out and again I'm going to leave the Iran question here we in our book focused primarily on the American national interest but we talk at times about about these policies not being in Israel's interest because we recognize that many Americans do have a strong attachment Israel and as an immigrant society as John alluded to a while back many Americans have attachments to countries other countries in addition to the United States doesn't mean they're disloyal it just means that for various different reasons they also feel strongly about some other country and that's perfectly fine it's perfectly fine to manifest that kind of an attachment in politics and what we want people who are ardently attached to Israel as well as being loyal to the United States to think about is whether or not the policies that some of them have been advocating have been good for Israel all right we can make the arguments that I've been good for us but we also believe that they've not been good for Israel as well we want to plant that thought in people's minds and again make that part of the conversation as well on on the question of American support for Israel I think it ought to be conditional on Israeli politics they don't need the support nearly as much as they might once have needed it and one could argue how much it was ever ever needed but as I indicated in my remarks Israel is now a relatively prosperous country and it will be even more prosperous once it has a final peace settlement with the Palestinians and with the rest of its neighbors so it no longer I think needs the three to four billion dollars a year that it gets as a as aid from the American taxpayer and I would like to see that gradually decline you know not cut it off instantly but I would like to see it gradually decline over a period of years as part of it you know again a final peace settlement there this is John Mearsheimer with regard to the question on Iran the United States would care about Iran acquiring nuclear weapons even if there was no State of Israel and there are two reasons for that one is that we care greatly about nuclear proliferation in particular we care greatly about limiting nuclear proliferation you all remember in May 1998 when India and Pakistan tested nuclear weapons the United States effectively went bonkers we did not like this at all so the fact that we care about nuclear proliferation means that we would worry about what Iran is up to regardless of whether or not there was a State of Israel in the system secondly we would care because the Middle East or the Persian Gulf is an area of great strategic interest to the United States and the United States cares greatly about the balance of power in that region and there's one state that we worry about more than any other one and that's Iran because it is the only state in the Gulf that has the potential to become a regional hegemon and the United States does not want that to happen and if Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons and no other state and the Gulf had nuclear weapons that would matter in terms of the local balance of power so we would care anyway where Israel really comes into play on the Iranian nuclear issue is that both the State of Israel itself and large portions of the Lobby are the main driving forces behind using military force to deal with the Iranian nuclear problem this is a situation that's somewhat analogous to what we saw in the run-up to the Iraq war it's basically the same cast of characters who are pushing for going to war against Iran who were pushing for going to war against Iraq and I believe that if you could take Israeli pressure and pressure from the lobby especially the neoconservatives out of the equation there would be very little talk in the United States today about using military force against Iran and that would certainly be all for the good my name is Marcus rocky I'm from Norwood I'm naturalized American citizen and the reason I reached out for your book is that my son was in Iraq in 2003 and I and my wife spent many sleepless organizing night you know just thinking about why he could die he didn't die he's now out of military so thank you for this book gentlemen but I have one practical question I'm an engineer by the way in your conclusions you asked a fundamental question what needs to be done and I'm asking you as a citizen how should I vote because because if I have to choose between Rudy Guiliani and Norman Podhoretz and Hillary Clinton I see it's hopeless it's hopeless our country our country I don't to make a statements but our country is losing moral compass you know if we look at these atrocities which were committed you know and and and and we see what's going on tell me tell me please how should I vote thank you thank you um I let everybody know that we can use write-ins right we can use write-ins we don't have to choose candidates which are like in my previous communist countries were given to me we have writings we can write George Washington thanked Jefferson thank you the question is clear yeah I'm tempted given some of the reactions to our book to endorse the candidate I want not to win and and and hope that that that gets that particular candidate in trouble I'm actually not going to endorse a candidate I don't know if John's going to want to or not but I think if you if you if the argument of our book is basically right it's not going to matter which of the let's call a mainstream candidates wins that that American middle east policy will continue to be heavily shaped by these institutions and organizations until we get a broader range of opinion represented on the subjects and until some of these organizations get a little less influenced um or and this is what we say in the conclusion of the book we remind everybody that what we think of as the Israel lobby is a heterogeneous group of organizations they agree on wanting to maintain the special relationship but they don't agree on everything one of the big problems now is that many of the policies that the most influential and powerful organizations in the lobby are pushing are some of the more hardline and extreme ones and there are more moderate groups within the so-called Israel lobby or pro-israel community whose views are much more sensible there would be nothing wrong with having a politically influential pro-israel community in the United States if it were pushing politicians to adopt a sensible set of policies so again the problem is not the fact that there's a powerful lobby the practice that the the problem is that that powerful lobby has been pushing for a confrontational approach to most of the Middle East and against a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians if we had a Lobby that was pushing the other way I'd probably be supporting it sir hi I was at your presentation at MIT earlier this month and asked a question that you either fail to refuse answer I want to ask it again because I think it gets to the heart of the of what this discussion is actually about do you believe it is possible for somebody in good faith in good conscience who's looking at the evidence to come to a different conclusion about what US policy ought to be of course then what's the point of your book I are you asserting that the people who are who are in favor of a policy that's different from you yours are acting in bad faith no we think they're wrong but they're not acting in bad faith no listen this is America where we debate policies we debate disagreements and we see who can win debate one of our objections is that there hasn't been much of a debate on this policy in the United States because any time people try to raise this they immediately get accused of being anti-semitic all right so we haven't had much of an open discourse in the United States we don't have very many people representing the Palestinian views on the pages of the New York Times of The Washington Post all right Jimmy Carter is one example and look what happened to Jimmy Carter right Jimmy Carter gets accused of being a Jew hater all right so but we're not we do not believe our critics are acting in bad faith we think they're wrong Jimmy Carter didn't pursue the policy that you're advocating when he was president and George Bush Senior didn't pursue the policy that you're advocating when he was president and President Eisenhower didn't so what is it what is your policy so but what is your point the point is that you're claiming that this policy hasn't been pursued yet at least three presidents have tried it they've all failed actually if you look at slo-mo Ben Amis book scars of war wounds of peace he's the former Israeli foreign minister he points out that the two presidents who made the greatest contribution to Israeli Arab Peace were Jimmy Carter and George Bush the elder and he this is Ben Amin not me saying it that he says they were successful in doing this because they were willing to take on the Israel lobby so yes we agree with you if more presidents were willing to take on the Israel lobby we'd actually make more progress towards peace that's certainly what Ben Emil was arguing we're just about out of time so I think this will have to be our last question first of all I'd like a little bit of clip can you hear me we had like a little bit of clarification I don't speak Farsi or read Farsi I've read numerous translations of president I used that term advisor acumen dinner jihad of Iran in his comments about wiping Israel off the map I assume you speak Farsi and read Farsi fluently but considering the fact that his remarks came at the confluence of installing 3,000 centrifuges to produce fissionable material his Holocaust denial conference and preceding his presidency the moderate president roslin Johnny's nuclear threats against Israel as well I'm a bit puzzled by your absolute certainty that this was not an ominous and existential threat from the mad mullah of Tehran that's number one you just specify what the nuclear threats against Israel were yes I refer anybody here to Google Ross vanjani Israel and nuclear and you will find specific ominous nuclear threats that the former president of Iran made against Israel you can check it but secondly my second question my second question is and I want to be brief how do you explain the very broad trashing of your book by respected analysts from journals as diverse as the New York Times The New Yorker the New Republic and institutions like the Council on Foreign Relations which by no stretch of the imagination can be considered pro-israel or neoconservative specifically specifically specifically Walter Russell Mead in a recent review and I quote called your work remarkably slipshod handling of evidence and also Benny Morris who you rely on in your book quite substantially and his his weight his his comment was and I quote Walton Mearsheimer are outrageously incorrect historical asserted and they provide very voluminous footnotes to that if your book is so rock solid in its scholarship how do you explain these very respected critics trashing your book thank you I think yeah the art with respect to all right please please ma'am please I think the question was directed at us the with respect to ahmed akkad with respect to Achmed in a jawed statement uh you know I stand by what I said earlier it's in the book and the sources we used for the correct translation this was actually heavily debated in a number of places and I think there's actually no real disagreement about what he actually said and as I indicated I found that remark and his Holocaust denial deeply objectionable as well I already also indicated that I think it's easy to understand Iran's interest in a nuclear capability given the strategic environment that it faces and I don't think this is based on the ambition to one day launch nuclear bombs at Israel John's going to take the other question with regard to the gentleman's comments about the negative reviews of our work in the United States there's no question that the book has gotten almost universal condemnation here in the United States and the response to the article which came out in March 2006 was not much different first of all with regard to the article Steve and I wrote an 80 page response to all the criticisms that were laid out by individuals like Benny Morris who the questioner referenced in his comments and for anyone who was interested in reading our responses you can go to the website that FSG has established for our book in setting the record great is there and I believe we set up and knock down virtually all of those criticisms including Benny Morris's that's my that's wwws really avi book.com right so so we dealt with the sort of first wave of criticisms with regard to the more recent ones anybody who reads our book would predict that we would be clobbered in the United States and that we would get actually quite good reviews outside of the United States and surprise of surprises that's almost exactly what's happened we get clobbered everywhere or almost everywhere in the United States and I would say that we've gotten about eight major reviews in Britain and seven of them are very positive and one of them is so-so but nothing like the United States and where is the best the most favorable review we got where do they come from it comes from Israel itself it's written by Yuri Ofner II who's actually invited us to Israel and we plan to go there this spring it's called two nights and a dragon and you can google it and read it furthermore furthermore two of the best reviews we've gotten have been in Haaretz the New York Times of Israel Daniel levees review in Haaretz is long and very favorable MJ Rosenberg has also written the piece in Haaretz that is very favorable what's really remarkable here is that this book has been received much more favorably in Israel which is not to say that everybody in Israel agrees with it and go back to go back to a previous questioner we didn't write the book because we expected everybody to roll over and say we agree with John and Steve end of story we wrote the book to generate a discussion to generate debate and the fact that people disagree with us is fine but again to get back to the reviews what is truly remarkable here is that we get slammed at every place in the United States and we get treated very differently overseas and you of course all no the reason Bobby

Channel: GBH Forum Network

Views: 94,914

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Keywords: israel, lobbists, middle eastern conflict, John Mearsheimer, Stephen Walt

Id: rzXS3tmZrcU

Length: 81min 32sec (4892 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 13 2012