Without taking into account the many criticisms levelled at the book of Mearsheimer and Walt by pro-Israel groups inside and outside the United States, a group of the prominent moderate intellectuals in the United States has also criticized the views of Mearsheimer and Walt from another angle but not to defend the Zionist lobby.
What gives importance to this criticism is that some of them are the leftists in the United States academic circles who are staunch critics of the domineering policies of the United States. The prominent figures among them are people like Noam Chomsky, such as Joseph Massad, a professor of contemporary Arab political thought at Columbia University, and Stephan Zunes, the professor of political science at the University of San Francisco, have explained the reasons for their objections to Mearsheimer and Walt through writing articles in this regard.
According to them, Israel has done a lot to serve the interests of the United States, and for this reason, the actions and demands of the Zionist lobby in the United States are not contrary to the general policies of the United States in the world and the Middle East. They believe that the United States seeks to fulfill its strategic interests in supporting Israel. In other words, although the role of the Zionist lobby, (both Jewish and non-Jewish supporters of Israel in the United States) was very important, influential, and even decisive at that time, it seems that the strategic interests of the United States also have played a key role in the continuation of its policies regarding Israel. If Israel’s importance to Washington had been rooted solely in the financial, organizational, and political strength of its proponents in the United States, the United States support for Israel should have been dependent on the power of the Zionist lobby in the United States and have grown accordingly; whereas this has not happened.
To refute Mearsheimer and Walt’s view regarding the importance of Israel’s lobby role in shaping the United States foreign policy, Chomsky, Massad, and Zunes point to some reasons the most important of which are as follows:
1) There are groups and organizations within the Jewish community in the United States that, contrary to those who generally support Israel, oppose the continuation of the occupation, the expansion of settlements, and unconditional support of the United States of Israel.
2) There is a systematic link between the United States policy in the Middle East and its policy in other parts of the world, in the sense that the United States policy in the Middle East is not separated from the general United States foreign policy. Therefore, it cannot be based solely on the demands of the Israeli lobby. In general, the United States has a hegemonic and imperialist orientation in its foreign policy; Israel is one of the means of the fulfillment of the goals of United States foreign policy and in this regard, it is by no means an exception.
3) Israel is a strategic asset to the United States which has served the interests of the United States in the Middle East in recent decades.
4) Both the Democratic and the Republican Parties have repeatedly pursued wrong policies, contrary to the long-term interests of the United States; while those policies had nothing to do with the influence of the Zionist lobby.
5) The United States government has always been able to withstand the pressure exerted by various lobbies and regulate its policy independently. For example, selling advanced weapons to Saudi Arabia (which the Israel lobby opposes) and the establishment of diplomatic relations with China (contrary to the interest of Taiwan’s lobby) in the 1970s are among such measures.
6) Congress does not play a central and decisive role in formulating foreign policy. Therefore, the influence of the Israeli lobby in Congress cannot have much effect on the foreign policy of the United States.
7) All the pro-Israel views of the United States House of Representatives do not stem from the Zionist lobby’s financial assistance to the electoral campaigns of the representatives; rather, in some cases, such views are rooted in the extremist liberalist orientations of those who, as an American, try to feel the same as the Israelis and favour the establishment of Israel.
Accordingly, people who favour the views of Chomsky believe that the burden of the failure of United States foreign policy in the Middle East cannot be placed solely on the Israeli lobby. In their view, even without the Israel lobby, it was highly unlikely that the United States would respect human rights and international law in its foreign policy. They also point to other powerful groups, (such as oil companies and the arms industry), and argue that their ideological influence on United States foreign policy in the Middle East is certainly not less than the Israeli lobby.
For them, the Israel lobby in the United States has gained power precisely because Israel is aligned with the interests of the United States around the world. In other words, if a totally leftist and anti-imperial government had run Israel the mere Israeli lobby would not have been able to strengthen the United States-Israel relations. Hence, the high level of influence which the lobby has in the United States legislative and executive systems is originated from Israel’s importance which originated from supporting American interests, not vice versa.
Conclusion
In short, the Israeli lobby plays a very important role in influencing the orientation of the foreign policy of the United States in the Middle East. Of course, one should not neglect the fact that the Zionist regime inherently possesses a strategically superior place in the view of the United States, and that the United States needs Israel’s help to secure its interests in the Middle East. In addition to Israel’s strategic interests for the United States in the Middle East (in the pre- and post-World War II periods) a set of factors, regardless of the role of pro-Israel lobbying in the United States, also have played a role in the establishment of strategic relations between the two countries. The dependence of the United States on oil, the issue of terrorism, dealing with Iran and Iraq, and the common claim in the United States that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, have played a role in strengthening the foundations of strategic relations between the two countries.
The pro-Israel lobby in the United States (both Jewish and non-Jewish) has played a key role in strengthening and perpetuating these relations. The elements of this lobby introduce themselves as the citizens who need an organization and try to achieve their goals and ideals. In addition, the setting within the United States made it possible for them to use the tools and levers of a democratic system to promote and implement their views. In general, it can be concluded that a combination of the views of the Mearsheimer and Walt and their critics’ (including Chomsky, Zunes and Massad) would provide us with the best view regarding the position of the Israeli lobby in the United States.
On the other hand, based on Mearsheimer, the role and influence of the Zionist lobby in the United States legislative and executive structure are undeniable and, without a doubt, it has more power than any other ethnic minority in the United States. However, as critics state, overemphasizing the power of lobby fulfills the desires and ideals of its advocators; that is to say, the public opinion will submit to this notion that the Israeli lobby is the main actor in the political arena of the United States and can do whatever it wants hence any opposition to it is futile and doomed to failure. Furthermore, overemphasizing the role of the lobby can also become an excuse for American officials to justify all the shortcomings and mistakes of their policies in the Middle East by projecting and attributing them to the lobby’s influence.
The relationship between the role of the Zionist lobby and the link between the United States and Israel is a complex one such that one cannot properly realize which takes precedence or priority over the other. But it is important to note that the Zionist lobby seeks to influence the foreign policy of the United States (in general) and the policy of the Middle East in the United States (in particular), and has made this goal quite public. The Zionist lobby seeks to make United States-Israel relations closer and stronger. At the same time, the warm relations between the United States and Israel – which are rooted in past historical events, especially in the history of the twentieth century- provides more room for lobbying.
Theoretically, the closer the relationship between country A and country B is, the greater the power the pro-B lobby would have with respect to A. On the other hand, the more difficult the relationship between country A and country C would become and the more hostile B would be to C, the more power of influence the pro-B lobby would have on A against C. But the better relationship A and C have, the less influence the pro-B lobby would have on C.
Thus, it can be said that Israel’s high lobbying power in the United States is primarily a product of the close ties between the United States and Israel. Also, because some of the Zionist enemy countries do not have close ties with the United States, the Israeli lobby has been able to direct United States foreign policy against these countries. The Islamic Republic of Iran or the elected government of the Palestinian people (Hamas) are examples of this phenomenon. On the contrary, although some Muslim countries which have close ties with the United States (such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Turkey) in some cases have taken an objective stance against the Zionist regime, Israel’s lobbying influence on them has been much more limited. Of course, some of the Islamic countries also sought to develop relationships with the United States and the Zionist regime simultaneously to prevent facing the consequences of the influence of the Israeli lobby in the United States; These countries include Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, Qatar, the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the Republic of Azerbaijan.
It is certain that Israel will probably be able to continue its relationship with the United States even without a lobby, but despite the existence of a strong Zionist lobby, the United States will certainly face many difficulties in achieving a balanced Middle East policy.
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