Let's talk methodological flaws while we're at it. Dershowitz points this out as well. The historian in me cringes at a purportedly scholarly piece of writing taken almost entirely from newspaper articles. I understand documents on the decision making process that led to the Iraq War are probably hard to get ones hands on (not so much the case for documents dealing with our relationship with Israel in past decades though). Nevertheless, many VERY in depth accounts of the decision making process that led to the war, based on original research, have been written - to take just two examples of such authors, Bob Woodward and George Packer. I don't know if M&W even bothered to try and get interviews or to try and see if there were any declassified documents to get their hands on, but I tend to doubt it. They figured there was a hell of a paper to be written from their offices in Chicago and Cambridge using little more than a Lexis-Nexis search, and as Dershowitz pointed out - that can easily lead to silly factual/historical errors.

I could address whether there is a moral case for our support of Israel (I think there is) but I'll focus first on the question of whether Israel is a strategic burden or not. M&W put forth a number of arguments as to why Israel is a strategic burden. (As Dan pointed out earlier, they never consider the benefits of Israel as an ally, therefore making it impossible to determine if Israel is a NET strategic burden or not)

1) "The first Gulf War revealed the extent to which Israel was becoming a strategic burden. The US could not use Israeli bases without rupturing the anti-Iraq coalition, and had to divert resources (e.g. Patriot missile batteries) to prevent Tel Aviv doing anything that might harm the alliance against Saddam Hussein."

It seems to me this is more indicative of how these Arab neighbors are a burden. The fact that we have to make nice with these thug dictators says nothing about what Israel has to offer on its own. They don't explain why Israel shouldn't be an American ally due to a conflict in interests, but rather that our alliance with Israel causes us problems elsewhere. I don't find that reason enough to drop Israel - to do that I would need them to explain to me, independent of outside factors, why Israel is a strategic burden. (As Dan also asked, why doesn't the lobby try to ween us off oil, the one thing forcing us to look the other way everytime these thugs do something we find distasteful or that could threaten Israel?)

On a side note, if we're talking the contributions Arab governments made in terms of military support in Gulf I, I'd personally rather have the far more professional and effective IDF fighting with me than the Syrians, Egyptians or Saudis.

2) "More important, saying that Israel and the US are united by a shared terrorist threat has the causal relationship backwards: the US has a terrorism problem in good part because it is so closely allied with Israel, not the other way around. Support for Israel is not the only source of anti-American terrorism, but it is an important one, and it makes winning the war on terror more difficult."

Actually, many would argue that's not much of a reason at all, including Osama bin Laden who has made clear that it is the presence of American troops on the Arabian peninsula that is driving America's terrorism problem. Prof. Mearsheimer's colleague, Robert Pape, has also argued that, if support for Israel was much of a driving motivation for suicide terrorism against America, you would expect to see the most attacks on US interests coming from Hamas and/or major attacks by al Qaeda on Israeli interests. You don't see either of those. M&W could still be right, but they spend so little time laying out their arguments for why Israel is a strategic burden and far too much time detailing which columnist and which assistant secretary of defense is a member of the "lobby."

3) "Iran’s nuclear ambitions do not pose a direct threat to the US. If Washington could live with a nuclear Soviet Union, a nuclear China or even a nuclear North Korea, it can live with a nuclear Iran. And that is why the Lobby must keep up constant pressure on politicians to confront Tehran."

Note that one sentence starting with "If" and ending with "Iran" is their entire argument on this point. Whether the US could tolerate a nuclear Iran is a contentious issue, on which you could write a book. To sum it up in this throw-away sentence makes a mockery of the whole issue. Like I said above, more time elucidating their arguments like these, less time naming names on who is a member of the "lobby" and who isn't.

On a side note, many have pointed out the the two leading "realists" in the field of IR suddenly managed to find the one issue in all of IR that is explained first and foremost by domestic politics rather than the structure of the international system. Rest assured, M&W aren't leaving realism. Note how they bunch the Soviet Union, China, North Korea and Iran together in a nuclear club, of which none of the members vary at all in implications for US security. No internal or external (other than the structure of the system) factors specific to any one of those countries allows for any variation at all in how the US should deal with these states.

4) "A final reason to question Israel’s strategic value is that it does not behave like a loyal ally. Israeli officials frequently ignore US requests and renege on promises (including pledges to stop building settlements and to refrain from ‘targeted assassinations’ of Palestinian leaders)."

Israel is an ally, not our lap dog. We weren't overly thrilled when Britain attacked Argentina over the Falklands or when France and Britain tried to start a war over the Suez, but we were bright enough to realize that things like this were going to happen, b/c even the interests of your closest allies don't always coincide with yours. There's plenty of things we wish our European partners would do and wouldn't do. Heck, by M&W's logic, France and Germany are also "strategic burdens" for not behaving like a "loyal ally."

Also, to argue that Israel is not allowed to pursue its counterterrorist policy of targeted assassinations (regardless of whether you think its effective or not) when the US is doing the exact same thing to al any Qaeda leaders we find is downright hypocritical. Israel has had a terrorism problem far longer than we have. We can't just barge in, insist everything is to be done "our way" and act shocked when Israel disagrees with that course of action.

5) "Israel is hardly the only country that spies on the US, but its willingness to spy on its principal patron casts further doubt on its strategic value."

This is entirely irrelevant. We spy on every one of our allies in some way, shape or form - and they do the same to us. Go back to Feb/March 2003 when we were trying to get the second resolution passed in the Security Council to authorize war in Iraq. The Observer broke a story about how the US was spying on the UN delegation of the Security Council members to find out ahead of time how they were going to vote. The reaction from those countries was overwhelmingly one of indifference because they knew they'd done the same thing to us many times before.

Like I said before, I think there's also a strong moral case to be made for support for Israel - not that Israel is perfect, but that it is far and away morally superior to its neighbors. M&W actually (unwittingly) recognize this. When they lament that there is no debate on the issue in the US, they cite the far more robust debate that takes place in Israel itself. By recognizing this M&W implicitly recognize the key feature that makes Israel morally superior to its neighbors: its ability to engage in domestic debate and have that debate affect government policy when they recognize that they have been wrong on an issue. This debate drove a number of governments back to the negotiating table in the 1990s, caused a great deal of change in the treatment of Arab Israelis over the years and played a major role in the eventual withdrawal from Gaza last year and the formation of Kadima. Therefore, despite insisting that Israel is, at best, the moral equal of its neighbors, M&W recognize otherwise elsewhere in their paper.

- if the friendship with Israel has been such a strategic liability to the U.S., then why has Europe borne the brunt of the post-second intifada terrorist attacks?

This seems sort of obvious to me. America has significantly better integration of its minority populations -- especially muslims. There are no disgruntled foot-soldiers waiting to be recruited. This seems like the most plausible reason for the difference in attacks vs. opinion polls ranking in the muslim world (of US vs. Europe).

Quack, quack, quack.

I'd like to discuss the MW paper as a continuation of the meme popularized by Thomas Frank's "What's the Matter with Kansas?" which goes

(A) "Progressive" policies are obviuosly the best possible ones

(B) Progressive policies do not have strong support in the nation as a whole

(C) Since people are not supporting obviuosly superior policies they must have been hoodwinked, bamboozled, and manipulated into doing so.

From a top level perspective both the Frank book and the MW paper look an awful lot alike.

In 1986, I attended an AIPAC conference at the request of a friend. I was surprised to meet several students there from Brigham Young University. My comment at the time, "I had no idea there were this many Jews in Idaho." I came to learn that the Mormons supported AIPAC because of their belief that the Messiah will not return unless the Jews are in Israel. In the years since, I have come to understand that this view is held by many evangelical and fundamentalist Christian groups and have been quite uncomfortable with the alliances forged between the Jewish pro-Israel lobby and the Christian pro-Israel lobby. How does the rise in power of these special interest groups affect the pro-Israel lobby?

In May 2004, the Village Voice reported "The e-mailed meeting summary reveals NSC Near East and North African Affairs director Elliott Abrams sitting down with the Apostolic Congress and massaging their theological concerns. Claiming to be "the Christian Voice in the Nation's Capital," the members vociferously oppose the idea of a Palestinian state. They fear an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza might enable just that, and they object on the grounds that all of Old Testament Israel belongs to the Jews. Until Israel is intact and Solomon's temple rebuilt, they believe, Christ won't come back to earth."

Kathleen Christison, a former CIA political analyst and the author of Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy states, "Whether the Bush administration is reflecting the views of the Christian right or responding to them is difficult to say, but some Mideast analysts are convinced they are seeing their effect played out in U.S. support for Sharon’s hard-line policies. “I think in general it’s safe to say Christian fundamentalism has an influence on the administration and specifically with regard to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

This is no longer just a Jewish lobbby.

SPergman - Minor quibble: When you said "Idaho" in your first paragraph, you were thinking of Utah, right?

More seriously, has anybody investigated the influence of ZOG on US support for Taiwan? Wouldn't it be very much in our national interest to back off and let the PRC do as they like with Taiwan, in the hope of thereby bribing the PRC to like us more?

And how does continued Taiwanese independence serve the Jews' interests? The more you think about it, the more alarming it becomes: What is their motivation there? Could it be that one of the blue stripes on the Israeli flag actually represents the Pacific Ocean? The Jews and the Chinamen are both very clever at playing violins. Is that what's behind it?

P. Froward,
Areas of Idaho, Arizona, Nevada and California are parts of "Zion". Brigham's boys had colonies all over the place.

The more I think about it, the more M/W's strategic logic doesn't hold up -- if the friendship with Israel has been such a strategic liability to the U.S., then why has Europe borne the brunt of the post-second intifada terrorist attacks?

Most (if not all, except maybe the Turkish synagogue bombings) of these attacks have not been launched explicitly to "punish" Europe for what's going on in Israel/Palestine. They seem to be manifestations of the Roy/Kepel dynamic of alienated Muslims from the margins of European society lashing out against their perceived aggrievors. Distaste towards Western policy might be a contributing factor towards their rage, but the post-2k attacks seem to arise from rather specific, local grievances -- hence, that's why they're perpetrated close to home, not in the US.

The power of the Israel lobby is something that deserves a full and fearless airing, but this paper could make such an airing less, not more likely.(Goldberg)

[M/W's] choice will either promote or forestall a policy debate.

I'm sorry, but I find it absurd to be placing blame for the failure to launch a debate at M/W's feet here.

At least in the press and the dominant chattering culture, the paper has been viewed primarily through the lens of "it's anti-Semitic, because David Duke likes it."

The M/W paper takes this subject much more seriously than 98% of those who have weighed in on it. You can call their paper cockeyed and overwrought, fine, but it's absurd to be blaming them for not writing a paper that tip toes around this subject, especially when you consider the disgraceful reaction it has received on the whole.

Treating the paper as something less than it is is like having a crazy racist uncle blather at a family gathering and to keep decorum the others try to glean some kernels of his comments and recast them in a way to allow them to ignore the nasty parts.

The paper is nothing new in content. There's always been these debates. What's new is the wild, wholesale adoption of classic anti-semitic themes of control, Jews cause wars, and quashing dissent.

Trying to recast the debate as if it's only about "AIPAC likudniks" is ridiculous. Did anyone read the paper? It's breadth is galling.

And the response of labelling as anti-semitic as censorship is self-serving. Look, if a paper mentions Protocols might one think the authors have that on their mind?

Factually it is ridiculous too. Osama, France, on and on. Noticeably absent in the paper is the possibility of Palestinian instrumentality in the failures in negotiation. Also missing are Oslo and Clinton plans. As with most post-Arafat lefty/righty papers Arafat is almost absent totally.

But the biggest mistake in my view is about the amount of aid that "goes" to Israel. No, most of it "goes" to The Lobby that is the biggest. So big I'll type it THE LOBBY.

Who is THE LOBBY?

Ike warned you about it.

How can a serious paper about a lobby ignore the interplay of others?

If it looks like a duck, talks like a duck, and acts like a duck - it's a duck. Trying to refine something else from it is a wasted procedure.

Evidence #1 - the matter of Israeli aid can be discussed in all manner of ways, and is. Why continue to defend Mearsheimer's paper?

Dan, there is another way to look at the "conceptual" weakness of the M/W paper.

M/W assume that the strategic and moral interests of the US exist in some Plato-like essence -- a pure, abstract truth outside and above any democratic process of debate, which of course includes interest-group advocacy, i.e., lobbying.

That M/W seem sure they know what these interests are, and that the many who are humbler do not, is an annoying bit of misguided arrogance.

Much worse, however, this conceptual mistake is anti-democratic. Amrican voters, not M/W all by themselves, get to decide what American interests are. If Americans objected to US support for Israel, they could and would vote or march its advocates out of office. Civil rights, Vietnam -- popular opposition to entrenched bureaucratic and political interest groups does occur and does succeed in bringing change. Even when there is a "lobby."

Probably best to ignore the responses of a spittle-flecked nature…

It is quite right to say that American voters should have the final say on American interests vis a vis Israel and what level of support should be provided to it. However, one of the points that M/W make, convincingly I believe, is that “the lobby” (N.B. “L” capitalized by the LRB, not M/W) with bullying and intimidation tactics has had a part in limiting the scope and objectivity of US MSM media coverage of the I/P conflict meaning that American voters haven’t been able to form a view on the issues involved based on what could be considered informed consent. To do so, sadly, Americans would do better to turn to newspapers like UK papers such as the FT or an Israeli paper like Ha’ aretz rather than any major US paper. (US television news is hardly worth mentioning.) They would find the contrast in the range of exchange of views and ideas on offer staggering.

Whatever criticisms one might have of the M/W paper (better considered a polemic than an academic paper?), it done has done Americans a service by sparking a debate about a topic that has far too long been taboo in the US in the media, politics and academia to the detriment of the interests of the US and Israel alike (not to mention the long-suffering Palestinians).

I don't blame Dan for being disappointed with the discussion generated by his last post on this subject.

I was myself disappointed by the Walt/Mearsheimer essay, which addressed what I have long considered a serious problem with American foreign policy and badly mischaracterized it. No one who has worked in Washington at any time during the last 20 years could possibly miss the fact that AIPAC and the other groups and individuals with a deep emotional commitment to the Jewish state have been and remain very influential, sustaining American aid levels to Israel during a period when US aid to nearly all other recipients has been allowed to decline and undermining in Congress the very sensible objections by successive administrations of both parties to Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, settlements that served no conceivable American interest and stirred up difficulties for Israel as unnecessary as they were predictable.

Perhaps it is the case that the long American history of being unthreatened by events overseas has led Americans to have only vague or sentimental ideas as to their own country's interests. To fill the vacuum some of them have adopted passionate advocacy of other people's causes -- and settlements in the occupied territories are surely that. From the standpoint of American interests there is little good to be said about this.

With that said, in politics any idea or position will be judged not just on its own merits but also in relation to its enemies. Americans used to fairly literal uses of language have long assumed that Arab rhetoric about destroying Israel (or "the Zionist entity" as the charming phrase goes) means exactly what it says -- and the existence of Israel, as opposed to the policies of the Israeli government, is not controversial in the United States. It hasn't been for decades, and it isn't going to be anytime soon.

One can certainly make convincing cases -- I find them convincing, anyway -- that Arab rhetoric is not always what it seems, that the hard core of Jew-haters and terrorism sympathizers in the countries surrounding Israel can be separated from other Arabs given a certain amount of commitment and skill, and so forth. Such arguments may be right or wrong (they may even be right at some times and wrong at others), but it is asking a lot of the American public, or even Congress, to follow the tangled thread of Arab language and politics that far.

It isn't necessary to ascribe vast powers to what Walt and Mearsheimer call the Israel Lobby to understand how it easily succeeds in arousing sympathy for the Jewish state against people calling for Israel's destruction. Those Americans most committed to supporting the Israeli government, or even the agenda of just one Israeli political party, would have to be idiots not to prosper in such an environment.

It might be worth considering the one Arab who came closest to undermining Israel's exclusive claim to American public sympathy and support in the Mideast. This, of course, was Anwar Sadat. Oddly enough, it was also Anwar Sadat who inflicted the most damaging blows to the Jewish state since the orginal war for independence, and who came far closer to threatening Israel's existence than any of the Arab terrorist leaders. Sadat made plain to Americans what his key objective was -- he wanted Egypt's land back, as part of a peace Egypt could agree to rather than one forced upon it. Americans have no difficulty understanding a limited, tangible agenda like that, and accorded a respect to Sadat they have never felt for any other Arab leader.

Right now Americans are being asked to accept and understand an elected Palestinian government that will neither recognize Israel's right to exist nor suppress suicide terrorism from its own people, but which nonetheless wants granted to it statehood. Sadat was ostracized by other Arab governments and eventually murdered by Islamists; Hamas has sympathy throughout the Arab world.

That is the context in which the current influence of the Israeli lobby needs to be seen. The Israeli government and its friends in this country have studied American politics carefully; they have learned what works. What works is often no more complicated than justifying everything Israel wants to do as a step to oppose what Arab leaders say they want to do.

Actually, many would argue that's not much of a reason at all, including Osama bin Laden who has made clear that it is the presence of American troops on the Arabian peninsula that is driving America's terrorism problem. Prof. Mearsheimer's colleague, Robert Pape, has also argued that, if support for Israel was much of a driving motivation for suicide terrorism against America, you would expect to see the most attacks on US interests coming from Hamas and/or major attacks by al Qaeda on Israeli interests. You don't see either of those.

[can anyone tell me how to italicize in the comments box?]

Anonymous, I agreed with much of your other posted rebuttals, but I take issue with this one. Yes, US troop presence in Saudi Arabia was one of Osama's complaints. But we have removed those troops from Saudi Arabia--or at least, we were supposed to remove them--yet that has not placated Al Qaeda's militancy.

Robert Pape's argument that Hamas not attacking the US and Al Qaeda not attacking Israel demonstrates nothing. To attribute the absence of action to a particular cause is risky, like saying because I didn't go to the restaurant I must not be hungry. Alternative explanations abound, but I think one can be certain that Hamas takes issue with the US providing Israel with more 1 billion in aid, military technology that Israel uses to kill Hamas members, and US vetoes of UN Security resolutions renouncing Israeli actions.

Surveys have revealed that Arab Muslims have a strong dislike for the US as a result of its military intervention in the region, its two-sidedness in democracy promotion, and its support for Israel, to the neglect of legitimate Palestinian rights. The resentment of US support plays quite well to ambitions of the Islamist groups. Al Qaeda allegedly uses montages of Israeli aggression and Palestinian suffering in its promotional videos. And to take the words right from the horse's mouth:

Offering a lengthy explanation of why he hates Americans, Moussaoui criticized the United States' support for Israel. He said Muslims have been at war with Christians and Jews for centuries. Israel, he said, is "just a missing star in the American flag."

Actually, many would argue that's not much of a reason at all, including Osama bin Laden who has made clear that it is the presence of American troops on the Arabian peninsula that is driving America's terrorism problem. Prof. Mearsheimer's colleague, Robert Pape, has also argued that, if support for Israel was much of a driving motivation for suicide terrorism against America, you would expect to see the most attacks on US interests coming from Hamas and/or major attacks by al Qaeda on Israeli interests. You don't see either of those.

[can anyone tell me how to italicize in the comments box?]

Anonymous, I agreed with much of your other posted rebuttals, but I take issue with this one. Yes, US troop presence in Saudi Arabia was one of Osama's complaints. But we have removed those troops from Saudi Arabia--or at least, we were supposed to remove them--yet that has not placated Al Qaeda's militancy.

Robert Pape's argument that Hamas not attacking the US and Al Qaeda not attacking Israel demonstrates nothing. To attribute the absence of action to a particular cause is risky, like saying because I didn't go to the restaurant I must not be hungry. Alternative explanations abound, but I think one can be certain that Hamas takes issue with the US providing Israel with more 1 billion in aid, military technology that Israel uses to kill Hamas members, and US vetoes of UN Security resolutions renouncing Israeli actions.

Surveys have revealed that Arab Muslims have a strong dislike for the US as a result of its military intervention in the region, its two-sidedness in democracy promotion, and its support for Israel, to the neglect of legitimate Palestinian rights. The resentment of US support plays quite well to ambitions of the Islamist groups. Al Qaeda allegedly uses montages of Israeli aggression and Palestinian suffering in its promotional videos. And to take the words right from the horse's mouth:

Offering a lengthy explanation of why he hates Americans, Moussaoui criticized the United States' support for Israel. He said Muslims have been at war with Christians and Jews for centuries. Israel, he said, is "just a missing star in the American flag."

Actually, many would argue that's not much of a reason at all, including Osama bin Laden who has made clear that it is the presence of American troops on the Arabian peninsula that is driving America's terrorism problem. Prof. Mearsheimer's colleague, Robert Pape, has also argued that, if support for Israel was much of a driving motivation for suicide terrorism against America, you would expect to see the most attacks on US interests coming from Hamas and/or major attacks by al Qaeda on Israeli interests. You don't see either of those.

[can anyone tell me how to italicize in the comments box?]

Anonymous, I agreed with much of your other posted rebuttals, but I take issue with this one. Yes, US troop presence in Saudi Arabia was one of Osama's complaints. But we have removed those troops from Saudi Arabia--or at least, we were supposed to remove them--yet that has not placated Al Qaeda's militancy.

Robert Pape's argument that Hamas not attacking the US and Al Qaeda not attacking Israel demonstrates nothing. To attribute the absence of action to a particular cause is risky, like saying because I didn't go to the restaurant I must not be hungry. Alternative explanations abound, but I think one can be certain that Hamas takes issue with the US providing Israel with more 1 billion in aid, military technology that Israel uses to kill Hamas members, and US vetoes of UN Security resolutions renouncing Israeli actions.

Surveys have revealed that Arab Muslims have a strong dislike for the US as a result of its military intervention in the region, its two-sidedness in democracy promotion, and its support for Israel, to the neglect of legitimate Palestinian rights. The resentment of US support plays quite well to ambitions of the Islamist groups. Al Qaeda allegedly uses montages of Israeli aggression and Palestinian suffering in its promotional videos. And to take the words right from the horse's mouth:

Offering a lengthy explanation of why he hates Americans, Moussaoui criticized the United States' support for Israel. He said Muslims have been at war with Christians and Jews for centuries. Israel, he said, is "just a missing star in the American flag."

Actually, many would argue that's not much of a reason at all, including Osama bin Laden who has made clear that it is the presence of American troops on the Arabian peninsula that is driving America's terrorism problem. Prof. Mearsheimer's colleague, Robert Pape, has also argued that, if support for Israel was much of a driving motivation for suicide terrorism against America, you would expect to see the most attacks on US interests coming from Hamas and/or major attacks by al Qaeda on Israeli interests. You don't see either of those.

[can anyone tell me how to italicize in the comments box?]

Anonymous, I agreed with much of your other posted rebuttals, but I take issue with this one. Yes, US troop presence in Saudi Arabia was one of Osama's complaints. But we have removed those troops from Saudi Arabia--or at least, we were supposed to remove them--yet that has not placated Al Qaeda's militancy.

Robert Pape's argument that Hamas not attacking the US and Al Qaeda not attacking Israel demonstrates nothing. To attribute the absence of action to a particular cause is risky, like saying because I didn't go to the restaurant I must not be hungry. Alternative explanations abound, but I think one can be certain that Hamas takes issue with the US providing Israel with more 1 billion in aid, military technology that Israel uses to kill Hamas members, and US vetoes of UN Security resolutions renouncing Israeli actions.

Surveys have revealed that Arab Muslims have a strong dislike for the US as a result of its military intervention in the region, its two-sidedness in democracy promotion, and its support for Israel, to the neglect of legitimate Palestinian rights. The resentment of US support plays quite well to ambitions of the Islamist groups. Al Qaeda allegedly uses montages of Israeli aggression and Palestinian suffering in its promotional videos. And to take the words right from the horse's mouth:

Offering a lengthy explanation of why he hates Americans, Moussaoui criticized the United States' support for Israel. He said Muslims have been at war with Christians and Jews for centuries. Israel, he said, is "just a missing star in the American flag."

How do I put quotes in italics?

<i>your comment here </i>

Yes, US troop presence in Saudi Arabia was one of Osama's complaints. But we have removed those troops from Saudi Arabia--or at least, we were supposed to remove them--yet that has not placated Al Qaeda's militancy.

Would you be placated if you were running al Qaeda?

On the one hand, we've mostly vacated saudi arabia.

On the other hand, we've invaded iraq and afghanistan and we're actively trying to kill or capture every al Qaeda member.

"Oh, thosed despicable al Qaeda! They're never satisfied!" [grin]

There was a report on NPR this morning:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5353855

if the friendship with Israel has been such a strategic liability to the U.S., then why has Europe borne the brunt of the post-second intifada terrorist attacks?

"This seems sort of obvious to me. America has significantly better integration of its minority populations -- especially muslims. There are no disgruntled foot-soldiers waiting to be recruited."

Eh????? Jor, you sound truly clueless here. First of all, the original poster's premise is false-- most attacks *have* been directed against the US *and our allies*. The 9/11 super-attack was the most obvious, but attacks in other countries have very much been shots against us or the nations that have allied with us in Iraq.

As for the European countries that *have* been attacked, you need to learn to use an ounce of critical thinking before stumbling like a drooling drunkard into an argument. Did you bother to even think about what those European countries are? 1. Spain, at a time when it was allied with the US in Iraq (seen as an imperialist venture by al-Qaida), and was also seen as being vulnerable and easy to push out of the Coalition, and 2. Great Britain, also allied with us and another place where the Iraq War is very unpopular with the people. Other targets have usually been Muslim countries themselves especially Saudi Arabia (the hardest hit), where al-Qaida's chief objective-- the overthrow of the Saudi royal family-- is based.

In some tape put out by Ayman al-Zawahiri after the Madrid and London bombings, it becomes clear that al-Qaida has been seeking to target the US's vulnerable and weaker European allies in Iraq, while refraining from an attack on the US for now, since we're being pummeled in Iraq and our cumulative losses there are far more than could be perpetrated by an attack on US soil itself. Thus, the greater targeting of Europe after the 2nd intifada is in fact very selective targeting, of countries that had joined with us in the Iraq campaign.

As for the "better integration" of Muslims in the US myth, remember that Europe has a more direct colonial history in Muslim countries and more geographical proximity, with a large number of very poor, unskilled and frustrated young Muslims like the North Africans in France, who came over when France opened up the gates to allow in lots of cheap labor. The US has tended to receive a more educated class of Muslim immigrants (though not invariably-- plenty of poor Arabs, Afghans, Bangladeshis and others here as well).

And FWIW, I would strongly contest your claim that Muslims here *are* better integrated into US society than European. We haven't had major riots yet (they're a smaller proportion of the US population), but we've had a number of arrests of Muslim immigrants in the US suspected of plotting attacks. John Allen Muhammad went on his shooting spree in the DC area in part out of his sympathy for the 9/11 attacks after he had converted to a radical quasi-Muslim sect. There was that sleeper cell outside of Buffalo, the more recent arrests of 3 US Muslim citizens. So I'd say, actually, there are quite a few very unassimilated US Muslims just as in Europe who don't like us much.

you need to learn to use an ounce of critical thinking before stumbling like a drooling drunkard into an argument.

how ridiculous. if you want to get your point across, i don't think you need to resort to insults.

sorry for posting three times. i obviously have much to learn about this process.

How can a serious paper about a lobby ignore the interplay of others?

Because the world is wide and not all of it can be described in an 83 page paper. M&W actually say they are going to describe a phenomenon, the Israeli Lobby (capital or not, scare quotes are not, that is what they are describing) and then do it. Not all social science -- pace our host, is comparative. Or better put, natural history -- the description of phenomena-- is the precursor to science. What M&W have done is a natural history of a very effective lobby that is sui generis for all the reasons they explain -- intensity, the variety of groups performing a variety of functions, etc. They describe -- and clearly state they are going to describe--how that lobby affects US foreign policy, to the point where US policies are *internally* inconsistent where Israel is concerned.

I wrote (for one):

"How can a serious paper about a lobby ignore the interplay of others?"

Mitchell Young responds:

"Because the world is wide and not all of it can be described in an 83 page paper."

Look at the paper. He attributes a large part of the power of The Lobby as shown by the billions of military aid. Who gets that money? Our military-industrial complex. Why is not the power of this not small lobby considered in the calculation? We give 1.5 billion per year to the Egyptians for the same purpose. Ergo, is the best answer to the question of military aid to Israel the MIC? Or is there an Egyptian lobby here? If we donate a lot of food to Haiti do we consider only the power of the Haitian lobby and not the farm lobby? To not consider it is disingenous. The least M/W could have done was lump the MIC into the broad Lobby. They put George Will into it.

"M&W actually say they are going to describe a phenomenon, the Israeli Lobby (capital or not, scare quotes are not, that is what they are describing) and then do it."

OK. I'm disputing they do it well. In fact it's awful. And it has an anti-semitic tone and is monomaniacal.

"Not all social science -- pace our host, is comparative."

M/W is very comparative. The power, control, etc. of The Lobby compared to others is a prominent theme of the paper.

"Or better put, natural history -- the description of phenomena-- is the precursor to science."

No, they try to explain the phenomenon. Vigorously. It's not a mere description, or question.

What M&W have done is a natural history of a very effective lobby that is sui generis for all the reasons they explain -- intensity, the variety of groups performing a variety of functions, etc.

OK. Is it good natural history? My opinion - no.

"They describe -- and clearly state they are going to describe--how that lobby affects US foreign policy, to the point where US policies are *internally* inconsistent where Israel is concerned"

And they did a poor job of it. There is such an overreaction in defense of M/W regarding the content of the paper as if it can't be touched. The approach is recast as to the effect of "this is a good starting point to discuss these issues" and the corollary being "criticism of the content is stifling dissent" or similar.

The "consistent" internal economic interests of the United States is if Israel and Egypt enter periodic wars, destroy most of their American equipment, we force a temporary peace and buy both sides off with arms sales subsidized by US tax dollars.

Not for the American Citizenry of course, but for THE LOBBY.

Elephant Man,

I'm not necessarily agreeing with Pape that support for Israel is not the motivating factor behind al Qaeda's attacks. Nevertheless, his argument is not really like your restaurant analogy. If you don't go to the restaurant you'll probably get food elsewhere. Hamas doesn't attack in the US, but it doesn't attack us elsewhere either.

In any case, we can have a long debate about this. My point was simply that you can argue it the other way too. Mearsheimer and Walt give about a sentence each to the various reasons why they think Israel is a strategic burden. Then they spend pages listing names of who is in "The Lobby." That's probably the single sloppiest part of this paper out of many contenders. The sentence they give to it makes a mockery of the arguments, all of which have many points and counterpoints to them.

As for the US having pulled out of Saudi, that's not what Osama said - his problem is US presence in the entire Arabian peninsula, which he sees as being the homeland of the Holy places, not the Western-created state of Saudi Arabia. That's what someone would answer to your point, at least (not that you have to accept it or think it's a good response).

You ever hear of "Strategic Ambiguity"? That's Israel's nuclear policy. Is this any different than what Iran is pursuing? Let's focus on the two most important issues in this examination of US-Israeli policy: The US's hypocritical stance vis a vis Israel regarding Israe'ls nuclear capability and that of the rest of the ME. And the second most important issue of Israel's settling of the Occupied Territories angainst international law and against US policy.

We won't hear much about this. And this is a source of a lot of rage in the ME.

And enough of this talk about how Osama was SO concerned about the US infidels in Saudi Arabia. Every speech coming from the Islamic world has the US and Israel inextricably bound with one another. Osama right after 9/11:

“I say to you, Allah knows that it had never occurred to us to strike the towers. But after it became unbearable and we witnessed the oppression and tyranny of the American/Israeli coalition against our people in Palestine and Lebanon, it came to my mind.”

It sickens me to think that I'm held complicit in the crimes of Israel because I'm American.

There is certainly no simple solution regarding the ME but we can start with confronting Israel on nuclear weapons and their defiance of the US and the world community regarding their settlement policy.

Frank,

Did you bother to even think about what those European countries are? 1. Spain, at a time when it was allied with the US in Iraq (seen as an imperialist venture by al-Qaida), and was also seen as being vulnerable and easy to push out of the Coalition, and 2. Great Britain, also allied with us and another place where the Iraq War is very unpopular with the people.

They are getting attacked because they are our allies.

So is the argument that Israel causes terrorism against us, and by extension we cause terrorism against our allies?

What about their allies? France was supporting and protecting Syria's Bashar Assad. Can we trace terror from Israel to the US to France to Syria. Syria supports Iran and Iran supports al Qaida. Will al Qaida bomb al Qaida because of Israel?

Well, no. AQ's beef is with us. We had boots on the ground profaning Muslim soil and we are propping up what they see as a corrupt regime that happens to be standing between AQ and control of the Saudi government. That's two of the big three reasons he lists. The third is Israel, but not because of the Palestinians. The Palestinians are always thrown in because it plays well to the crowd. The real beef with Israel is that they exist. AQ and their like cannot accept non-Muslim control of what was once Muslim land.

I'm sure you have heard him refer to the "Caliphate", right? He is referring to all lands that were once Muslim, including Spain.

I found the paper shocking.Not in the habit of reading foreign newspapers but in the habit of reading the Times,Wash. Post, and Wall St.Journal,I knew nothing of this.

I find the idea of my Congress being bound and gagged by AIPAC and CO repellant and the amount given to Israel equally repellant. To think that my very hard=earned tax dollars have gone and do go to build and maintain the world's third largest military force, including a force with nuclear weapons, is shocking.

I acknowledge my naivete and vow to read foreign papers, including Haaretz, from now on. I vehemently disagree with the status quo and will be regularly conveying this sentiment to my elected officials from here on in.

I perceive Israel as a bully state.