To All,

As a long term ex-FAO on the Middle East and Africa, this subject was never far from my mind, especially after serving as a UN Observer in Lebanon and living in Israel. I am both pleased and amazed that Harvard, JFK School of Government, had the guts to publish this one. It pulls no punches and will undountedly draw much fire and abuse.

The Israel Lobby
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt
For the past several decades, and especially since the Six-Day War in 1967, the centrepiece of US Middle Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel. The combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related effort to spread ‘democracy’ throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardised not only US security but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the US been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries was based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives, but neither explanation can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the US provides.

Instead, the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby’. Other special-interest groups have managed to skew foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US interests and those of the other country – in this case, Israel – are essentially identical.


You can read an abridged version on line at http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n06/mear01_.html

And you can downlaod the full document from http://ksgnotes1.harvard.edu/Researc.../rwp/RWP06-011 or http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=891198

I would recommend this be added to the SWJ Library.


Best all,

Tom