Realism and pragmatism needed on Israel-Palestine, but American policymakers find those very difficult

The current outbreak of violence in Israel-Palestine, clearly initiated by Benjamin Netanyahu's far-right government, currently facing the dilemma of being unable to form a new government after elections, is obviously developing quickly at the moment. The Israeli attack on worshippers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque was a very dramatic, highly symbolic act of violence and contempt for not only Palestinians but Muslims generally. (Oliver Holmes and Peter Beaumont, Oliver Holmes in Jerusalem and Peter Beaumont Guardian 05/10/2021; Frank Andrews, Al-Aqsa under attack: How Israel turned holy site into a battleground Middle East Eye 05/12/2021)

Juan Cole has a suggestion for how we should describe it at this point: "a performance of Israeli dominance and Palestinian defiance." (Gaza and Israel’s Kidnapper’s Dilemma: Keeping a Million Children Brutalized in its dark Basement Informed Comment 05/15/2021)

He calls attention to the dramatic disparity of power between the two sides:

Israel’s staccato bombardment campaigns against Gaza (2008-9, 2014, 2021) are not a war. Israel has an army, Gaza does not. Israel has a sophisticated Air Force with 581 aircraft, including fighter jets and helicopter gunships. The Palestinians in Gaza don’t have a conventional army or navy or air force, don’t have tanks or aircraft or artillery. Most of their rockets are high school science experiments (they have a handful of longer range rockets). The Izzuddin Qassam Brigades have a few tens of thousands of poorly armed and trained volunteer militiamen. If they tried to mount a conventional assault on Israel they would all be killed in an afternoon. The Asian Spa killer in Atlanta killed more people than Hamas has since the beginning of the current hostilities.

Pragmatic realism on the Israel-Palestine conflict has been desperately hard to find in American politics. It's not that no one has been trying. Two books that appeared during the Cheney-Bush Administration, when conflict with Muslim countries and groups took center stage in American politics represent two significant exceptions. One was The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy (2007) by the über-Realist scholars John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt. This combined a realist analysis of general US policy toward Israel with a fact-based discussion of groups lobbying for US support for Israeli policies, a subject that has been used in dishonest ways by anti-Semitic propagandists. Having two of the most important American foreign policy intellectuals lay out this analysis was an important step in demystifying the whole topic.

Jimmy Carter's 2006 book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid is the other. The idea that Israel was in real danger of making a two-state solution a practical impossibility, and that they would be left with an apartheid state, with a Jewish majority and a Palestinian minority deprived of equal civil rights and many denied basic human rights, forcibly held in desperate conditions.

American policy didn't change for the better. Cheney and Bush saw Israel's rightwing governments as allies in the War on Terror against Muslims, and made no serious attempt to forward the Israel-Palestine peace process. The Obama Administration was so stridently anti-Muslim. But the Obama-Biden Administration was generally willing to give Netanyahu's government free rein, as well, and also did little to advance the peace process. And the Trump-Pence Administration was completely deferential, even recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a major issue in an attempt to end the Israeli occupation in a way that would bring actual peace.

There's certainly no guarantee that the Biden-Harris Administration will do better, though the public should demand they do. But there are signs that there might be important shifts in American understandings of the conflict. The two-state solution seems less feasible than ever. And it's at least no longer as shocking as it was in 2006 to talk matter-of-factly about the possibility and reality of "apartheid" in Israel. And there's at least some hope that a more realistic discussions among politicians and at least some of the establishment press about American pragmatic foreign policy interests, human rights, and international law in regard to Israel than we've had for a long time.

But it's not as though there isn't plenty of solid information and analysis on the subject available for those who are motivated to look.

Zaha Hassan and Daniel Levy provide a good example with Biden's Old Playbook Won't End Israeli-Palestinian Violence Foreign Policy 05/13/2021:

They also have a good analysis of why the latest developments in Israel-Palestine is a problem for the foreign-policy branding that the Biden-Harris Administration is attempting. As they note, "the United States is indisputably the most consequential external actor in this arena." And however cynically pragmatic professed US concerns about human rights problems in other countries so often are, the "soft power" of the US in matters of democratic governance and human rights really is A Thing. And the (so far thankfully tentative) new-cold-war posture toward China has relevant implications on Mideast issues: "The 'America is back' message has been all about a law-abiding, norm-promoting, rights-respecting nation leading a resurgence of democracies. ... It's not hard to imagine the refrain in Beijing: 'You say Uyghurs, we say Palestinians.'"

Aaron David Miller and Daniel Kurtzer write about the current situation in Battle between Israel and Hamas is an unwelcome surprise for Biden CNN 05/12/2021: "It is doubtful whether the current crisis in Jerusalem -- which has now grown into a larger battle between Israel and Hamas -- will impel the Biden administration to launch a full-throated effort to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But, at a minimum, it should compel the administration to do everything it can to defuse this dimension of the crisis."

Democrats, voting rights, corruption, and stepping on their own message

The Young Turks made a good report and discussion on an important case in which the Democratic House took the unusual-for-them step of passing a bill that is both substantively good and excellent for them politially, an voting and ethics reform package that would counter Republican voter-suppression tactics and put some new limits on corruption through campaign donations. As they explain, all Republicans voted against it. So it gives the Democrats an obvious win by getting the House Republicans on record as being pro-corrupütion and against protecting elections, right?

Mitch McConnell Admits Defeat 03/08/2019:

Ana Kasparian notes that "the media doesn't care" about policy issues. But the panel goes on to discuss the ways that Democrats could use this bill as a way to generate controversy against the Republicans. Because, as Cenk Uygur notes, "if the media doesn't like policy, which it doesn't, they love controversy."

But not only did Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic establishment not take an aggressive strategy for promoting the controversy of Repüublicans being pro-corruption and anti-clean elections. They gave the Republicans and the media the Ilhan Omar flap to crowd out the message the Democrats should have been emphasizing.

The Democrats do something that's not only right but that the Democratic base finds attractive and exciting. But not only to they stumble in setting up the issue against the Republicans. They went did one more favor for the Republicans by publicly bashing Congresswoman Ilhan Omar with concocted outrage over her mild public criticism of the Israel lobby. Which was a controversy against a Democrat which the Democratic establishmenbt in the House leadership headed by Pelosi generated themselves. And, of course, that gave the media a controversy to bloviate over, one that worked against the Democrats.

The wonder is not that the Democratic Party loses so often despite its (official) policies being more popular than those of the Republicans. The wonder is that this Democratic Party ever wins anything at all.

Cenk Uygur also did this interview with Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies on the Omar flap, Ilhan Omar Controversy Getting Out Of Control 03/08/2019:

My favorite weekly political commentary segment to take measure of the state of conventional political wisdom of the moment, the PBS Newshour Political Wrap, illustrates how badly the Democrats fumbled with their mini-jihad against Ilhan Omar, Shields and Gerson on Democrats’ bigotry resolution, Trump investigations 03/08/2019 (transcript here):

They talked about the Omar controversy, Trump's whining over Congressional investigations, and whether Joe Biden would run for President again. The Democrats' impressive bill to protect elections and reduce corruption didn't come up.

Michael Gerson, sitting in for Bobo in this segment, seemed unusually agitated, often speaking in such a weepy-sounding voice that I thought he might go all Meghan McCain on us.

Mark Shields could have been better on the Omar issue. But he was more good than bad, saying things like this:

Well, I guess I think the speaker had a — didn't seek this fight, didn't want it.

And, certainly, it's not something the Democrats — the Democrats had to confront it. There's no question about it. But, I mean, we're talking about a president, Judy — let's be very blunt about it — who, when the white supremacists marched through the streets of Charlotte with torches, saying, "Jews will not replace us," said there's good people on both sides.

I mean, so this is — if you want to see anti-Semitism ...

"Allegiance" as a club against Democratic progressives, especially Ilhan Omar

Susan Davis reports on the Democratic establishment's effort to brand at least one of its Muslim Members of Congress as anti-Semitic based on their criticism of the Democrats' often extremely one-sided and conservative Israel policies in Democrats Planning Another Public Rebuke Of Rep. Ilhan Omar NPR 3/04/2019.

The fact that there is an Israel lobby is not news. John Mearsheimer's and Stephen Walt's landmark political science study on it, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy was published in 2007, though the reality was well known long before 2007. The most prominent group among that lobby is AIPAC, which tends to support hardline rightwing Israeli government positions. There are more liberal and critical elements of the lobby, like the liberal group J Street, which criticizes some of Israel's democratic deficits and foreign policy positions. And an important part of the lobby also consists for far-right fundamentalists Christians, who support hardline rightwing Israeli governments for their own bizarre mixture of political, theological and even racial motives, i.e., white nationalist fundamentalists often see Israel as a bastion of white supremacy.

See also online: Mearshimer and Walt, The Israel Lobby London Review of Books 28:6 03/23/2006 The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy (60-page article) Middle East Policy 13:3 Fall 2006. Former President Jimmy Carter published a critical analysis of problematic Israeli policies in 2006, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid. (See Jimmy Carter Defends 'Peace Not Apartheid' NPR 01/25/2007.) The irreversibility of the settlement process has greatly advanced since then. The two-state solution seems now completely impossible for all practical purposes, and Israel does confront the real choice of being a Jewish-majority state or a democracy.

I won't bother here hashing through the truisms that clutter around discussions of the Israel lobby: it's perfectly legitimate for American citizens and politicians to advocate for support for Israel; the US and Israel are countries with some national interests that coincide and others that conflict; anti-Semites criticize Israel, seeking to equate Jews in general with bad poilicies of Israel; some anti-Semites support Israel, notably many of the Christian fundamentalists who do so based on a sick theological construct of apocalyptic Scriptures that looks forward to the day that most Jews of the world will be killed in a massive war; a majority of American Jews (the US is the country in the world with the largest Jewish population numerically) are critical toward many Israeli policies, far more so than conservative Jews or Christian fundamentalists.

Congresswoman Ilhan Omar is currently a metaphorical punching-bag for Democrats who generally support hardline Israeli policies and who want to pander to Islamophia; Omar is Muslim and wears a hijab headscarf in Congress.

The current Democratic establishment's hostility to Omar is part of their larger freakout over the new strength and Congressional presence of Democratic progressives. I know corporate Dems take any kind of observation that Democratic hostility toward progressives who support programs a majority of not just Democratic voters but the public generally could wind up provoking a full-blown party split. But it could.

As Davis reports:

The latest controversy follows comments Omar made at an event last Wednesday at Busboys and Poets, a politically minded coffee shop and restaurant chain in Washington, D.C., that held a "progressive town hall" with Omar and fellow freshman Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich. The duo are the first Muslim women to serve in Congress. Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., and Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., also attended the town hall.

"I want to talk about the political influence in this country that says it is OK to push for allegiance to a foreign country," Omar said at the event. The statement has sparked a furious response from senior Democrats and Jewish groups.

Josh Marshall makes what I take to be a good-faith commentary on why Democrats should be especially careful about public references that could be taken to invoke the infamous "dual loyalty" trope. (The Problem with Ilhan Omar TPM 03/03/2019) I wouldn't join his particular criticism of Congresswoman Omar in this situation. Because, as he himself point out in the piece, Americans who are pushing for allegiance to Israel are primarily rightwing Christian fundamentalists, not Jews:

American citizens are entitled to espouse foreign policy views of whatever sort they want. The American Jewish community’s support for Israel has had a decisive impact on US foreign policy toward Israel going back decades. Anyone with the vaguest acquaintance with recent American history knows this. But it is equally true that the anchor of unequivocal US policy support for Israel today and specifically the Israeli right is far more anchored among conservative white evangelical Christians than it is among Jews. As anyone who follows these issues knows, the American Jewish community is increasingly divided over the policies of the rightwing governments which have dominated Israel for the last generation. [my emphasis]

Juan Cole expresses straightforward support for Omar's controversial comments in this case (Israel Lobbies slam Ilhan Omar even as they Try to Bankrupt small Leftist Arkansas Paper over Israel Boycott Informed Comment 03/04/2019):

The Israel lobbies that direct campaign money to representatives and senators insist that Israeli policy of imposing Jim Crow discrimination on Palestinians in the Occupied Territories never be criticized on the floor of Congress. They also insist that the US give Israel, a relatively wealthy country, $3 billion in aid every year on top of other extensive grants and perquisites, despite what the UN says are war crimes committed on a daily or weekly basis. ...

The hypocrisy of her critics on this issue is breathtaking. For nearly a year, Israeli snipers have shot down unarmed, unthreatening peaceful protesters on the Gaza side of the border, which is just murder. Israeli soldiers have killed hundreds this way, including small children, women, medics and journalists, and wounded thousands more with live ammo or military grade tear gas.

Cole includes video of Omar's comments that are at issue, Rep Ilhan Omar Speech about Standing Up for Palestinian lives (video dated 02/27/2019):

It's worth recalling one of the more diplomatically questionable occasions in American history, the time in 2015 Israeli Prime Minister addressed a Joint Session of Congress at the invitation of the then-Republican majority in both Houses, asking them to oppose President Obama's policy on Iran, i.e., the official policy of the US Government, and instead support his own government's position, The Netanyahu speech controversy, explained by Zack Beauchamp Vox 03/03/2015.

While the Democratic establishment panders to Islamophobia to bash Democratic progressives, the dominant narrative of corporate Democrats since the 2016 election is that Donald Trump is in some way working for the interest of the Russian government. They may be correct. But it's pretty severe cognitive dissonance for Democrats to criticize Congresswoman Omar while making a major theme of Trump's compromising links to a foreign government. Here's Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016 calling Trump a Putin "puppet," which sounded less persuasive to the average viewer then than it would today. But she is nevertheless accusing him of allegiance to a foreign power. i.e., a much more specific claim than Ilhan Omar's comment for which she's most recently drawing such criticism, Trump to Clinton: 'No, You're the Puppet' Bloomberg Politics 10/19/2016: