March 19, 2009
My dad grew up in the only Jewish family in a town in upstate New York. When I ask him about anti-Semitism, he tells me this story: One day he was playing baseball, and he slid hard into second base. “Yer out!” says the second baseman. “I’m safe!” says my father. “Yer out, ya dirty Jew,” says the second baseman. “Okay, I’m out,” says my dad. “But what does my being Jewish have to do with it?”
I thought of my dad’s story when reading Charles Freeman’s scorched-earth explanation for his withdrawal, under pressure, from consideration as chair of the National Intelligence Council. Freeman doesn’t merely blame his opponents for “libelous distortions” of his record. No, he blames a powerful “Israel Lobby” whose “tactics plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency” and which is “intent on enforcing adherence to the policies of a foreign government.”
Freeman’s opponents ranged from Nancy Pelosi to a group of Republican senators to Human Rights Watch (hardly a charter member of the “Israel Lobby”). Pelosi and HRW thought he had it wrong on China; the Republicans thought he lacked experience and “objectivity.”
And yes, many members of the pro-Israel establishment felt he was soft on Saudi Arabia and too hard on Israel. The Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs wrote he was “suspect because of his financial ties to the Saudis and appalling in [his] inability to differentiate between a Western democratic ally under siege from a combination of terrorists and the states that harbor and support them, and those very states and terrorist organizations.”
Freeman was right that some vocal and influential pro-Israel types had it in for him. But his statement crossed the line from angry to deranged with his direct accusation of disloyalty and his careless, even ominous use of the word “lobby.” He wasn’t using it in the legal sense, of individuals or groups paid to directly influence legislation or appointments. That applies to a group like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (although, officially anyway, AIPAC said it took no position on his pending appointment).
And if he was using “lobby” in the looser sense — that is, to refer to the array of interest groups and nonprofits that seek to influence public debate on common causes — there’s nothing wrong with that.
But Freeman went the route of Walt and Mearsheimer, who use “lobby” when they really mean “cabal” or conspiracy. (Freeman’s son, also named Charles, laid it right out there by blaming a “cabal of ideological hard-liners” who “orchestrated a remarkable, self-referential smear campaign against my Dad’s appointment.”)
In this case, the difference between a lobby and a cabal is the difference between “yer out” and “yer out, ya dirty Jew.” Washington is full of interest groups, dependable in the ways they line up behind an issue. There’s a Cuba lobby, a tobacco lobby, and a gun lobby, and all leave a trail of angry opponents who feel they overstepped in making their various and rigid cases.
But Freeman implies something else: that the “Israel Lobby” has special powers in getting its way. That’s what Freeman suggests when he says the lobby is intent on “enforcing adherence to the policies of a foreign government.” Or when he writes that it is “not permitted for anyone in the United States” to consider views that differ from the sitting Israeli government’s. “Enforcing” and “permitting” are words that apply to authorities, whether military, civil, or criminal. They don’t apply to bloggers, fund-raisers, and op-ed writers. Freeman, who lamented that Chinese authorities moved too slowly to suppress protests against the government, knows the difference.
Nor do Freeman’s opponents collude at the whim of a “foreign government.” Many are linked, I’ll concede, but more often it is by a common (and, in my view, overly narrow) vision of what’s good and bad for Israel. But this is not dictated by Jerusalem.
Take the current right-leaning mood of American pro-Israel activism. When its history is written, this shift over the past decade will be credited to disillusionment over Oslo; the growing influence of religious Zionism; an extremely receptive and like-minded Republican White House; and reaction to, and sometimes exploitation of, a series of looming, linked, and genuine threats: the rise of Hamas and Hizbullah, the scourge of extremist Islam, and the saber-rattling of Iran.
These trends have shaped a worldview that is wary of “concessions,” suspicious of negotiations, keen on military solutions (especially when it comes to Iran), and deeply pessimistic about the Palestinians’ willingness or ability to deliver a credible peace. These are dominant views among the pro-Israel mainstream, despite efforts by groups like J Street and the Israel Policy Forum to promote alternatives, and independent of supposed diktats handed down from the Israelis.
Ironically, that leaves the pro-Israel camp vulnerable to the charge that they march in lockstep, and feeds the conspiracy theories of the Freemans, Walts, and Mearsheimers. For years we’ve been told that our strength comes from unity. You should note, however, how much traction Freeman’s rant about the “Israel Lobby” gained among “mainstream” pundits. We shouldn’t let antagonists dictate our communal agenda, but there’s more than one reason why our most influential pro-Israel groups should encourage more ideological diversity. Rebutting crackpots like Freeman is an added bonus.
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