Realism in the Middle East

This essay has caused quite a stir in the US. It was published by Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer, two scholars of the "realist" school of international relations - believing that rationality rather than identity should determine how a country acts in international relations, and that the foreign policy conduct of a country is primarily determined by its power status and position in the international system.

The article argues, accurately, that Israel is not helping the US (or Britain) in foreign policy objectives or in the war on terror, despite receiving $3bn annually of American financial assistance. The citizens of the Middle East can't believe our pronouncements of hope and democracy for the region when juxtaposed with Israeli state-sponsored terrorism in the continued clinical eradication of Palestinians and acquisition of their land through the settler movement and "security wall".

"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 has provided sensitive military technology to potential rivals like China, in what the State Department inspector-general called ‘a systematic and growing pattern of unauthorised transfers’. According to the General Accounting Office, Israel also ‘conducts the most aggressive espionage operations against the US of any ally’. In addition to the case of Jonathan Pollard, who gave Israel large quantities of classified material in the early 1980s (which it reportedly passed on to the Soviet Union in return for more exit visas for Soviet Jews), a new controversy erupted in 2004 when it was revealed that a key Pentagon official called Larry Franklin had passed classified information to an Israeli diplomat. 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."

The article concludes that we should treat Israel as a normal state in the Middle East, and cease our unconditional support for its activities, to detach ourselves from support for this agenda and improve relations with other states in the Middle East, all valuable prescriptions. However, a New York Times review of the article stated that this is unforseeable in the near future - support for Israel is too deeply rooted in our view of the Middle East to change policy. Nevertheless, this article is to be applauded as a valuable contribution to the Israel-Palestine conflict and wider policy in the Middle East. The authors have published this article to a heavy cost on their careers - despite being world-famous in their field of study, they have been banned from speaking at several universities.

I find it disappointing that all the American presidential candidates, Democrat and Republican, are resolutely pro-Israeli, as this will close off any debate on Israel during their campaigns. This makes the publication of this article all the more refreshing.