A plea to The Bulwark: why is Israel an ally?

A genuine request

The ask

Hi

Jonathan V. Last

,

Sam Stein

,

Lauren Egan

,

Jonathan Cohn

and/or

Will Saletan

,

It is taken as an article of faith that the United States is an unwavering ally to Israel: when necessary, we’ll provide two aircraft carrier groups to protect them, give billions of taxpayer dollars in military aid, grant unlimited diplomatic protection from international sanction, allow charitable, tax-deductible donations to the illegal Israeli settlers in the occupied territories, ignore Israel’s illicit nuclear weapons program, and grant it most-favored trading status, amongst many other largesses.

So, it’s clear why Israel wants to remain an ally of the United States.

But why would the United States want to be an ally of Israel?

The reasons given

During his recent congressional speech, Prime Minister Netanyahu gave three reasons why Israel is an ally to the United States:

1. “Israel provides America with critical intelligence”,

2. We “jointly developed sophisticated weapons”, and

3. It keeps “American boots off the ground while protecting our shared interests in the Middle East.” (The shared interests were not enumerated).

AIPAC makes additional claims:

1. Israel helps keep us safe,

2. Israel “promotes our values and interests” because Israel is a democracy that promotes “stability” in the Middle East and creates “lasting peace” for the region,

3. Israel "promotes democracy, stability, and peace" in the region.

4. It “protects U.S. troops” with defense tech and PTSD research.

5. The U.S.-Israel partnership tackles cyber-security, AI, water scarcity, and climate change.

6. Israel “invests in our economy.”

7. We face "common threats" like WMD proliferation and terrorism.

But a recent article by Josh Paul¹ and Tariq Habash² debunks these reasons. I hope you read the article or listen to their discussion with Mehdi Hasan before repeating them.

Our relationship with Israel has been described as iron-clad and sacrosanct by both sides of American politics. As a conservative Catholic

Jonathan V. Last

, I know you understand the meaning and etymology of the word “sacrosanct.”

Can you make the affirmative case for Israel as an ally? To three different Americans?

The three people to make the affirmative case for Israel as ally

If Israel’s alliance with the U.S. isn't just faith-based, it should stand up to scrutiny. Can you justify it to:

Progressives like me

For you to convince me that Israel should be an ally, your argument would have to overcome:

• Dozens of reports by human rights organizations about Israel, which include evidence of apartheid, ethnic cleansing, and now genocide. Saying “the whole international community is antisemitic” would require you to ignore the evidence and arguments presented in these reports.

• Hundreds of video testimonies of former IDF soldiers about atrocities committed in the occupied Palestinian territories under the direction of the State of Israel (I’m confident that

  Sarah Longwell
  understands the power of such testimonies).

• The more than five hundred genocidal statements by members of Israeli civilian leadership (all sides of politics, not just Likud), Israeli military leadership, and Israeli civil society.

The reason I’m #NeverTrump is because I love the law, and Trump is a career criminal, rapist, and insurrectionist. I believe the most significant thing the United States has done since the end of World War 2 was building a body of international humanitarian law and supporting the “rules-based order,” often led by American Jews.

The Biden Administration has violated Executive Orders³, domestic law⁴, and international law⁵ in our unconditional, unquestioned, and unlimited support of Israel. Another example of support for Zionism endangering domestic law was when Tony Blinken lied to Congress (video).

These violations erode our credibility against authoritarianism. How do we condemn China’s Uighur camps while Israel holds 7 million Palestinians under occupation? How do we object to Russia’s 10-year occupation of Ukraine while Israel occupies far more of Palestine, for far longer?

A Muslim voter in Dearborn, Michigan.

I know these voters are not your favorite people. Still, if Progressives have to tolerate the Cheneys to stop fascism, I hope you can tolerate the voices of those who have lost family members in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Consider one such Muslim voter; she does not believe Zionists have an ancient religious claim to land to build a Jewish supremacy state, just as she doesn’t believe ISIS has a religious claim to land to rebuild an ancient Muslim supremacy Caliphate. All she sees is the Administration sending taxpayer dollars to support the occupation and, in her view, the genocide of her friends and family.

Telling her “… but Trump plans to ethnically cleanse Gaza and build a golden statue!” may not be enough for her to forget the damage that Democrats have already done, and Republicans are doing now. In her mind, ethnic cleansing is a preferable outcome to genocide⁶. But even discussing which is worse, Israel committing ethnic cleansing or genocide with our support, only emphasizes why her home country should not ally with a state committing these offenses.

Anti-Zionist Jews

Over the last 17 months of debate and death, one of the voices least covered is that of anti-Zionist Jews, people like

Peter Beinart

, Ilan Pappé, Jewish Voices For Peace, and IfNotNow. Depending upon how the question is posed, and the questioner, approximately 15%-30% of American Jews do not support Zionism, and that skews much higher for younger Jews.

These Jews do not want violent Zionism to be undertaken in their name. They take Never Again to be universal. Watching the media, including the Bulwark, you would not know these Jews existed.⁷

Also, allow me to point you to people much closer to the issue than you or I, American Jews with an intimate knowledge of the military and medical situation on the ground in Gaza: American Jewish doctor Mark Perlmutter (Politico article), and American Jewish Defense Intelligence Agency Major Mann. These Jews, who are as close to the ground as possible, do not support Israel acting as they are.

What I am not requesting

I’m careful in what I am requesting and what I am not requesting.

I would be disappointed if you dismissed this request as “antisemitic”, or by calling me a “Hamas-lover” or “Jew-hater”. Apart from being untrue and beneath your intellect, this attempt to delegitimize the person instead of arguing the case's merits has long lost its silencing vigor.

I would be disappointed if you made a claim of a “religious right” to land, a claim you would not extend to others, such as ISIS, who also wants to re-establish their ancient religious homeland.

I would be disappointed if you decided to indulge in whataboutism: "What about other bad countries?”, "What about Muslim countries?”, "What about North Korea?”

I would be disappointed if, as in the Klein-Coates debate, you changed the subject to “What did you think of October 7?”, or “Do you condemn Hamas?”

I would be disappointed to see this devolve into a semantic argument about “what constitutes genocide?” or “it's only ethnic cleansing if it’s from the Lavage region of France, otherwise it’s sparkling self-deportation” or “actually, there are good, unique, and exceptional reasons why apartheid is necessary for Hebron, but nowhere else.”

This type of goalpost moving is quite common, so I beg you only for the affirmative case for Israel as an ally, to those three different citizens.

With gratitude for your consideration,

A long-time listener.

PS: Our ally just bombed a hospital to kill a patient who had recently been operated upon. That’s a war crime.

1. https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-political-scene/why-a-state-department-official-lost-hope-in-israel

2. https://www.democracynow.org/2024/1/10/tariq_habash

3. Presidential Policy Directive 27 (PPD-27) – United States Conventional Arms Transfer Policy and National Security Memorandum-20 (NSM-20) – Conventional Arms Transfer Policy (2024).

4. The Arms Export Control Act (AECA) (22 U.S.C. § 2751), The Leahy Laws (10 U.S.C. § 362 and 22 U.S.C. § 2378d), The Foreign Assistance Act (FAA) (22 U.S.C. § 2151), The Export Administration Act (EAA) & International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), The Genocide Convention Implementation Act (Proxmire Act) (18 U.S.C. § 1091), and the War Crimes Act (18 U.S.C. § 2441).

5. Geneva Conventions of 1949.

6. In a fascinating discussion with

Mehdi Hasan

,

Tim Miller

asserted that he would vote for Biden-Harris, even if that Administration had supplied the bombs that killed his entire family.

7. The Bulwark has never had any of these voices on their platform, which is odd, considering The Bulwark holds itself out as not being a silo or an echo chamber.