How Israel Lost by Richard Ben Cramer

[Classical_Liberal]

Curiously, it's this last fuzzy reason that comes closest to answering "Why do we care?" For in the end, there is no rational benefit in realpolitik - either internationally, or for campaigns inside America. There is no lobby or group in the U.S. that could pressure the government to make Israel the number-one recipient of American foreign aid - three billion dollars each year (plus a couple of billion in loan guarantees) - and that's before you start adding in special military credits, trade preference and other backdoor deals. The only other country that comes close is Egypt - we pay them two billion to act like they don't hate Israel. Altogether, almost half of the U.S. aid dollars for the world shower the land for a few hundred miles around Tel Aviv. (Talk about making the desert bloom!) ... And not just by dollars should our interest be measured. There is also the matter of attention we pay. We may spend more than five-billion-a-year in the currency of newspaper words and CNN chat; there are endless and more-or-less deep analyses in monthly magazines, in The New Yorker, the New York Review of Books and the quarterly Foreign Policy; it's no accident (and not without effect) that The New York Times covers Jerusalem better than Staten Island, or that Redbook, the ladies' mag, responds to its readers' new fear of terrorism by commissioning a personal essay from a mom in Israel (who also just happens to be the head of the Jerusalem office of AIPAC). The fact is, Israel sells. And we have sold ourselves on Israel. Why? Because in some measure we are all like those Christians who see and support shared values there. For decades, we've read and talked about Israel, we've backed and begirded Israel, we've paid for Israelis' first-world standard of living ... because we came to assume, somehow, they are like us.

The Israelis, no dummies, did what they could to foster this impression - from appointing a government spokesman who talked like he grew up in Detroit (he did), to allocating scarce shekels for the world (i.e., Western World) tour of the Israel Philharmonic. From '48 on, the most important resource of the young nation was the harrowing and latterly triumphal story of the Jewish people - which had elicited the sympathy of the world, and spurred the U.N. vote that made the Jewish state. And so, the first growth industry of Israel (even before tart Jaffa oranges found their market in Europe) was what the locals called hasbarah - which literally translates as "explaining," but we might call it propaganda, or spin.

From the moment a U.N. cease-fire ended the first war in the spring of '49, Israelis led the world in guided tours. Their new immigrants were living in squalid tent camps, the air force was maybe two banged-up bombers, but the government still bought fistfuls of boat and airline tickets, and hotel rooms and state-of-the-art buses, to put together freebie trips for eager Swiss or Swedish students, South African "opinion makers," Jewish "pioneer campers" from North America, young politicians and journalists from all over the world and, of course, rich Americans (who might fund the guided tours of the future with a generous gift someday). They had to get their story out - and the hasbarah industry attracted the best and the brightest. It wasn't just the friendly tour guides, who could explain - in their perfect Dutch or Danish, Walloon or Serbo-Croatian (language skills were the other great resource) - how the Arab armies shot deadly artillery from that hill, right there! (And those poor kibbutzniks who just gave us that wonderful lunch live under that threat every day, even now....) There were also the spokesmen, guides and greeters for every government department, every municipality, the big Histadrut national labor union, the Israel Lands Authority, the Jewish Agency - they were all making friends, "explaining." And these guys were good! ...

Long ago, I witnessed one tour of up-and-coming American poobahs - or poobahs-to-be - the Young Presidents Organization. And some wiseacre asked a sticky little question: Are Israelis going to have to pay compensation to the Arabs who ran away? ... Now, the fact was, and is, that Israel won't pay a nickel - but the first "explanation" was palliative: Yes, it's a complicated question ... now, a commission is studying the fairest method ... but you have to understand, land records under the Turks.... And then, as the tour moved on, the hasbarah man was walking next to that fellow, and issued this pained, confidential aside: "You know, it was a terrible shame - we begged them to stay!" ... which was a bold, but uncheckable lie. And that night at dinner (a slap-up dinner, on the cuff of course), having found out that his new friend hailed from Connecticut, the hasbarah professional inquired - just by the bye: Say, how's it going with those pesky lawsuits from American Indians - aren't they claiming that half the state is theirs? .............

http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36~27~2178716,00.html

[physioex]

1. I am aware of much of this...

The combination of careful marketing by the Israelis, and the Evangelical Christians has shaped much of the foregin policy of this country.

But this country is very quickly becoming a muti ethnic/cultural country. I hope this brings about a more even handed policy. Perphaps the Arab American community can come togethor and start their own organizations.

[Classical_Liberal]

2. I think the Israeli lobby is more empowered by fundamentalist

christian support and the defense industries support, than Jewish support. I don't know how Arabs can compete with this. I think the rest of the world has to become more assertive, particularly on trade issues. If it hurts the Cheney types in their pocket books they will change. Citizens movements do not work in a country not actually governed by citizens. I wouldn't cross my fingers that this is going to work for Arabs, though it would help to some degree.

[physioex]

3. I couldn't agree more....

Let's hope for a more even handed policy.