Republican politicians clearly plan to make the Obama administration’s strained relations with Israel an important campaign issue in the Presidential race.  By doing so, they hope to portray the President as insufficiently supportive of the Jewish state.   These Republicans will take their cue from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which utilizes a network of wealthy donors who generously contribute to both parties’ campaign coffers,  provides free educational guided tours of the Holy Land and arranges audiences with Israeli officials for many members of Congress and their families.   Led by majority leader Eric Cantor and his democratic counterpart, Steny Hoyer, more than 80 House members are traveling to Israel as guests of AIPAC’s educational arm during the August recess, a time when you would expect most lawmakers to be back home consulting with constituents anxious about their economic future.

Republicans are not alone in their opposition to President Obama’s Middle East policies.  Most Democratic politicians, who are equally beholden to AIPAC, have expressed discomfort with the administration’s handling of relations with the Netanyahu government.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told Politico,* “… there are a lot of questions unanswered as to where this president stands on Israel.”  Many Democrats concur with the Republicans, although most are presently reluctant to publicly criticize Mr. Obama.  The Politico web post also quotes an unnamed Democratic source admitting that “There’s a lot of anger about that [Obama’s Israel policy] both in the Obama administration and campaign and DNC [Democratic National Committee].”

Although Obama raised expectations that he could broker a just and enduring peace between Israelis and Palestinians, his record to this point has been abysmal.  Neither side is talking to the other, and there are no prospects for negotiations in the near future.  George Mitchell, who was Obama’s envoy and adviser to the region, resigned months ago, apparently out of frustration with Obama’s willingness to press Netanyahu harder.  It is widely believed that Mitchell was frustrated by Obama’s unwillingness to apply greater pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to halt settlement activity or make other gestures that would permit a resumption of peace talks.  No new envoy has been appointed.   Obama’s chief advisor now appears to be Dennis Ross.   Placing Ross in charge of Israel policy indicates that Obama has lost any desire to tangle with the Israelis and their U.S. loyalists.

Despite the President’s recent retreat from confrontation with the Israelis or maybe because of it, the Republicans sense they can reap political rewards by questioning Obama’s loyalty to our “important ally.”  These politicians can rely on the U.S. media to assist them in this endeavor by continuing to depict the conflict virtually from Israel’s standpoint.

The issues that will probably be raised in the election are:  Obama’s initial demand that Israel freeze settlement activity in the occupied territories (which has been withdrawn), his call last May to use the pre-1967 borders as a basis for negotiations, and his administration’s supposed softness toward the alleged Iranian nuclear threat to Israel.  Republicans may also demand that Obama cut off U.S. funding to the Palestinian Authority (PA) if it persists in seeking statehood at the United Nations in September.  Discontinuing financial assistance to the PA was part of a recent resolution which was passed by both the House and the Senate.

In the context of the sound bites that comprise much of political campaigning, these arguments could damage Obama even though all are easily refuted.   If evacuating some settlements is to be an integral component of the peace talks, it is reasonable to stop their expansion before the negotiation.  Obama’s statement concerning the 1967 lines in no way implied that Israel should return to the pre-1967 borders, as many of his detractors claim.  The President’s position on Iran and his willingness to support an Israeli attack on its nuclear facilities are not all that clear.  Finally, even Israel does not want the U.S. to withdraw its financial support from the PA because that money pays the Palestinian police, who suppress armed resistance against the Jewish state.

Obama thought he could resuscitate the Oslo peace process and build on previous agreements made during the Clinton administration. His incentive for bringing the parties together is that it would improve U.S. relations with the Arab and Muslim world.  However, he found that Israeli political reality had shifted markedly since the Clinton years.  Both the government and the population are presently quite comfortable with continuing the occupation.  The West Bank provides Israelis with a captive market for exporting consumer goods, it is a good source of cheap labor (although fewer Palestinians are allowed to work inside the Green Line than were in the past), and is a source of water and other natural resources.   It is difficult to assess the net economic effect of the occupation since Israel does not publish statistics on its costs and benefits.

In addition, a growing number of Israelis and most politicians in the ruling Likud party now believe that they are the rightful sovereign in the territories.  This all means that even if the Netanyahu government enters into negotiations, its demands will be more unreasonable than they were during the failed Camp David negotiation in 2000 or the terms worked out between former Prime Minister Olmert and PA President Abbas just before Netanyahu took power.

The pro-Israel lobby is probably more powerful today than it was ten years ago.  It exercises a tighter control on the U.S media.   In 2003 the pro-Israel media watchdog CAMERA organized protests in 33 cities claiming that the programming of National Public Radio (NPR) was overly critical of Israel.  The Boston station reportedly lost 1 million dollars as a result of the campaign.  NPR coverage of the conflict has shifted markedly toward the Israeli viewpoint since those demonstrations.   The Congress, ever beholden to AIPAC, has become more insistent that the executive branch not challenge the Israelis.  The time is approaching when the political consensus may not even pay lip service to “the two-state solution.”

The Middle East policy and peace negotiations Obama initially championed were designed to improve U.S. foreign relations with Arab nations and the vast majority of the world that supports ending the Israeli occupation.   The peace treaty that Obama desires is based on what President Clinton proposed in 2000.  It is a treaty that severely restricts the sovereignty of a future Palestinian state by limiting its control of borders, foreign policy and defense capabilities.  These are just a few of the unresolved problems.  Thus it is not at all clear that any Palestinian government could sign such an agreement, or whether it would be accepted by the Palestinian people.

The Republican attack upon Obama’s Israel policy will place him in an uncomfortable position.  Many members of his own party are urging him to defuse the GOP criticism by backing away from brokering a Middle East peace.  They will tell him to refrain from even sparse and weak public criticism of Israel.   The Democrats are afraid that any friction between Obama and Israel will cost them and the President dearly in campaign contributions and at the ballot box in 2012.

The President may stand behind his policies and explain that what he is attempting to do is in the best interest of the U.S. and Israel.  If he does so, he can count on the support of the Jewish pro-peace lobby JStreet.  Its assistance will, however, be small consolation in the face of the combined strength of AIPAC, Congress and the media.

President Obama has demonstrated that he is extremely reluctant to challenge powerful political forces.  He has consistently demonstrated an ability to adopt positions he has previously opposed in order to appease powerful interests.   Under these circumstances, it is easy to envision the President embracing the extreme pro-Israel stance of Congress and AIPAC.  It is more difficult imagining him continuing to defend his policies and chasing a U.S.-brokered two-state solution that after almost two decades appears increasingly out of reach.

If the President concedes in the upcoming debate on Israel, and becomes more Bush-than-Bush on this issue, as he has become on many others, it will reposition the public discourse on Israel and Palestine toward a truly delusional and hopeless place.  Will the U.S Presidency become as beholden to Israel as the US Congress?  Will this set a precedent for a future total and unequivocal surrender to the pro-Israel lobby by the U.S. executive?  The day soon may be upon us when the weak admonition, “it is not helpful,” in regard to massive illegal Israeli settlement construction will be interpreted as a bold and out-of-bounds attack on our strong ally and friend, Israel.

It has been a dream of the pro-Israel lobby to transform the U.S. presidency into an institution that is as subservient to its dictates as the United States Congress has become.  Unfortunately, there may never be a better time than between now and the 2012 election to realize this terrifying vision.   If the election debate weakens the Presidency, it will solidify Israel’s hegemony over the territories it occupied in 1967 and make U.S. relations with the Arab world much more difficult.

* Marin Cogan and Jake Sherman, “Hill Fight Simmers Over Palestinian Statehood Vote,” Politico, August 8, 2011. http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0811/61638.html

Ira Glunts first visited the Middle East in 1972, where he taught English and physical education in a small rural community in Israel. He was a volunteer in the Israeli Defense Forces in 1992.  Mr. Glunts is a Jewish American who lives in Madison, New York where he owns and operates a used and rare book business with his wife Linda Ford.  You can contact him at  gluntsi[at]morrisville[dot]edu.

My own conclusion after reading his book, was that Oren’s role as a conservative Israeli think-tanker had completely subsumed any desire he may have had to be an honest American historian. I assumed that he believed that this was a good career move for someone who simultaneously lived in Israel and taught at Yale University. At that point this apparently mild-mannered, obviously intelligent scholar seemed harmless enough. Of course, it was impossible to have known then that Oren would become Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s ambassador to the United States.

Last week Michael Oren, as Israeli Ambassador to the United States, visited Atlanta in order to lay a wreath upon the grave of slain civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King. In addition to the wreath, Oren used his Atlanta visit to lay some of his country’s particularly odious hasbara (meaning public relations, some say propaganda) upon no doubt unsuspecting Georgians.

According to Martha Dalton of Atlanta radio station WABE, Oren exploited the ceremony honoring King by making a statement about the imminent danger Iran’s nuclear program presents to both Israel and the rest of the world. This is far from a universally accepted claim, but after having it repeated enough times in the U.S. media, most here accept it as fact. The ambassador also expressed concern about fallout from the recent Wikileaks release of thousands of diplomatic cables, some of which were embarrassing to Israel.

In an opinion piece in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on November 26 entitled “A 63-Year Search For Mideast Peace” Oren took full advantage of the leeway American newspaper editors give to public figures and especially to pro-Israel columns. According to Oren, Israel has been engaged in a 63-year struggle to make its neighbors and those it expelled from its territory, understand that all it has ever wanted is to peacefully share the land it claims for itself with its indigenous population.

The United Nations voted to partition what is now Israel 63 years ago into Jewish and Palestinian states. The wisdom of this decision, which was rejected by the region’s Arab governments and populations, is very much in question today. However to Oren, whose views reflect his own blind faith in Israeli power and a generous serving of fantasy, the partition decision (UN resolution 181) expresses the uncontestable truth that “[t]he Arab world was to welcome the Jews, after 2,000 years of exile back to their homeland.”

Surprisingly, at least according to Oren, the Arabs did not understand the imperative that they were morally obligated to welcome the Zionists and their proposed Jewish State on lands upon which the Palestinians had lived for centuries. A war ensued, in which according to Oren (repeating one of the favorite false claims of countless pro-Israel propagandists) “the weakly-armed Israeli defenders defeated the much stronger Arab armies.” This description is on its face false. Of course, the stronger army won, do you think it was God who made the Israelis triumph despite their weakness? (For an extensive and detailed description of the relative military strengths of both sides in the 1948 War see the Israeli historian, Benny Morris’ The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949.)

Continuing to mercilessly ladle on the hasbara (which literally means explanation in Hebrew), Oren writes that despite the Palestinians’ history of rejection of continuous Israeli goodwill, his government persists in reaching out with generous peace proposals. The ambassador points to examples of Palestinian recalcitrance in their refusal to accept the Israeli offers of “full statehood” in 2000 and 2008. The reader is not told how full statehood for the Palestinians is compatible with Israeli control of Palestinian water sources, no foreign policy, no army, and Israeli overflight rights, among many other crippling limitations, which are conditions upon which the Israelis always insist. Oren also neglects to mention that this “generous offer” of statehood does not now include Gaza nor its democratically-elected government.

To this point Oren’s op-ed had been a rehash of the Israeli and pro-Israel lobby talking points. But suddenly and unexpectedly the mild mannered ex-historian turned diplomat seeks to incite his audience with an original gem of hasbara. Oren declares, “Hamas …[is a]… group dedicated to the murder of all Israelis – indeed all Jews worldwide [my emphasis].”

Hamas is a political party and a social service organization which was democratically elected to rule the Palestinian territories. It also is a liberation and resistance movement which has employed violence against the Israeli army of occupation, the illegal Israeli settler/colonists, and ordinary Israeli civilians. However, the general statement that Hamas is dedicated to the murder of all Israelis is as valid as saying that the Israeli occupation army is dedicated to killing all Palestinians. The second charge, that Hamas is dedicated to killing all Jews worldwide is as fantastic as Oren’s claim in Power, Faith and Fantasy that the American founding-fathers were proto-Zionists who spent inordinate amounts of resources fighting implacable Muslim enemies. Actually, Hamas explicitly rejects the use of violence against targets outside the occupied territories and Israel proper. Its behavior has reflected that policy.

Before Oren went to Atlanta he made an appearance at the Jewish Federations General Assembly in New Orleans. In addressing the assembly, Oren urged American Jews to make it a priority to ensure that U.S.politicians continue to give Israel “bipartisan support” even if these same American Jews may believe that Israel’s policies are wrong. Oren insisted that it is not only the duty of American Jews to fall into line with Israel’s wishes, but he further declared, “we [Israelis] expect American Jews to refute… [any criticism of Israeli policy].”

Ambassador Oren is demanding that American Jews become hasbara agents who blindly follow Israeli government policy while simultaneously inciting them with false fears of being murdered by what, for American Jews, is a totally imagined enemy. In assuming his new diplomatic role, Michael B. Oren has, unfortunately, been given the authority and platform to promote fantasies about which he could only theorize three years ago, when I heard him merely urging his audience of college students to buy his book.

This article was first published in The Palestine Chronicle on December 6, 2010 as “Hasbara at Work: Oren Promotes Fantasies.”

The event, which was described as “surreal” by one of the organizers, took place in Washington on the evening of June 9. The meeting was sponsored by the S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace, which is currently headed by former Florida congressman, Robert Wexler. As a legislator, Wexler was a staunch and mostly uncritical supporter of Israeli government policy. He was a leading defender of the 2008 Israeli invasion of Gaza and recently justified the Israeli commando assault upon the Turkish-led aid flotilla as self-defense.

In attendance at the event, in which Abbas spent 90 minutes answering questions from the Jewish leaders, were an all-star-team of prominent pro-Israel activists. Among the participants were leaders of the most powerful Jewish organizations: Howard Kohr, Executive Director of AIPAC; Lee Rosenberg, President of AIPAC; Robert Sugarman, National Chair of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL); and Alan Solow, Chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. Also present were former government officials Elliot Abrams, Steve Hadley (I guess he must be Jewish) and Dov Zakheim. The pro-Israel American press was represented by Mort Zuckerman. (This list is taken from the S. Daniel Abraham Center’s website.)

A transcript of the meeting was made apparently at the insistence of the Palestinian leader. (It has been made available to various media and Jewish organizations, but is not, to my knowledge, been publicly posted online.) In his replies to questions, Abbas attempted to assure those gathered that he was a reliable peace partner, that he is a strong opponent of the Palestinian armed struggle and that he will promote the understanding of the Holocaust among Palestinians. Abbas also told the Jewish leaders that he will do all he can to limit what the Israelis and American Jewish leaders claim is a campaign of “incitement” to anti-Israel violence in the Palestinian media, in the mosques and in textbooks. Abbas stated that he was willing to talk to the Jewish leaders in an effort to explain his positions and win their support.

The answers that Abbas gave his interlocutors will not endear him to many Palestinians, who already tend to view the Palestinian President as more concerned with pleasing his American benefactors than fighting for justice and Palestinian rights. Most of them believe that an armed response to the brutal Israeli oppression is justified and that the incitement charge is both exaggerated and too widely defined. An example of this is the suppression of the displays of Palestinian flags in Jerusalem, which is justified by Israeli claims that they incite violence. Also many believe that Israeli actions are the prime cause of the violence and anger, and to the extent that the Israelis change their behavior, the Palestinians’ anger and violence will decrease.

How many words have been written and spoken in the last 10 years which make the case that these same people in attendance at the Abbas meeting are the lobbyists who are the engine driving a self-defeating U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East? Members of this group and others like them have too much power to influence policy. Now they have direct contact with the only Palestinian negotiating partner which the U.S. and Israel will recognize. This cannot be good.

Although most reports of the meeting describe it as cordial and beneficial, Jeremy Ben-Ami, the director of JStreet, professes another view. Expressing disappointment in the behavior of the Jewish leaders, Ben-Ami told Ron Kampeas of the Jewish news agency JTA, that “[w]e have a man [Abbas] ready to make peace, and we raised [the issue of incitement-filled Palestinian] television shows and said for that reason he is not a partner.”

JStreet is the Jewish group that is politically closest to the Obama administration. This begs the question of what the administration thought of the meeting. It is likely that Obama’s Middle East team does not want these Jewish leaders in direct contact with Abbas, thus creating a possibility of opening an additional competing channel for the negotiations or maybe a proxy group of negotiators for the Netanyahu government. A minority of those in attendance, like Debra DeLee of Americans for Peace Now, were from so-called moderate pro-Israel groups or individuals like Sandy Berger not known as strong AIPAC supporters. However, Ben-Ami was not listed as one of those in attendance. I wonder if JStreet’s exclusion was a message to the Obama administration that this group wants an even more pro-Israel policy from this White House. I am afraid that these Jewish leaders will get what they want simply because they have the power to make it happen, a fact that is illustrated by Abbas’ willing attendance at this tawdry Jewish affair.

The reason why the American Jewish leaders would want to hold this meeting is not totally clear. Robert Wexler, the organizer of the event, probably hopes that it will enhance his stature as a player in the world of U.S. – Israel diplomacy. He may also feel that it will improve his chances for an appointment as the next U.S. ambassador to Tel Aviv. It is a position he does did not deny that he covets in a recent interview by Ha’aretz reporter, Natasha Mozgovaya. Others, such a Elliot Abrams, probably just attended so that they could report that he “is skeptical about [Abbas’] ability to deliver, his evasiveness suggested that he doesn’t want to be pinned down on substantive issues.” I wonder though how many of the attendees thought that this and future meetings could give them increased leverage in their quest to protect Israeli interests.

I really do not see any good coming from meetings between this group of powerful pro-Israel Jews and Mahmoud Abbas. If the Jewish leaders actually wanted to support Abbas in a quest for a fair and just two-state solution they would never compromise his credibility by a public meeting in which they force him to be conciliatory bordering on the obsequious.

Netanyahu will not attend the weapons conference because he is afraid to confront a group of representatives of Arab nations who plan to bring up the issue of Israel’s non-participation in the Non-Proliferation Treaty. These nations want to force Israel to publicly acknowledge its nuclear capability and permit international inspection of its facilities.

The Jerusalem Post refers to the Israeli nuclear arsenal as “alleged,” maintaining the ludicrous Tel Aviv “policy of ambiguity.” The headline of the Hebrew version of Ynet says Netanyahu is afraid of an “ambush” by the Arab delegates to the conference. Israel will send Intelligence Minister Dan Meridor to the conference to be the flak-catcher for Netanyahu. The Israeli leader’s absence will deflect attention from the potential bad publicity that discussion of Israel’s nuclear capability will generate.

Israel maintains an arsenal which is assumed to be between 100 and 300 warheads depending on the source of the data estimate. Mordechai Vanunu revealed details of Israel’s nuclear arsenal to the British press in 1986. He served 18 years in an Israeli prison after being abducted from Italy by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad. Vanunu is prohibited from leaving Israel, where his freedom of speech, association and movement have been severely limited by authorities since his release. He has been designated as a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International.

According to the Federation of American Scientists website, it has been reported that “fearing defeat in the October 1973 Yom Kippur War, the Israelis assembled 13 twenty-kiloton atomic bombs.” The fact that Israel may have seriously considered a nuclear strike in 1973 first became known to the general public in Seymour Hersh’s 1993 book, The Samson Option. If my memory serves me, Hersh claimed that Israel loaded the nukes on missiles and aimed them.

Surely the Americans must be ecstatic about Netanyahu not coming for another visit, although they are forced by their “very special relationship” with Israel to explicitly deny the obvious. The dubious honor for the denial fell on the shoulders of General James Jones, who told reporters that “of course we wanted the Prime Minister [Netanyahu] to come [back for another visit].”

Isn’t the very special Israeli-American relationship getting more special all the time?