Volume 4 No 1 - Journal for the Study of Antisemitism

234 JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF ANTISEMITISM [ VOL. 4:221
policy stands a good chance of getting labeled an anti-Semite. In fact,
anyone who says there is an Israel lobby runs the risk of being charged
with anti-Semitism . . . In effect, the lobby boasts of its own power and
frequently attacks those who call attention to it. . . . Supporters of Israel,
in fact, have a history of using fears of a “new anti-Semitism” to shield
Israel from criticism . . . the charge of anti-Semitism remains a widely
used weapon for dealing with critics of Israel, especially in the United
States. 26
It must, however, be strongly noted that writing their argument the
way in which they choose to phrase it is quite disingenuous; even the selective
evidence presented in chapter 6, “Dominating Public Discourse,” 168-
198—in which this quote appears—diminishes their own attempts to validate
historical antisemitism as part of the historical and contemporary experience
of both Jews and Israelis, and thus denies any validity to any
argument that antisemitism is, indeed, a factor in U.S. foreign policy discussions
as well as present-day critiques of Israel. It would thus appear that
Mearsheimer and Walt engage in a classic case of Shakespearean
“Methinks the lady doth protest a bit too much!” (Hamlet, Act III, scene 2,
222-230).
And so the conversations continue both within and without the American
and Israeli Jewish communities and between the American Jewish community,
the Israeli Jewish community, and the government and
administrations of the United States. Given the uneven history of the United
States in its relationship to its Jewish populations over the last more than
three hundred fifty years, the dominating presence of various Protestant
Christianities still evolving their own modus vivendi in relation to Jews and
Judaism, as well as the theological and religious implications of a reborn
State of Israel (framed by a European history of overt antisemitism), one
can only conclude that antisemitism has been a factor in the ongoing U.S.-
Israel relationship, at times very much in evidence in the persons of U.S.
State Department ambassadors and other foreign service officers and less so
at other times. As the historical awareness of the Holocaust/Shoah and its
implications and moral mandates for civilization continue to recede, present
and future nation-state relationships between these two countries will be
grounded in pragmatism and self-interest. One can only hope and pray that
this alliance, forged in strength and mutuality of benefit, will continue.
26. John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign
Policy, 188ff.