09/02/14 – Robert Naiman – The Scott Horton Show

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All right, next up is Robert Naaman from Just Foreign Policy.
And this piece is at Common Dreams, CommonDreams.org.
If liberal Zionism were dead, what actions would that imply?
Well, that's a good question.
Welcome back to the show.
Robert, how are you doing?
Good to be with you.
Good, good.
Very happy to have you here.
First of all, let me just mention real quick here, because I didn't get a chance to earlier, and I just want people to know this stuff is out there and searchable.
There's, I think, drone footage, seems like remote control airplane footage of Gaza, that if people just look, if you Google aerial view of Gaza destruction, something like that, put that in your search terms, you can find the video.
It's posted all over the internet, and it's really something.
And just consider what all they claim about, you know, precision laser guided this and that claims and bending over backwards to protect civilian lives.
Apparently, they're just carpet bombing the place, if you look at the results.
And then also, there's this footage of IDF soldiers sniping children playing on a rooftop in the Gaza Strip.
There's your search terms, again, IDF sniping children, and then laughing and mocking the child that they shoot in the leg, who limps away in terror, of course.
Anyway, so, and then I guess this headline can wait till the next segment, because I want to ask you about this too.
But first of all, I want to now, sorry, third of all, fourth of all, I want to get back to your article here.
You can comment on anything I just said, if you want.
But otherwise, I would ask you to do like you do in your article, and ask, well, just what is liberal Zionism?
What's the crisis?
And what difference does it make anyway?
Well, you know what I was trying to, so the context was, there was a piece in the New York Times that was widely circulated that said, you know, liberal Zionism is dead.
Meaning, the sort of the liberal, you know, pro-Israel ideology that's animated such groups as the J Street and Americans for Peace Now, people who refer to themselves as pro-Israel, pro-peace, in support of two-state solutions.
And in the wake of the Gaza War, many people said, you know, wow, what happened to that ideology?
It seems to be dead.
And the article, which is, you know, obviously a very important set of questions.
But then the article went on to say, well, the two-state solution is dead, and we should push in the direction of a singular binational state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean that has equal rights for Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs.
And when I was arguing my piece that, you know, while that might, as an abstraction, be an appealing ideal, it doesn't answer the more fundamental question of how we got to the point that we're at, which is the, you know, the whole reason that anybody was in favor of the two-state solution in the first place was not that they necessarily thought that this is, you know, the greatest thing that one could possibly imagine from the point of view of justice.
It was that it seemed to satisfy kind of minimum criteria for some justice of the Palestinians saying, okay, well, they can have their own state in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem.
That's one.
But two, it seemed realistic.
The idea was that international pressure, international support can, including U.S. pressure, can compel the Israeli government to accept the two-state solution.
And so what I was pointing out in the piece is that the asking, you know, is liberal Zionism dead?
And then, well, maybe we should abandon the two-state solution, doesn't answer the question of why did it fail?
And what should we therefore do?
The fundamental problem, I argue, is not that this is a morally contradictory ideology that couldn't square the circle between the liberal values of equality and the Zionist idea of Jewish dominance in Palestine.
The fundamental problem was that people didn't use liberal Zionists, two-state supporters, whatever you want to call it, didn't use the tool, sufficiently use the tools of political pressure that anybody else would use in any other context to try to bring about a realistic solution, a labor union, a women's group, environmental group would use the nonviolent tools of political pressure to force their demands.
And that's what hasn't happened.
There has not been a movement that forced the, used political pressure to force the Israeli government to change its policies.
That's been the key failing.
And we saw in the Gaza War that these groups first did nothing.
And then, you know, were kind of anemic in their response.
And did not, for example, try to lobby members of Congress to say, hey, let's stop this violence with a ceasefire, or let's support a diplomatic solution that ends the blockade of Gaza.
Two members of Congress did that, Keith Ellison and Barbara Lee.
But if you look at the public discourse around this, hardly anybody is asking the question, gee, how come we only have two members of Congress to say this reasonable thing?
Why don't we pressure other members of Congress to say this reasonable thing?
It's, we're not directing, we're not, we collectively, it's not successfully directing pressure to winnable fights and using political pressure to bring that about, as every other organization or movement engaged in US politics would do.
Right.
Well, so in other words, it sounds like what you're saying is MJ Rosenberg is basically out there as a one man band.
He's a liberal Zionist who's a two state guy, very against the one state.
He very much is for Zionism within 67 borders, but is basically hell bent on, you know, being at least mad as hell about it.
I don't know if he has anybody to organize to really do anything about it.
Instead, you know, we got J Street and they really are basically, they're filling up that vacuum in a sense, but they're not really doing anything.
They're not insisting so, but why not?
I mean, what are they in denial?
Netanyahu, he'll do the right thing.
He's going to give up the West Bank because it's obviously the smart thing to do.
I mean, is that what they think or what?
No, I don't think they think that.
I think that there is a taboo in the organized Jewish community against pressuring the Israeli government and J Street is incorrectly deferring to that taboo when they need to be more aggressive in challenging that taboo.
I mean, for me, I don't have any connection to Israel really whatsoever.
But I'm more than happy to say this is a suicidal policy.
They're crazy to let Netanyahu and worse be their leadership up there.
The sooner they give up the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the better according to their own goals of maintaining this 80-20 Jewish majority inside Israel itself.
Otherwise, everyone just shrugs and says, okay, really you do rule all the land all the way to the Jordan River and you're nothing but the Jim Crow South, worse than apartheid South Africa.
And that'll be even less sustainable than the current mess.
So I don't know why people who really care about the future of Israel got to be so afraid to say what is obvious to anyone about what's best for the Israelis.
Right.
So I think the key difference, I mean, one way I think that's really helpful to look at it from the point of view of understanding what would politically realistic organizing do is let's compare two similar issues, U.S. policy towards Iran and the question of Iran's nuclear program and U.S. policy towards Israel-Palestine.
What do these two things have in common?
They have in common that the Israel lobby, so-called American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its friends are on the other side.
So, yes, this is a huge 800-pound gorilla that is an obstacle to good policy.
You know what?
I'm sorry, Robert.
We got these hard breaks and we just got to take them.
But we'll come right back and talk again about your analogy there about Israel-Palestine and Iran policy and the politics, the liberal politics of opposing these bad policies.
On the other side of this break with Robert Naaman at CommonDreams.org and JustForeignPolicy.org.
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All right, guys.
Welcome back to the show.
I'm Scott Horton.
I'm talking with Robert Naaman.
He runs JustForeignPolicy.org.
Oh, actually, that's not right.
He runs JustForeignPolicy at JustForeignPolicy.org because it's more than a website.
It's a thing.
Also, he's got this great article at Common Dreams.
It's called If Liberal Zionism Were Dead, What Actions Would That Imply?
And I'm sorry, we were interrupted by the break there, Robert.
When you were explaining, look at the difference in political activism on the question of the Iran issue and the Israel-Palestine issue where the lobby clearly is hawkish on both.
But so what's the difference on the other side?
So the difference is that people that want to have a different US policy towards Iran, a policy of diplomacy and not war, a policy of realistic engagement to deal with the issue of Iran's nuclear program, have actually won in important policy fights in the last couple of years, despite the fact that AIPAC and the Israel lobby was on the other side, pushing towards confrontation and trying to undermine diplomacy.
And groups like J Street and Americans for Peace Now were a key part of the coalition that helped bring that about, defending diplomatic engagement.
So, for example, a key fork in the road when the US agreed to an interim nuclear deal, the Obama administration agreed to an interim nuclear deal with Iran and was attacked by the right and AIPAC and the Israel lobby, J Street and Americans for Peace Now and other groups dove in with Congress, organized letters, bipartisan letters of Democrats and Republicans saying, no, we should not do more sanctions on Iran now.
Let diplomacy work.
Let the president's diplomacy work.
Don't blow up US diplomacy with Iran.
And they won that confrontation, including bringing Democrats and Republicans along with diplomacy with Iran and against AIPAC.
So a key question that we should be asking ourselves, if we could do that with US policy towards Iran, why can't we do that for US policy towards Israel and Palestine?
And I think the key answer is that these same groups that have been willing to be more aggressive and assertive in pushing on US policy towards Iran have not been willing to do that with respect to US policy towards Israel and the Palestinians.
Like when President Obama said, OK, we're going to insist on a freeze in Israeli settlements in the West Bank to get negotiations going.
These groups did not strongly back him up.
They did not strongly go to members of Congress and say, OK, you need to speak up now for the president's diplomacy because they were too shy to say, hey, you know, it's a good thing that President Obama is trying to take a firm line.
Any time, any kind of daylight opens between Obama and Netanyahu, these groups, all of us need to be get behind Obama and say, you know, whoever the US president is, it doesn't matter, Obama.
But Obama happens to be someone sometimes willing and Kerry sometimes willing to have some daylight.
We need to get behind, get behind that.
Happen again with the question of ceasefire and the Israel-Gaza war with Kerry coming out and pushing for a ceasefire to end the war and deal with the issue of the blockade in Gaza.
It's a key thing that we need to to end that war completely and stop violence in the future.
These groups did not come out and solidly defend Kerry.
But, you know what, Robert, I don't understand why not.
You know, as we talked about the giving up of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is absolutely of dire importance for the future of the Israeli state for the long term.
They have to do this.
It's life or death.
Whereas the Iran nuclear issue is basically just a big red herring excuse to have a cold war with Iran, as we all know, reading Gareth Porter, as we do.
And so that's right.
You know, what the hell is going on over there?
Jay Street differences, you know, in APM, the problem is not the level of rhetoric.
The problem is at the level of putting rhetoric into practice because these groups have not been willing to really fight and organize in support of the policies that they claim to support.
So, you know, for example, President of the Palestinian President Abbas goes to the United Nations to try to save the two state solution and get diplomatic recognition for an independent Palestinian state.
West Bank Gaza and East Jerusalem gets attacked by Netanyahu and the right and the Israel lobby.
And like, where's Jay Street?
Where's Americans for Peace now?
The, you know, Jay Street put out this convoluted statement saying, well, we don't agree with what Abbas is doing, but it would be bad if the U.S. vetoes its own position.
This is not this kind of like on the one hand, on the other hand, isn't isn't going to change the dynamic.
These groups, you know, when Abbas goes to the U.N. and uses nonviolent diplomacy to push for a two state solution, these groups need to come out, you know, four square and say, that's good.
That's what we want the Palestinians to do.
Use diplomacy, nonviolence and politics to force the demand of the of the two state solution, not this in between triangulation on the one hand, on the other hand.
Well, yeah, I mean, we've really seen I mean, it's been pretty obvious all along, but they kind of explored some of the background in that New Yorker piece of just how willing Netanyahu was to not just fight Obama, but enlist the entire Israel lobby to fight Obama on the settlements on Iran and everything else, and especially on Iran, where it really came down to.
I mean, you talked about some of these groups were were good and lined up behind Obama on the issue, but it really came down to him saying in the State of the Union address, basically knock it off.
OK, I will veto this if you do it.
I mean it.
And they finally went, oh, OK.
But it really came to that.
And they were acting basically the Congress, both houses, both parties as agents of a foreign power against the president of the United States on here because that's what Netanyahu wanted.
The guy's got Yahoo right in his name.
But here's the thing, Scott.
When President Obama did then the State of the Union, that was the final nail in the coffin.
But prior to President Obama, the United States Union, these groups intervene with members of Congress to defend the administration's position.
So when Obama took that stand, he knew he was going to win because the the groundwork had already been laid.
So it's these two things together.
Yes, you know, Obama has to fight, but he's not the only person that has to fight.
You know, the groups have to fight.
Public opinion has to fight.
So when Obama picks the battle, he wins the battle.
And those two things go together.
Right.
Yeah.
You know, speaking of MJ Rosenberg, he told me on the show, I think he wrote it up in an article and we talked about it in an interview at one point about how in 2009 Obama really had Netanyahu on the ropes and he was really going to give in and freeze the settlements and this and that.
And and I guess MJ said he had sources in Israel who told him Obama blinked one day early that basically he had won and then woke up in the morning and snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.
And he really could have made major progress towards his state thing then.
And of course, it was to balance on supposedly we'll get more cooperation on the Iran issue.
Yeah.
Well, see how much that how well that worked out for what it was worth.
Well, I think the important takeaway is that none of this is John.
You know, President Obama still going to be president till 2016, never has to run for election again.
And, you know, we're going to have a congressional election and then that's done.
And President Obama, anytime he wants and anytime the groups and public opinion is ready, can pick a fight with Netanyahu on this and win it.
But people have to be ready for the competition.
So give them good advice about how to organize, how to participate in the groups that are good on this or to pressure the groups, you know, whatever it is.
What what do people do to help you out here?
Well, so right now there's a fight going on.
You know, Israel, the Israeli government just announced a big bunch of settlements.
I actually have an alert in my email from J Street condemning the announcement and demanding that the U.S. take a harder line.
That's exactly what J Street should be doing.
But they also need to be pushing members of Congress to say that, yes, the U.S. should oppose this and it should really oppose it.
Take a hard line in opposing it.
Right now, talks are going on between Israel and Hamas in Cairo about a long term, trying to get a long term ceasefire in Gaza.
In order for that to work, there needs to be diplomatic pressure to say, OK, we're going to end this blockade of Gaza once and for all.
Groups could be doing that right now, saying, let's end this.
You know, let's end this between Israel and Gaza, like we ended it between Israel and Lebanon after 2006.
End the violence across the border.
Let's end the blockade.
That is achievable in the next month.
If there were serious political pressure to bring it about.
Yeah.
Well, and, you know, it is kind of a matter of herding cats or something.
I don't know how AIPAC does it so well.
And the Peace Party always has such difficulty with this.
But there are so many, you know, liberals, Jews and otherwise who are good on this, who could be such a powerful force.
So I sure hope we see some progress.
Thank you for your efforts, Robert.
Good stuff.
Good to be with you.
All right.
That's Robert Naiman, everybody.
He's at JustForeignPolicy.org.
And this one is at CommonDreams.org.
If liberal Zionism were dead, what actions would that imply?
And that's the show for today.
Thanks very much for listening.
Y'all see you tomorrow here on LRN.
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