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All right, y'all, welcome back to the show.
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So you don't want to miss that.
Now to Scott McConnell, founding editor of the American Conservative Magazine and also writer for the nationalinterest.org.
Welcome back to the show.
Scott, how are you doing?
I'm doing good.
Well, good.
It's been a long time since we've spoken.
I'm glad to have you back on the show.
And I was very happy to see this piece today at the National Interest, again, nationalinterest.org.
It's called Why Americans Don't Understand Palestine.
Huh.
Why don't we understand Palestine?
Well, I was looking at the poll numbers in response to how people viewed the Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip and was struck by that Israel typically got, you know, pretty strong majority support for what it was doing.
You know, I think the score was like 57% approved of the Israeli actions, 15% disapproved and some kind of undecided, you know, 20 or 30%.
And that's fairly typical.
And it's really out of step with much of the rest of the world, including Western Europe and, you know, Latin America and, of course, the Middle East.
And so I thought it was worth trying to figure it out.
And my conclusion is, A, most Americans take their foreign policy cues from elected politicians or a lot of them.
And the Congress is incredibly reflexively pro-Israel, in great part reflecting the strength of AIPAC in selecting candidates and punishing candidates who stray from the pro-Israel line.
And as a result, even if you might have 40 or 50 or 100 congressmen who look at what's going on and saying, this is terrible, the United States shouldn't be a party to this and should oppose it, actually, they're not going to do that.
So you have really nobody in Congress who's willing to speak up in favor of sort of fairness between Israel and Palestinians.
And then I looked at the media, and I obviously didn't do a whole comprehensive thing, but I looked at the elite editorial and opinion pages, the New York Times and the Washington Post.
And what was really striking was that many, many of the writers, including the Times editorial and many of the top columnists of the Post, constructed a narrative in which it was impossible to understand why the Palestinians would fire off rockets that hit, you know, the towns in southern Israel where the people often have to go into bomb shelters and stuff like that.
And it seems like there's no possible reason for this, that it's just that the Palestinians are kind of crazed and bloodthirsty.
But in fact, there is a reason, which is that the Palestinians in Gaza are under a blockade, and the blockade immiserates their lives.
I mean, they don't have access to their fisheries, they don't have access to the kind of construction materials that would allow their water supply not to fail.
They can't export the things they do export, which are food and stuff, to the West Bank, which is their traditional market.
And they have incredible difficulty in traveling to and from Gaza.
So, if you don't look at that context, which is a context everybody in the Middle East understands, which is why there's widespread support in the Middle East for Palestinian resistance, it's impossible to understand what's going on.
And I guess I argue that this was a really failure of establishment journalism.
Right.
Well, and you say that, and I agree with it, but I'd like to give you a chance to develop a little bit more that this amounts to a lie.
This is not just, geez, guys, I wish you'd do a little bit better job covering this story.
This is a major lie by omission.
This is like sitting around claiming that the Sous started it, and never even mind who got to North America first.
Come on.
Yeah, I would go that far.
I'd say it's really not different from a lie.
And it's journalistic malpractice, because, I mean, America will pay the price for ignorance in the world.
If you were being led around by journalists getting a worldview from people who are afraid to, for one reason or another, just find the easiest thing is to just say what, just to copy Israeli talking point, it makes it very, very difficult to come up with a sane or rational or realistic policy, or any policy that will.
So you have, like, the American people are sort of puzzled.
Gee, you know, at the General Assembly, you know, 90% of the countries are going to vote to recognize the Palestinian Authority, govern on the West Bank.
And Americans have no idea why.
Gee, and our government is opposing it, of course.
And Gaza, it's an incredible example of avoidable human suffering going on right now.
And I think 90% of the American people have no idea what's going on.
Right.
Yeah, no, I totally agree with you about that.
And, you know, my measure for what the American people think is always, well, what did I think when I was 16?
Something like that, you know, which, sorry, everybody, but that's pretty much, you know, the best I can approximate what y'all think.
And it's that I don't really know what's going on over there, but I'm pretty sure it has something to do with all sides claim that God is on their side.
And so, therefore, it's an intractable problem.
And so, therefore, who cares about keeping up with the details?
They have this thing called the peace process.
That means a never ending state of low intensity warfare.
And then, you know what?
Other than that, I never heard of anything about one side is permanently occupying the other until I was in my 20s, probably, and decided I was finally going to sit down and read and learn about this thing.
You know, they just never tell you that, you know, for the people who hear their news, you know, accidentally or just, you know, day to day reading the paper, something like that.
No one ever says that.
Look, Gaza is occupied territory.
Yeah, it was.
I mean, later than that, for me, because I was probably well into my 40s before I began paying close attention to this issue.
Yes, Gaza is occupied territory.
It's been I mean, first, I think the one salient fact is that most of the people there are descendants from of 1948 refugees.
So they are you know, they consider themselves Palestinian and they want, you know, national rights as Palestinians.
And I think it can be negotiated what form those rights take.
And I think Israel has legitimate claims to sovereignty.
But, you know, no, they don't.
They certainly do not deserve to be blockaded from the world just because of their they're exercising a, you know, a right of resistance to occupation.
Yeah.
You know, I even saw Jon Stewart, who, you know, from time to time, he'll get it right.
But I saw him do his thing the other night about what does it all come down to?
It all comes down to, in fact, he's he's going back in time.
This is tit for tat.
These guys started and he's saying, well, the Gazans say that the Israelis started when they did this.
And the Israelis say the Palestinians started when they did this.
And he goes back in time till he's almost to the 1940s.
And then he decides he's going to skip back 2000 years and just, you know, go back to the same old intractable problem of who did God give the land to?
Instead of what is actually going on here?
Come on, man.
You know, like it's a fair fight.
That's the pretension, right?
Is that Gaza is the country next door and they're so Muslim that they just won't stop their terrorist aggression.
Yeah, I don't think who God gave the land to is a really I mean, it is the way people think of it.
Both certainly Christian Zionists and probably many Israelis and perhaps many Muslims.
But I don't think it's the most helpful way to come to a way out that doesn't lead to more suffering.
Right.
Yeah, it's just a way to end the argument.
Basically, it's a way to say that there's no there's no gain that could be had here.
It's a it's an intractable problem.
So give up.
Yeah, it's not intractable.
But solving it probably has to require the kind of diplomatic pressure on Israel that makes Israel think that it has to recognize that Palestinians have some legitimate claims in what was formerly Palestine, instead of just relying on the Israel lobby to intimidate the American people in the world and relying on their superior military to suppress all those rights, because I don't believe the Palestinians are going to go away.
I also think that both people neither people want to share a state with where they're both competing for control over the same government.
I don't see that as a particularly happy thing, in which case there is the obvious way of coming up a way of sharing the land and giving the Palestinians passports and the chance for economic development.
It just seems to be so eminently sensible.
And it's very disappointing that the Congress, in particular, where there's a lot of particularly able people just want to be blind to what's going on.
All right.
Now, so and you're right, too, when you talk about, you know, the disparity between the way the world looks at this and the way the American people look at this.
And, of course, you know, with the default being we're right about everything.
It makes the rest of the world seem like that, you know, crazy, no offense, conservative fantasy that everyone in the world hates us and they all want to kill us.
And also all by the way, they all want to move here and take all of our jobs away, too.
And what a what a crazy, dangerous place this world is if everybody's on the side of this terrorist state.
Yeah.
No, I mean, it reminds me of, you know, you can get into these you sort of dig yourself into a nationalistic hole where you are unable to see the world, see what other people see and what other people's interests are.
And Israel is, you know, well, well advanced into digging that hole.
But America is kind of digging it itself into the same thing.
It's kind of following Israel's lead.
And, you know, the results have been, well, I mean, most notably the war in Iraq, which was incredibly costly.
I don't know how many casualties we have, but, you know, there could be further.
So, I mean, we could be so permanently at war with the Middle East that even if we don't lose those wars, we could bankrupt ourselves and lose our civil liberties.
And that seems to be the trajectory we're on.
And it's a bipartisan trajectory.
Yeah.
Well, it's unfortunate, too, that, you know, they really have been successful in pushing the narrative that, you know, the reason that their enemies are their enemies is because they're Muslim terrorists.
And then once our support for them provoked enough blowback that we had our own war on terrorism, they succeeded in basically convincing, it looks like to me, the American establishment that, see, we told you.
You know, this is what it's like to have to deal with Muslims, man.
You got to kill them all the time or else they'll come and get you.
When really it was our support for Israel that made our enemies in the Middle East in the first place.
And if you look at the actual conditions which Gazans live under, you can't imagine any, say, European people, or any Western people, or I'd include Jews, would tolerate these for any length of time.
I mean, it would just be, it would be an open, there would be open resistance all the time.
And, you know, the Israelis wouldn't tolerate that kind of blockade.
What do you think about this move in the General Assembly?
What do you think is going to happen?
Well, France is going to back it, and Spain, and maybe Britain, which means that the United States is going to be rather isolated with maybe a couple of Western Samoic-type countries backing it, and Israel, or opposing it, and Israel.
It doesn't, I don't think, change things on the ground.
I mean, I'm of mixed sentiment about whether the Palestinian Authority is useful to the cause of Palestinian self-determination, or, you know, almost so corrupt that it's an impediment.
But I think, on balance, it's a good symbolic measure.
And the Palestinians are very conscious that, you know, it's being done on the same date in which the United Nations General Assembly voted to partition Palestine, what, in 1947, 65 years ago.
What's going to happen?
I don't have my future predictions ready.
I mean, I think that, will this break open any doors towards a two-state solution, a fair two-state solution?
I hope it does.
I don't really see things going that way.
I mean, I'm pessimistic enough to think that the two-state solution probably doesn't have a chance, though that seems to me the most realistic and practical thing, in which case we'll be stuck with this for another 20 or 30 years.
And the Palestinians will eventually say, you know, and may be very close to saying, look, our struggle isn't about land, it's about the right to vote.
And then I don't know, really, what the Israelis are going to say.
I mean, but Israel will become increasingly perceived as an apartheid state.
And I don't, and may be tempted to use any excuse possible to ethnically cleanse the remaining Palestinians off the West Bank, which would be moving about 3 million people, would be very tough to do.
And it's very strange to me the way this works, because, you know, you have like Ehud Barak, what, a year or two ago, said, hey, if we don't figure out a solution to this thing, we're going to end up an apartheid state where, you know, it's a minority Jewish population ruling the majority, that kind of thing.
We've got to solve this before then.
Isn't that pretty obvious?
Doesn't the entire Israeli electorate understand that?
And then, but the polls say that they don't want that.
So I don't understand why they keep reelecting Netanyahu and his ilk and continue pushing on there.
I mean, do the people of Israel, do they favor greater Israel?
Or do they want to give up the occupation, at least eventually, and have their little country?
I think the people of the Israeli electorate have gotten remarkably more stupid over the last 20 years.
I think that there was a majority, and still is a majority, in favor of a two-state solution, but most of them are complacent and don't really see what's going on with the occupation.
And there are a great number, and probably growing parts of the electorate, which includes Russian emigres and American Jewish emigres who don't have a democratic or tolerant spirit at all.
I mean, they are, I don't want to use words like fascist or something, but they are among the least tolerant people of any demographic in any Western country.
Now, I don't know if this really counts for anything or not, I guess it won't in the American media, but it seemed to me like a pretty big blunder for the Brits to announce that, well, we might support this move to up Palestinian status in the General Assembly if they promise not to seek charges against the Israelis at the International Criminal Court.
I could see them saying that in private, but isn't that a terrible blunder for them to announce that in the headline?
I don't know the story behind that story, and I don't really know what the Brits think about this.
I mean, the British establishment, gosh, it bears quite a bit of responsibility for the Balfour Declaration, but they are reflexively less inclined to say how high whenever Israel says jump.
But I guess they're trying to make the vote less meaningful.
I mean, the vote would be more meaningful, obviously, if both Britain and France supported it.
You spoke earlier, Scott, about the, I guess, near impossibility of getting the settlers out of the West Bank.
When do you think was the last time that that was even plausible?
I've made two trips to the region, and in 2006, most of the people we talked to, I was with a delegation of Churches of Middle East Peace, and we spoke to quite a few Israelis and quite a few Palestinians.
And I would say, I mean, a lot of the Palestinians would say, really, it's about over, you know, we really can't talk about a two-state solution anymore.
And you would press them, and you would say, well, yeah, you know, there were some settlements and places where you could kind of deal with and think about making a land swap, you know, to maybe change the borders a little bit.
And then you wouldn't have to pull back that many.
And I think it's changed in the last six or seven years.
There's more militant settlers, you know, of maybe 500,000 overall in the West Bank, and maybe 100,000 of them are armed and say that they just won't withdraw.
And so I don't really see any Israeli government having a civil war by crossing them, especially when it would go against what the government, which has been putting settlers there for the last 40 years, I mean, I just don't see them doing that.
So, I mean, I think you could concoct scenarios where you say, all right, you know, you can stay there, but you're not part of Israel anymore, and the army won't protect you, and, you know, leave it to a Palestinian-authority police to deal with them.
But that's not a very – doesn't sound like a very viable situation either.
Yeah, I can't imagine a negotiation that would end with that conclusion.
Well, I mean, there are – you know, Israel is like a very varied place, and the last time we were there, we actually spent an evening with some settlers who were all kind of biblical and long-beard and long-dressed, who say that they want to – had biblical reasons to be there, but they were perfectly happy to be part of Palestine.
And they actually had a mixed kindergarten or elementary school and playground with Palestinian kids.
Yeah, there you go.
And it was, like, so unusual and really kind of moving, because I'm not – you know, can't really get too against somebody who wants to live in some place for religious reasons, but you don't have to do it in a racist way.
And so, I mean, there are different kinds of people there, but I don't think that's the majority of the way the settlers are, sad to say.
Well, you know, as libertarian as I am, I want to see a no-state solution there.
But I think a one-state solution where the government had so little power, its only job was really protecting everyone's rights and that kind of thing, then it wouldn't really matter who was the majority in the Knesset or who held the most judgeships, et cetera.
Everybody could just be individuals and get along.
It doesn't matter whether they're Christian, Muslim, or Jewish.
Maybe.
I guess that's a little pie in the sky, but then again, like you said, it's working right now, even in the occupied West Bank, a little bit.
Yeah, a little bit.
Yeah.
Well, I'm a dreamer.
Who knew?
I didn't even realize, but I guess I am.
All right, now, Scott, tell me real quick, and I'm sorry, I meant to ask you more about this, but then I spaced out and forgot.
But you've got this great piece in the American Conservative about immigrants against empire.
And I guess you sort of say that the conservative movement in the Republican Party kind of dropped the ball on immigration back over the last, say, 30 years or so.
And then they've ended up with a country whose demographics are not amenable to their drive for world conquest.
So maybe it's a silver lining after all kind of a thing, huh?
Yeah, well, that is.
Back in the 90s, and to some extent true, I was one of the people who thought the United States should have lower rates of immigration.
And I can still make that argument, but I now realize that once you get off different issues and change issues, that it seemed to me pretty obviously that most of the new Americans were not part of the demographic electoral base for this big, hawkish foreign policy.
I mean, they're not Republicans, and if they are Republicans, they're not big America, war on terror, everything.
And then you see on college campuses, a lot of the interesting groups are led by immigrants.
A lot of interesting Palestinian solidarity groups are led by Muslim immigrants.
And so I think that I may have thought that the United States shouldn't transform its demography a lot, but once you become thinking that an anti-imperial foreign policy would be a good thing, and that becomes an issue, as it was not for me in the 90s, then it's a very, very significant silver lining.
And it seemed to me that neoconservatives, who were always pushing for high immigration, kind of shot themselves in the foot because they're bringing in a demographic that is not amenable to their foreign policy.
Right, and so now, at this point, you're thinking, since the empire is so much more important to you than it used to be, that, well, good, thank goodness for that, I guess.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
See, I think that's a really important thing, because I'm a libertarian, and I would tend to side with the, I hate to say it, but with the evil businessmen here that just want an endless supply of cheap labor, because I'm looking at it more from the cheap labor's point of view, that they're looking for a job, and who am I to stand in the way of that kind of a thing.
So I'm very libertarian about open borders and all that.
But I was talking with Tom Woods yesterday about, well, so what's the future of the conservative movement, and specifically the Republican Party?
Is there any chance that the Republican Party is going to take the lesson that they need to start acting more like Ron Paul on foreign policy, for example, in order to win?
And Tom's answer was, well, I think they're more focused on how are they going to get the Hispanic vote, and it sounds like what you're saying is maybe a peaceful foreign policy would be a good way to help win over the Hispanic vote.
I think that's true.
I noticed that Ron Paul, Ron's father, Ron's son, was on CNN yesterday, and he said about three times in 90 seconds a less aggressive foreign policy, less aggressive foreign policy.
He begins to flesh that out, which he hasn't yet, and it's just a slogan yet, but he begins to flesh that out, and I think he could become a very significant player, either as a candidate or just as a senator who is considered to be saying important things.
Well, and then the Democrats, we could go back.
I have this dream that we could one day have a two-party system where you have Obama, who's deported more immigrants than the last few presidents combined anyway, certainly more than George W. Bush did and is waging his Wilsonian world empire and all of that.
Maybe we could just let the Democrats have authoritarianism and try to make the Republican Party the party of the Bill of Rights and Peace.
I know it sounds crazy, but I was trying to stay with a straight face.
All right, well, listen, it's great to talk to you.
Always insightful.
A couple of great articles here.
I hope people take a look at them.
Thank you very much, Scott.
My pleasure, too.
Appreciate it.
Everybody, that is Scott McConnell.
He is a founding editor of the American Conservative Magazine.
That piece, most recent there, I think, is Immigrants Against Empire.
And then today, isn't it today?
And the National Interest, nationalinterest.org.
Why?
Oh, yesterday, sorry.
Why Americans don't understand Palestine.
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