By: Bailey Palmer
The relationship between the United States and Israel is peculiar, and given recent developments, quite childish. On Oct. 28, “The Atlantic” published an article titled “The Crisis in U.S.-Israel Relations Is Officially Here.” A bombastic exposé, it quoted U.S. officials complaining about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s intransigence behind closed doors. The attacks were decidedly personal. An incomplete list of adjectives used includes: recalcitrant, myopic, reactionary, obtuse, blustering, pompous, and “Aspergery.”
The author asserted that the wealth of irritation with Netanyahu within the White House was indicative of an impending crisis. The problem with this conclusion is that it leaves out a vital aspect of US-Israeli relationship: It is a “special” relationship. The United States and Israel somehow developed a relationship of unconditional support. The events that followed the publication of the article are a microcosm for U.S.-Israeli relations at large. Netanyahu petulantly claimed that he “was only being attacked because he protected Israeli interests” and further refused to cease expansion despite American pressure to do so. Of course, the United States played nice. John Kerry and Barack Obama repeatedly assured Netanyahu the article was unrepresentative of American policy.
This brings us to the broader question of why this relationship exists in the first place. The United States has a vested interest in finding peace for Israel and Palestine for a multitude of reasons: stability, economic development, and reducing terror. Yet, Israel has repeatedly made compromise difficult by expanding settlements, maintaining a blockade, and effectively occupying the land. Of course, Palestine may be equally to blame, but U.S. officials certainly don’t support their every decision. Arguably, the United States would be better served by a more even-handed approach.
The United States has been allied with Israel since its creation in 1948, but the relationship between the two has not always been so “special.” Until the Johnson administration, there was little favoritism beyond the ties of common interest. When Israel invaded Egypt in 1956, Eisenhower was firm in his demands that Israel relinquish the Sinai Peninsula. This response alarmed the American-Jewish community and galvanized them to form one of the largest and more effective lobbies in America, AIPAC. While there is something to be said for skillful lobbying, the key to AIPAC’s success has been Americans’ receptivity to the Israeli cause. Americans seem to feel a sense of kinship to the Israeli story for many different reasons. Americans identify with the call for a homeland free from religious oppression – it harkens back to the Puritans, one of the country’s defining narratives. It is the kind of self-made success story that Americans love to hear. Within the United States’ own cultural history, Jews figure highly as the “ideal” immigrant. U.S. communities accepted their huddled masses, and they worked hard to become productive members of our society, so the narrative goes. There is almost a sense of responsibility to return the favor.
This idea of “self-made success” has more concrete effects. Jews are more likely to be well-educated, and they are overrepresented in government, centers of higher education, and civil society. This is arguably the result of cultural traditions within the Jewish community, such as an emphasis on education. While this may explain why AIPAC has greater pull in Washington, historical precedents shed more light into the “special” relationship.
In the late ‘50s, Pan-Arabism – an ideology of Arab-wide political unity– was gaining traction under Gamal Abdel Nasser, the charismatic leader of Egypt. Combined with the Soviets’ increased involvement in the Middle East, this trend worried U.S. leaders. Israel seemed a viable counterweight to Soviet influence and armament in the region. It was this consideration, alongside the sizable influence of a growing Jewish lobby that turned the US from a “fair player” to unconditional ally of Israel.
The Six-Day War in 1967 signified a notable shift in the dynamic between the United States and Israel. Israel won the conflict decisively, and, unlike in 1956, the US did not demand the return of Arab territories. Johnson was pro-Israel from the start, and no one wanted to get involved in another conflict with troops in Vietnam. Another interesting, albeit more subtle point: Americans love a victorious underdog, and tiny Israel fit the bill.
In the aftermath of the war, the United States tried to influence Israel to make peace with Egypt by withholding military aid but repeatedly caved. This set the precedent that Israel could act outside of U.S. interests and still expect full support. Later, when the Yom Kippur War caught Israel unprepared, it was only a massive U.S. intervention that saved the country. In the negotiations that followed, the Israeli administration was so uncooperative that President Gerald Ford reassessed their relations by reducing military aid. AIPAC mobilization was so overwhelming – legendarily so – that the U.S. envoy backed down. Israel took advantage of this; in exchange for returning the Sinai to Egypt, they demanded a detailed commitment of protection from the US.
These commitments still hold today. A statement made in May 2014 by the current American envoy to Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations, sums it perfectly:
“The U.S.-Israel relationship has also changed in quite dramatic ways. Only those who know it from the inside – as I have had the privilege to do – can testify to how deep and strong are the ties that now bind our two nations. When President Obama speaks with justifiable pride about those bonds as “unbreakable” he means what he says. And he knows of what he speaks. Unlike the “reassessment” Kissinger did in the Ford Administration, there is one significant difference: President Obama and Secretary Kerry would never suspend U.S.-Israel military relations as their predecessors did back then. Those military relations are too important to both our nations.”
He speaks with pride, unsurprising, given his role. Yet, the “Atlantic” article wasn’t the first article to claim that Israeli-American relations were “in crisis.” Both prescient and ironic, in 1979, “Foreign Affairs” published “The Coming Crisis in Israeli-American Relations.”
Perhaps there is no impending crisis. This, however, is precisely the problem. The United States needs to reevaluate its unequivocal support for Israel. The Israeli-Palestinian problem will never be solved when one side has a free pass to act however it pleases.
