The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy
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Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #1984 in Books
- Published on: 2007-08-27
- Released on: 2007-08-27
- Number of items: 1
- Binding: Hardcover
- 496 pages
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Expanding on their notorious 2006 article in the London Review of Books, the authors increase the megatonnage of their explosive claims about the malign influence of the pro-Israel lobby on the U.S. government. Mearsheimer and Walt, political scientists at the University of Chicago and Harvard, respectively, survey a wide coalition of pro-Israel groups and individuals, including American Jewish organizations and political donors, Christian fundamentalists, neo-con officials in the executive branch, media pundits who smear critics of Israel as anti-Semites and the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee, which they characterize as having an almost unchallenged hold on Congress. This lobby, they contend, has pressured the U.S. government into Middle East policies that are strategically and morally unjustifiable: lavish financial subsidies for Israel despite its occupation of Palestinian territories; needless American confrontations with Israel's foes Syria and Iran; uncritical support of Israel's 2006 bombing of Lebanon, which violated the laws of war; and the Iraq war, which almost certainly would not have occurred had [the Israel lobby] been absent. The authors disavow conspiracy mongering, noting that the lobby's activities constitute legitimate, if misguided, interest-group politics, as American as apple pie. Considering the authors' academic credentials and the careful reasoning and meticulous documentation with which they support their claims, the book is bound to rekindle the controversy. (Sept.)
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Review
“Controversial.” —Terry Gross, Fresh Air, NPR
“It could not be more timely.” —David Bromwich, The Huffington Post
“The strategic questions they raise now, particularly about Israel’s privileged relationship with the United States, are worth debating.” —David Remnick. The New Yorker
“Ruthlessly realistic.” —William Grimes, The New York Times
“The argument they present is towering and clear and about time.” —Philip Weiss, Mondoweiss.com
“Mearsheimer, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, and Walt, on the faculty at Harvard, set off a political firestorm.” —Jay Solomon, The Wall Street Journal.com
“Promises controversy on a scale not seen since Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations sought to reframe a new world order.” —Stefan Halper, National Interest.com
“Deals with Middle East policymaking at a time when America’s problems in that region surpass our problems anywhere else . . . People are definitely arguing about it. It’s also the kind of book you do not have to agree with on every count (I certainly don’t) to benefit from reading.” —MJ Rosenberg, Israel Policy Forum Newsletter
About the Author
John J. Mearsheimer is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science and the co-director of the Program on International Security Policy at the University of Chicago. He has published several books, including The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.
Stephen M. Walt is the Belfer Professor of International Affairs at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and was academic dean of the Kennedy School from 2002 to 2006. He is the author of Taming American Power: The Global Response to U.S. Primacy, among other books.
Customer Reviews
The Failure of Democracy
A splendid, well researched tome on how money buys influence to pander to dogma. The annotations are impeccable.
The Israeli Lobby
This book initially angered me so much that I had to stop reading it for awhile. I could not, or did not, want to believe what it said. A week or two after the initial anger, I decided to sit down and read it and it is an eye opener.
I find the evidence compelling and I agree to the extent that I believe our government has been manipulated into a lop-sided foreign policy favoring only Israel -- something that has to change if we are to become an honest broker in any peace attempt in the region. I've seen too much of the destruction rendered by Israel's bombs in Lebanon to believe anything else.
That these authors had the courage to swim against the tide of popular opinion in the U.S., however misguided that opinion may be, is a credit to their effort. Whether all of their statements are fact will be up to the historians. But what they say is, for me, substantive.
Comprehensive study, Great Book
They displayed the highest level of academic integrity as well as an unbiased look into the influence of the Israeli Lobby.



