Many people have recently shared a video with great enthusiasm featuring former President Barack Obama speaking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Obama’s description of the conflict as “complex” is a fallacy—specifically, an ‘argument from complexity’. This claim was presented alongside a collection of irrelevant facts, despite the situation in Palestine being a clear case for decolonization.
Obama’s statement that he could not resolve the conflict during his term in office has proven to be a missed opportunity. Lawrence Wright demonstrates in his book “Thirteen Days in September: Carter, Begin, and Sadat at Camp David” that Jimmy Carter forced Menachem Begin to make peace and return the Sinai. Similarly, Obama could have forced Israel to sign a peace treaty and end the occupation.
Even if the argument from Israel supporters were true that Israel must continue the occupation for security reasons, it does not follow that the settlements are necessary. Therefore, Obama could have compelled Israel to stop building settlements and to continue the occupation solely with the military.
But let’s not forget that Obama himself suggested that peace was possible. In a statement to The Jerusalem Post, he said: “Before I leave office, I would like to bring a resolution to the UN Security Council that would set parameters for Israeli-Palestinian peace, stating the guidelines for the principles of a peace agreement, a Palestinian state, the final status of Jerusalem, and overall permanent borders based on the 1967 lines.” Such a proposal suggests that a peace plan was indeed within the sphere of influence of the American president.
Not complexity, but internal American politics is the reason
The following quote from Obama’s memoirs refutes his own argument in the video:
“By the time I took office, though, most congressional Republicans had abandoned any pretense of caring about what happened to the Palestinians. Indeed, a strong majority of white evangelicals—the GOP’s most reliable voting bloc—believed that the creation and gradual expansion of Israel fulfilled God’s promise to Abraham and heralded Christ’s eventual return. On the Democratic side, even stalwart progressives were loath to look less pro-Israel than Republicans, especially since many of them were Jewish themselves or represented sizable Jewish constituencies.
Also, members of both parties worried about crossing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a powerful bipartisan lobbying organization dedicated to ensuring unwavering U.S. support for Israel. AIPAC’s clout could be brought to bear on virtually every congressional district in the country, and just about every politician in Washington—including me—counted AIPAC members among their key supporters and donors. In the past, the organization had accommodated a spectrum of views on Middle East peace, insisting mainly that those seeking its endorsement support a continuation of U.S. aid to Israel and oppose efforts to isolate or condemn Israel via the U.N. and other international bodies. But as Israeli politics had moved to the right, so had AIPAC’s policy positions. Its staff and leaders increasingly argued that there should be “no daylight” between the U.S. and Israeli governments, even when Israel took actions that were contrary to U.S. policy. Those who criticized Israeli policy too loudly risked being tagged as “anti-Israel” (and possibly anti-Semitic) and confronted with a well-funded opponent in the next election.
I’d been on the receiving end of some of this during my presidential campaign, as Jewish supporters reported having to beat back assertions in their synagogues and on email chains that I was insufficiently supportive of—or even hostile toward—Israel. They attributed these whisper campaigns not to any particular position I’d taken (my backing of a two-state solution and opposition to Israeli settlements were identical to the positions of the other candidates) but rather to my expressions of concern for ordinary Palestinians; my friendships with certain critics of Israeli policy, including an activist and Middle East scholar named Rashid Khalidi.”1Barack Obama (2020) A Promised Land
Obama is right here. In America, there are enough voters who consider it very important to help Israel gain more territory. They don’t need to be numerous. Let me make an analogy. Imagine that in the Netherlands there are only two parties, as in America, and that the elections usually end almost in a tie: 50% of the voters vote for party A and 50% for party B. Now imagine that 5% of the voters find it extremely important that more bike lanes are built. They consider this so important that they always vote for the party that promises more bicycle paths. It would be foolish for the two parties not to promise bike lanes because 5% of the votes would automatically go to the other party, which would likely decide the election.
The same applies in the US. The lobbying organization “Christians United for Israel” represents 10 million voters, which is 5% of the votes. They always vote for the party that acts in Israel’s favor. Therefore, both parties will be biased in favor of Israel.
Antisemitism
Many Western politicians believe that Jews exert a significant influence on world politics, and their antisemitism often results in pro-Israel policies. Take, for example, this quote about the Balfour Declaration:
“Although other factors played their part, Jonathan Schneer says that stereotypical thinking by British officials about Jews also played a role in the decision to issue the Declaration. Robert Cecil, Hugh O’Bierne and Sir Mark Sykes all held an unrealistic view of “world Jewry”, the former writing “I do not think it is possible to exaggerate the international power of the Jews.” Zionist representatives saw advantage in encouraging such views. James Renton concurs, writing that the British foreign policy elite, including Prime Minister David Lloyd George and Foreign Secretary A.J. Balfour, believed that Jews possessed real and significant power that could be of use to them in the war.”
John Judis shows in his book “Genesis: Truman, American Jews, and the Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict” that Truman initially supported the Arabs, but changed his mind for two reasons: he was overwhelmed by Christian and Jewish lobbies, and he believed this would have an influence on the elections. Judis writes:
“Jews made up only about 4 percent of the electorate nationally, but they had considerable clout in New York—the nation’s largest and most important state—and some influence over results in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Maryland. In New York that year, a Senate seat, the governorship, and forty-five House seats were being contested. Ohio had a closely watched Senate race. And with Truman unpopular—a dismal 40 percent approval rating in that fall’s opinion polls—these races were expected to be so close that a shift of a few percentage points toward the GOP in the Jewish vote could make a large difference.”
Historically, there was initially no significant pro-Palestinian lobby, and even today it is quite weak. The now more powerful Arab lobby is more concerned with self-enrichment and acquiring more weapons than with advocating for the Palestinians. This means that politicians have more to gain from being pro-Israel than pro-Palestinian.
Politicians do not like to be called Jew-haters
Benjamin Netanyahu writes the following in his autobiography:
“Newspapers back then still wielded a powerful influence over public opinion, especially their editorial and op-ed pages. I looked up the fifty top newspapers in the United States. Our ten consulates covered the areas in which they were published and distributed. If each consulate submitted an op-ed article to their local papers every few months, we could produce a critical mass of op-eds to influence the senators, members of Congress and other decision makers who read those pages.
I set up a small cottage industry in the embassy to prepare and distribute the op-eds. Sharply crafted by writers I recruited, they were signed by Israel’s consuls. I allowed the consuls to insert changes to suit their particular audiences. If they submitted good op-eds on their own, I encouraged that, too. Soon we blanketed the key opinion markets of the United States with a steady stream of pro-Israeli op-eds debunking the vilifications leveled against us. Nothing on this scale had been done in America since my father published his ads during World War II.”
Not only Netanyahu’s opinion industry but also numerous Western columnists put pressure on Western governments. Take for instance Leon de Winter, who calls the officials of the Foreign Affairs antisemites whenever they vote for a UN resolution. For politicians, it seems more rational to pursue a pro-Israel policy than to risk a portion of the electorate who believe they are antisemites.
In conclusion
Every country has three legal obligations: not to support Israel in annexing occupied territory, to enforce Israel’s respect for humanitarian law, and to support the Palestinians in realizing their right to self-determination. However, governments ignore these duties because they believe it benefits their vote count. So, when Obama says he couldn’t do anything about it, that is not true.
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