International relations scholars John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt published a critique of the Israel lobby in 'The London Review of Books' March 23, 2006. In "The Israel Lobby," Mearsheimer and Walt argued that a wide-ranging coalition including neoconservatives, Christian Zionists, leading journalists and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) exerts a "stranglehold" on US Middle East policy and public debate on the issue. While supporting the moral cause for the existence of Israel, Mearsheimer and Walt argued there was neither a strategic nor a moral interest in the United States's siding so strongly with post-occupation Israel. Many US citizens believed the Iraq War was about oil, but "the war was motivated in good part by a desire to make Israel more secure," according to the authors. Philip Weiss reports on the response to the article which continues to resonate, and the background to its publication.