News :: Civil & Human Rights
Walt and Mearshimer: With Friends Like These, Who Needs Anti-Semites?
"The Israel Lobby"
Walt and Mearshimer: With Friends Like These, Who Needs Anti-Semites?
Along with about 150 other people, I checked out the Berkeley stop of the Stephen Walt/John Mearshimer book tour last week. For the rabid anti-Zionists, their book "The Israel Lobby" gives Israel-bashing the mainstream academic pseudo-legitimacy that they have desperately sought for years.
The first thing I noticed at the Berkeley event, despite the fact that it was co-sponsored by Tikkun and moderated by Michael Lerner, was the presence of several well-known local anti-Zionist activists, one of whom was busy handing out postcards advertising the now-annual protest at the December AIPAC dinner in Oakland. (For those unsure of the nomenclature, "anti-Zionist" describes those opposed to the existence of Israel as a Jewish state-- whether they be virulent Jew-haters, pie-in-the-sky "one state solution" idealists, or Neturei Karta ultra-Orthodox extremists). The table at the event held only copies of the W&M book and a flyer from Gush Shalom describing "millions starving in Gaza" (which, if it were actually occurring, would of course be accompanied by extensive video on the same Hamas TV station that airs the wonderful children's show featuring Farfur the Martyr Mouse and Nahool the Jihad Bee).