[lbo-talk] The Banality of anti-Israel Lobby Doctrine

Seth Kulick skulick at seas.upenn.edu
Wed Aug 11 07:43:14 PDT 2010


Michael Pollack wrote:


> No, dominant factions are still factions. (Also I believe SA is arguing
that you are overstating that -- that a lot "have a problem with it," but accept it as a fact of life. Just as a lot of economists have a problem with the home interest deduction, but accept it as a fact of life.)

It seems to me that for all the discussion regarding this topic on the left, there has been relatively little, perhaps zero, discussion on how different understandings of the Israeli lobby impact on activist tactics and strategies. I have not seen anything from Blankfort, Mondoweiss, Counterpunch, etc. on what should be done differently. This was the basic point in the first Blankfort/Chomsky "debate" in the old National Guardian from 1991 (which I still have a copy of, having read it and saved it at the time). So the entire discussion is more or less pointless, in my opinion. Interesting as history and understanding of foreign policy decisions, etc., but I just don't see how it impacts on what people should do. Suppose one takes a Blankfort view of the lobby instead of the Chomsky view, to whatever extent that's even a coherent thing to say. Then what?

Seth



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