The erudite Jerome Chanes has (mostly) positive things to say about my book in the latest NY Jewish Week. Love the opening line: “Oy! Yet another book on the `Israel lobby.’”
Author: Dan Fleshler
The Egos at AIPAC
In the official indictment of ex-AIPACers Steven Rosen and Keith Weisman and their Pentagon contact Larry Franklin, there is a tidbit that hints at the role of egos and self-aggrandizement in the lobby’s day-to-day activities. This topic is related to something I discuss in my book, which conveys how AIPAC and the conventional Israel lobby […]
Errors in my book
I am mortified by a few factual errors in the book. They are the product of careless copyediting and proofreading. In fact, they are mystifying because they are so obvious, and I am not even sure how they got into the manuscript in the first place, let alone how I missed them during proofreading. Before […]
Who deserves award for the most stupid behavior in Jane Harman fracas?
We still don’t know a great deal about the Jane Harman affair, in which she allegedly agreed to try to intercede in the Justice Department’s investigation of two former AIPAC employees. But I believe we now have incontrovertible proof of the utter stupidity exhibited by some of the main players. Here are my current nominees […]
Ace reporter: American Jewish leaders are getting nervous about Obama
The well-connected and astute James Besser is hearing from American Jewish learders who are concerned that Obama will ignore conventional political wisdom and not worry (too much) about battling “the pro-Israel establishment.” He tells us: Last month Obama said “the status quo is unsustainable,” and he sounded like he meant it. For many pro-Israel leaders […]
Is praise from Philip Weiss the kiss of death?
Uh oh. Philip Weiss had nice things to say about me and my book in a recent post. Did he just ruin my life? Walt and Mearsheimer, let us remember, were castigated because David Duke promoted them on his web site. Should I worry for similar reasons? I am sometimes deeply offended by what Weiss […]
New spin from Israel’s desperate foreign ministry
Imagine the consternation among the career staffers at Israel’s foreign ministry after their new boss, Avigdor Lieberman, said that Israel was not bound by prior agreements and explicitly mentioned Annapolis. It was hard enough for them to adjust a few years ago, when Tzipe Livni started to sound more like a Peace Now activist, ca […]
Why not call Netanyahu’s bluff on “economic peace?”
Prime Minister Netanyahu still hasn’t given up on the idea of forging an “economic peace” with the Palestinians, Bloomberg reports. Last week, at a meeting in Washington, I heard Yossi Beilin tell some left-learning, pro-Israel American Jews that they –and the Israeli left– should take Netanyahu at his word. “If he wants economic peace, let’s […]
J Street poll: for some American Jews, “evenhandedness” doesn’t go far enough
There has been much ado about the latest J Street poll of American Jews. The most important finding, as noted in the survey analysis, is that “Jews want America to be much more aggressive in its Middle East peace efforts than it is today.” 87% of respondents said they supported the United States playing an […]
Jeffrey Goldberg laments the Jewish “Cossacks”
Jeffrey Goldberg appears to be the new punching bag of left-leaning bloggers and Walt/Mearsheimer realists who focus on Israel and the American Jewish community. After Goldberg opposed the Chas. Freeman nomination, my dear friend and fellow-traveller MJ Rosenberg (who wrote the Foreward to my breathlessly anticipated, long-awaited book) lumped Goldberg into the same category as […]