The Israeli Defence Force’s grotesque slaughter of ‘Freedom Flotilla’ activists trying to break the blockade of the Gaza Strip has rightly been condemned around the world. But in campaigning against Israel the left stands accused of anti-Semitism – what truth is there in the charge?

The state of Israel denies the rights of its own Arab population, and has subjected the occupied territories of the Gaza strip, the West Bank and the Golan Heights to vicious oppression. Israel itself is an artificial state, whose Jewish population attained state-hood primarily as a proxy for western Imperialism in its struggle against the movement to Arab liberation. The Palestinian people have born the brunt of the United States’ sponsorship of Israeli domination of the region. Rightly, freedom-loving people have opposed the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands, and have called for Israel to be replaced by democratic and secular state embracing all people, Palestinian and Jews alike. Israel’s defenders in Washington and Tel Aviv have replied by accusing the state’s critics of anti-Jewish prejudice, and of selective condemnation of the ‘one democracy in the Middle East’.

For years the left resisted the charge of anti-Semitism, rightly arguing that it is nothing more than a smoke-screen to forestall any and all criticism of the West’s domination of the Middle East. Far from being the ‘one democracy in the Middle East’, America’s proxy in the region, Israel, has been used to undermine genuine movements towards democracy and the freedom of the Arab peoples.

Unfortunately, the left’s angry rebuttal of charges of anti-Semitism have become themselves something of a smoke-screen, standing in the way of a cool assessment of the changing dynamics of western policy in the region.

In recent years the left has – without fully understanding why – shifted the ground of its attacks on the Israeli state. Where once the case against Israel was understood as part of a larger campaign against imperialism, it has in recent years restricted its focus to targeting Israeli actions as themselves the barrier to a just settlement between the west and the Arab people.

No longer is Israel seen as the West’s proxy. Rather the case today is that Israel’s undue influence in Washington has led American foreign policy astray. In a depressing turn to anti-Semitism, some parts of the left point the finger at the so-called ‘Israel lobby’ and its imagined stranglehold on American policy makers. Today, this is a view that is shared not just by the left, but is held more widely amongst U.S. and European foreign policy analysts.

Left-wing critics of U.S. foreign policy have tried to isolate the influence of what it called the Israel Lobby to try to explain America’s belligerent stance. According to this argument Jews with power and influence in Washington have subverted America’s role as honest broker. John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt’s 2007 best-seller The Israel Lobby blames Jewish supporters of Israel for the failures of US foreign policy in the Middle East. But the truth is that it was America that imposed a warmongering policy on Israel not the other way around, using its as a proxy to take on radical Arab regimes and Soviet influence.

(Image, Right: anti-Semitic caricature on November 2009's London Gaza demonstration, (c) Spiked)

The left points to the influence of a group of American policy makers they call ‘neo-conservatives’. According to one British-based (and ESRC-funded) website ‘NeoCon Europe’ ‘the movement remains predominantly Jewish in its composition and concerns’.

This website goes on to give a psychological account of the Jewish resentment that has led these ‘neocons’ to conspire to get their hands on power:

‘Resentful of their exclusion from the WASP-dominated elite’ say Neocon Europe, ‘the neocons proceeded to create their own parallel national security establishment’. Further ‘this parallel establishment replaced the traditional foreign policy elite to itself become the new establishment.’

There are many objections to be made to this argument. The first is that most ‘neo-conservatives’ are not Jews. Ronald Reagan, Jeanne Kirkpatrick, Jack Kemp, Francis Fukuyama, William Bennett, and Donald Rumsfeld are not Jews, but they were among the most important proponents of neoconservatism in the twentieth century.

More than that, America has been just as belligerent without the ‘neocons’ anywhere near the Whitehouse – as it was under Bill Clinton’s presidency, and again, more recently under Barack Obama’s. You do not need a conspiracy of Jewish cabals, or alternative establishments of ‘neocon’ influence to explain U.S. imperialism. America’s belligerent role arose out of its need to secure influence and power in the world against people yearning to be free.

One last, destructive element in the mix of attitudes towards Jews is the collapse of Socialism as a political project. The Socialist movement challenged the rule of capitalism. They understood capitalism as a system, not just the malevolent behaviour of individuals: ‘Capital is, therefore, not a personal, it is a social power.’ (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, The Communist Manifesto).

In the wreckage of the Socialist movement a more primitive anti-corporate outlook has grown up. Without the broader ambition of social transformation, anti-capitalist sentiments have reduced to a bitter resentment against individual businessmen. Targeting hate-figures like ‘Fred the Shred’ Goodwin or Bernie Madoff is one way of getting your rocks off – but it has not positive consequences.

Worse, it can encourage targeting of individual businessmen who happen to be Jews. Consider this report of the protests over the Freedom Flotilla in Edinburgh: ‘Several hundred people symbolically blockaded the entrance to Israeli goods retailer Marks & Spencer, with a chant of “Boycott; sanctions; free Palestine!” ringing out.’ (Socialist Worker, 8 June 2010) Many businesses import Israeli goods, but ‘Israeli goods retailer Marks and Spencer’ is a roundabout way of saying ‘Jewish shop-keepers Marks and Spencer’.

Compared to the slaughter carried out by the IDF on the Mavi Marmara it seems like a small matter of getting a bit carried away on a protest. But potentially it is much more than that. Once backing Israel is seen as the actions of individual Jews the temptation to target those Jews gets stronger. Already websites like the Strathclyde University-based SpinWatch are drawing up lists of the names of Jews prominent in supporting Israel.

U.S. policy on Israel is conflicted. Policy-makers know that with American authority in the Middle East in tatters, they must rely on their ally Israel as they have in the past. But at the same time there is a growing belief that Israel is the problem for the U.S.. Those two tendencies side by side create a destructive dynamic. America will not rein Israel in, but it will echo liberal criticisms of Israel in the media. The result satisfies no-one, but only builds the growing perception that Israel is the malevolent force in the world. The temptation for leftists to target ‘Israel Lobby’ and prominent Jews is one that ought to be resisted at all costs.