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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. It was not only correct, but also easy, to dismiss fringe figures such as Noam Chomsky (who somehow parlayed his expertise in linguistics into extreme leftist politics) and Norman Finkelstein (who somehow parlayed professional failure at 3 different universities into becoming the Jew most beloved by anti-Semites). Walt and Mearshimer bring much more gravitas to the debate. However, they bring very little else that is new, and their analysis of history and politics in the Middle East conveniently leaves out much that undermines their thesis.

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