The Israel lobby - The influence of AIPAC on US Foreign PolicyThis lobby, Mearsheimer and Walt contend, has pressured the U.S. government into Middle East policies that are strategically and morally unjustifiable: lavish financial subsidies for Israel despite its occupation of Palestinian territories; needless American confrontations with Israel's foes Syria and Iran; uncritical support of Israel's 2006 bombing of Lebanon, which violated the laws of war; and the Iraq war, which almost certainly would not have occurred had [the Israel lobby] been absent.
Remember the Roman empire. For a long long time the state of Judea behaved in ways, which annoyed the Romans, but did not do them any harm. At the point at which they were becoming a nuisance, the Romans turned against them, destroyed their Temple, wiped them out, told them: an empire has bigger concerns than you. This is what Israel faces in the next 25 years. The risk that the American empire will say, wait a minute, you don't matter to us so much, either because we need oil more than we need you, or because oil is no longer important, doesn't matter, you are more trouble than you are worth. And the issue of the Holocaust and anti-semitism is declining with the demographic move to the next generation. This is a catastrophe for Israel, because Israel has no other friends in the world.
