The US has been devoting more attention to Israel than it deserves at the cost of ignoring more weighty problems that Washington faces today, says Harvard professor Stephen M. Walt
An Israeli flag and an American flag fly at Abu Dhabi International Airport before the arrival of Israeli and US officials, in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on August 31, 2020.
He says the US should have a normal relationship with Israel, similar to Washington’s relationships with most other countries.published on Thursday, Walt says that Israel's moral support by the US may have been justified in the past, considering the persecution of Jews by the Christian West. But the moral case for this support was compelling only if one ignores the consequences for the people who have been living in Palestine for centuries, he adds.
It can be argued that during the Cold War days Israel was a strategic US partner, Walt says, as backing Israel was an effective way to check Soviet influence in the Middle East. However, he said, for the US the actual costs of this special relationship with Israel is more political than economic.‘Israel gets more US attention than it deserves’
The second political cost of this special relationship is that Israel exceedingly gets more of the US foreign policy attention than it deserves, Walt says. For example, negotiating a new deal with Iran over its nuclear programme would be far easier if the US did not face constant opposition from the Netanyahu government.