The idea that Israel’s Lebanon offensive had “nothing to do with Hezbollah” is “nothing short of demented.”

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


In response to an interview with frequent MJ contributor Robert Dreyfuss on Mother Jones Radio, a listener/reader writes:

To the Editors of Mother Jones:

I was in the past an occasional reader of Mother Jones and have recently re-engaged with the magazine through your podcasts, which, up until recently, I have quite enjoyed. This changed when I heard the July 30, 2006 interview with Robert Dreyfuss, which was truly
shocking. My impression was that Mother Jones had embraced a moderate leftist political stance, but Mr. Dreyfuss’ hateful diatribe against Israeli and U.S. policy was anything but moderate, anything but reasoned. [Rather, it was] the rant of an ill-tempered ideologue.

I think the crux of the matter was reached when Mr. Dreyfuss claimed that Israel’s attack in Lebanon had “nothing to do with Hezbollah” and “nothing to do with Syria”, but was only an attempt to drag the U.S. into conflict with Iran. Mr. Dreyfuss seems driven by a theological hatred of the Bush administration, and while it is unlikely that Mr. Dreyfuss despises Bush et al. more than I do, that is not an excuse for the public articulation of unsupported, near rabid attacks on his political enemies, in which clearly Israel has equal footing [with] the Bush administration.

The fact that Hezbollah has been attacking Israel for years on a small scale, dictating the terms of the conflict, killing people here and there, while supporting Hamas and engaging in various terrorist excursions is not in dispute. Many critics would advocate a “measured
response”. That is, when Hezbollah sends over a few rockets, injures or kills the odd Israeli, Israel should be expected to do no more than respond in kind. In other words, Hezbollah gets to set the terms and the timetable of the conflict, justify[ing] its belligerent existence to Lebanon in a never-ending conflict with Israel, while giving courage and leadership to those who would attack Israeli and Jewish targets around the world. The fact that Iran trained and largely armed Hezbollah is also not in dispute. So that when Israel, or more or less anyone, says that Hezbollah is an arm of Iranian foreign policy, it does not follow that Israel’s desire to wipe out this incessant threat on its border is a ruse intended to steer the U.S. toward confrontation with Iran.

Whatever you might think of the Israeli offensive in Lebanon, the idea
that it had nothing to do with Hezbollah is nothing short of demented.
For Mr. Dreyfuss to portray Israel as the bully of the Middle East, leading the U.S around on a leash, while he expresses sympathy for the “poor” (Mr. Dreyfuss’ word) Syrians is utterly repellant and entirely immoral. It is true, as he says, that Syria does not want a war with Israel, but this does not stop them from funneling, along with (and largely from) Iran, huge quantities of state-of-the-art weaponry to Hezbollah in order to conduct a proxy war.

One final note: in the absence of substantiating claims for his wild theories, Mr. Dreyfuss in the July 30th interview repeatedly justified his views by saying the “whole word” shares his views of Israel and the U.S. Apart from that not actually being an argument of any kind, the whole world he refers to is overrepresented by Muslim countries who constitute a billion people, and who in most cases have been steeped in long-term propagandist hate-mongering against Israel. Many
in Western Europe also share Mr. Dreyfuss’ anti-Israeli feelings, but between the ever-growing acceptance of anti-Semitism in Western Europe (presumably, hopefully, not an issue for a man named Dreyfuss), and the large representation of Muslim populations in Western European protests, Mr. Dreyfuss has put himself in some very distasteful company indeed.

What do you think? Comment below or write in to backtalk@motherjones.com

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate