The most persuasive arguments tend to be those that do not inflame the sensitivities of others and through the means of civil debates, can result in some sort of compromise. While those who yell and scream their way through disagreements by arguing with their emotions over reason may sway the opinions of those around them in the short term, they will eventually disenchant their listeners in the long run with these same tirades.
By taking this understanding from an individual level and applying it to the public stage, I would like to point out that many pro-Israel lobbies in the United States are the equivalency on a macro-level to our overenthusiastic debater, described above. Ever since the violence of the 1991 Gulf War, Israel has yet to see public opinion ratings reach the same heights, even during the 2006 War in Lebanon when Israel repeatedly clashed with terrorist organizations stationed in Lebanon. This is not to say that the majority of Americans don’t support Israel, but rather to point out that the avalanche of self-righteous content that has been produced by both Israeli and pro-Israeli Jewish lobbying groups has grown to levels counterproductive to their aims.
Thanks to the funding, inspiration and support of these lobbyists, we have reached a time where ridiculous Internet domain names such as HonestReporting.com can openly claim to both “promote fairness” and “ensure accuracy” despite a mission statement which seems to care little for such ideals. The site all but endorses pro-Israel propaganda behind statements which claim that their “efforts are changing the face of the media and reporting of Israel throughout the world.” Other organizations such as Campus Watch, founded by conservative thinker Daniel Pipes in 2002, does nothing but tout those views in line with pro-Israeli lobbies at college campuses across the United States. Often opposing viewpoints are cited as faulty due to “analytical errors,” “extremism” or “intolerance,” in the name of what Campus Watch claims is the tendency of professors to engage in abuses of power during class time; don’t for a second believe that this doesn’t affect you — Binghamton University itself lays claims to some of the names listed on the Web site and the ideas produced by those people which Campus Watch tends to distort.
Even close allies of Israel have been able to attest to the harmful effects of both the Jewish and Israeli lobbying groups in the U.S. Shah Reza Pahlavi of Iran, a close ally of the Israeli government prior to his overthrow, expressed his concern to Mike Wallace in 1976. When asked if he believed that Jewish lobbies garner too much power in the United States to further Israeli interests, he responded, “I think so. Sometimes they are disserving the interests of Israel [by] pushing around too many people” while later in the interview particularly stressing the influence these lobbies have in American media. Thirty-three years later and these words still ring true today; the lobbies targeted by Pahlavi cannot continue to claim an anti-Israeli bias in both the media and academia when leading newspapers such as The New York Times, regarded as one of finer journalistic publications in the United States, continue to report Israeli deaths at a rate 2.8 times greater than the deaths of their Palestinian neighbors (according to the If Americans Knew organization, which notes all deaths mentioned in the headlines or first paragraphs of deaths relating to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict).
While the pro-Israeli lobbying groups continue to drown out opposing viewpoints, it is only a matter of time before their kicking, screaming and whining grows old and Americans begin to wonder more about the Palestinian viewpoint to the ongoing conflict between these parties. The messages of pro-Israeli lobbyists is beginning to wear thin on the American people. Whichever party may be right, whichever may be wrong, this conflict is one that requires compromise between the people of Israel and Palestine alone. Meanwhile, here in the United States, we have an incoming president who ran on a platform which spoke of breaking free from powerful lobbyists — one can only hope Barack Obama delivers on his word. It is becoming increasingly obvious that multimillion-dollar lobbying groups have no place in the United States, particularly when attempting to trick the public or our government into favoring one party over the other.