The Future of US-Israeli Relations

Survival Global Politics and Strategy ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/tsur20 The Future of US–Israeli Relations Jonathan Rynhold To cite this article: Jonathan Rynhold (2021) The Future of US–Israeli Relations, Survival, 63:5, 121-146, DOI: 10.1080/00396338.2021.1982202 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00396338.2021.1982202 Published online: 28 Sep 2021. Submit your article to this journal View related articles View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=tsur20 The Future of US–Israeli Relations Jonathan Rynhold The year 2021 has seen a changing of the guard in the United States and Israel. The door is now closed on four years of exceptionally close relations between the administration of Donald Trump, a one-term Republican president, and the government of Benjamin Netanyahu, the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history. They were bound closely together by personal political interests, populist right-wing rhetoric, and shared positions on Iran and the Palestinians. The Democratic administration of Joe Biden presents a vastly different face to the world than its predecessor, as does the new Israeli government headed by freshman right-wing Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and centre-left Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, who is slated to take over as prime minister in two years. It is the most ideologically diverse government coalition in Israeli history, with the slimmest of parliamentary majorities. Thus, it is unlikely to complete its four-year parliamentary term. The new teams face many testing issues on which their perspectives diverge, most notably how to deal with Iran’s nuclear programme. Yet the main challenge to the long-term viability of the special relationship depends mainly on American domestic politics, in which a sharp and unprecedented decline in Democrats’ sympathy for Israel is threatening bipartisan support. Under the Biden administration, the relationship is unlikely to be as synchronised as it was during the Trump–Netanyahu years. At the same time, the working relationship stands to be far better, and the policy gaps Jonathan Rynhold is a professor in the Political Studies Department at Bar-Ilan University. Survival | vol. 63 no. 5 | October–November 2021 | pp. 121–146 DOI 10.1080/00396338.2021.1982202 122 | Jonathan Rynhold less pronounced, than during the Obama–Netanyahu era. In the short term, the Iranian nuclear issue will be difficult to manage. In the medium term, however, the relationship has arguably been strengthened insofar as the Israeli–Palestinian conflict no longer blocks strategic cooperation between Israel and America’s Gulf Arab allies, which is helpful to an America determined to diminish its military role in the region. Longer term, the new Israeli government has the potential to arrest and reverse the decline in bipartisan US support for Israel, though this will remain a challenge without progress towards a two-state solution. A special relationship One of reasons the US–Israeli relationship is distinctive is that it is based on more than national interests. Israel holds a unique place in the American political imagination and an important role in American domestic politics. Another special characteristic of the relationship is the depth, breadth and quality of cooperation. Israel has received more US foreign aid than any other country, and on preferential terms. The US has used its UN Security Council veto on Israel’s behalf more than for any other ally or partner. The US has also served as Israel’s main arms supplier and is statutorily committed to preserving Israel’s ‘qualitative edge’. The web of close, longstanding ties between their respective elites and the institutionalisation of cooperation across a range of spheres have afforded the bilateral relationship considerable resilience through multiple crises. Biden himself has embraced the relationship. His personal support for Israel is deeply rooted, and his extensive ties with the country go back to his visit in 1973, when he met Golda Meir, then prime minister, which he often mentions. Unlike Bernie Sanders and other leading Democrats, Biden has refused point-blank to impose conditions on military aid to Israel. During the recent war between Hamas and Israel, Biden was firm in his support for Israel, blocking several hostile Security Council resolutions.1 The Biden administration has welcomed the new government and is engaged in ongoing, wide-ranging consultation.2 In contrast to Netanyahu’s government, the new Israeli team has stressed the need to work closely with the Democratic administration, attempting to resolve differences in The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 123 private.3 Though personal relations are not as intimate as they were between Netanyahu and Trump, the insults and public confrontations that marked the Netanyahu–Obama era are unlikely to return for the foreseeable future. Pillars of the relationship There has been much debate as to what factor has most sustained the special relationship. Some argue that it is Israel’s status as a strategic asset, others that it is the pro-Israel lobby, still others that the glue is shared values and Israel’s resonance in American political culture.4 Each of these factors has a significant effect on the relationship, though their relative importance has varied significantly over time, and none alone explains American support for Israel. America’s sense of fraternity with Israel is widespread and long-standing.5 Since Israel’s founding in 1948, US presidents have recognised a special duty to protect Israel. The American public has consistently supported Israel over the Arab states and the Palestinians by a margin of about 3:1. For many, especially Christian evangelicals, the Hebrew Bible mandates support for Israel. About half of Americans believe that God gave the land that is now Israel to the Jewish people – including majorities of black and Hispanic Protestants, and about a third of non-Hispanic Catholics, in contradiction to official Catholic dogma. Support for Israel, originally informed by a Protestant theology, has become part of the wider culture. Many Americans also feel that the United States has a special duty to support human rights and democracy worldwide that extends emphatically to Israel in light of the Holocaust. In 2008, more than 80% of Americans agreed that the two countries shared common values, including a commitment to freedom and democracy. In assessing Americans’ attitudes to foreign countries, however, the nature of a country’s political regime is paramount. Of the 20 countries referred to by Gallup in its annual poll, the eight most popular are democracies, the 12 least popular non-democracies.6 For the overwhelming majority of Democrats, Israel’s democratic character is more important than its Jewish character. Accordingly, whether Israel was moving towards a two-state solution has been key to Democratic approval of Israeli governments. Furthermore, polling suggests that, if the two-state solution were off the 124 | Jonathan Rynhold table, many Democrats would favour a one-state solution that theoretically preserved Israel’s democratic character even while compromising its Jewish character.7 In 2020, the liberal Jewish-American commentator Peter Beinart, a previous supporter of the two-state solution, called for the adoption of a democratic one-state solution.8 Enthusiasm for this idea among Israelis and Palestinians alike is negligible, even as support for the two-state solution is declining. Nevertheless, the continuing gap between Democrats’ political ideals and the situation on the ground threatens to erode bipartisan underpinnings of the special relationship. Since 2015, a rising proportion of Democrats has supported sanctions against Israel for building Jewish settlements in the West Bank. The core of the pro-Israel lobby is the US Jewish community. Since the mid-1990s, evangelicals have come to play an increasingly important role. Pastor John Hagee’s Christians United for Israel claims to have two million members. The pro-Israel lobby, represented primarily by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), leverages vague feelings of sympathy for Israel into focused policy positions. This can deter an administration from applying heavy pressure on Israel. However, the claim that the ‘Israel lobby’ is the driving force behind US policy, advanced by John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt (among others), is greatly exaggerated.9 AIPAC tends to be most successful in dealing with economic matters such as aid. If an administration makes a given issue a priority, it is likely to overcome resistance from AIPAC, especially if the issue is diplomatic or strategic in nature, such as the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) – that is, the Iran nuclear deal. During the Cold War, the US feared that the Soviet bloc would gain control of oil in the Middle East and then be able to pressure Western Europe and Japan, which were dependent on that oil, to adopt a neutral stance, thereby shifting the global balance of power against the United States. Subsequently, the US feared that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq or the Islamic Republic of Iran might convert oil revenue and market dominance into coercive power, blocking energy supplies to the global economy in the event of geopolitical conflict in the Gulf and ultimately threatening America itself with weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 125 Against this background, Israel and the US have worked together against common enemies, and Israel has proven to be America’s most militarily powerful and politically reliable ally in the Middle East. The US has benefitted from Israeli ingenuity in the fields of intelligence, missile defence and counter-terrorism. Israel has also demonstrated its exceptional operational abilities, conducting cyber and other operations, some in conjunction with the US, that disrupted the Iranian nuclear programme.10 But the bilateral relationship has imposed strategic costs on the US by complicating US relations with the Arab world. To resolve this tension, the US has promoted the Arab–Israeli peace process, and the deepening of the strategic relationship has often been tied to progress in this area. American and Israeli strategic calculations In the first few years of its existence, Israel was heavily dependent on financial support provided by the US government and American Jews. In the 1970s, Israel was far stronger, yet US governmental aid shot up to between 10 and 20% of Israel’s GDP.11 Israel also became reliant on American arms and diplomatic support after the Soviet bloc and many African countries broke off diplomatic relations and many Western European countries reversed their pro-Israel orientation between 1967 and 1973. Today Israel is considerably stronger. It still receives substantial military aid, but this constitutes about 1% of its GDP. Israel is among the top ten arms suppliers in the world and now has diplomatic relations with 162 of the 193 UN member states. Nevertheless, Israel’s strategic relationship with the US remains of central importance.12 The US is Israel’s principal arms supplier, helping to guarantee its qualitative edge. Any diminution of US involvement in the Middle East generates a vacuum, which tends to be filled by less friendly or downright hostile actors. Witness the concern in the Israeli security establishment when Trump announced the withdrawal of US forces from Syria, and Israeli officials’ belief that the US pull-out from Afghanistan would lead to renewed transnational jihadist attacks against Israeli – as well as American – targets.13 Israel cannot easily deal with a potential challenge from Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey regarding its exploitation of gas reserves in the Mediterranean, even with Greece and Cyprus as partners.14 Most crucially, 126 | Jonathan Rynhold Israel needs American support to deal effectively with the threat of a nucleararmed Iran. US diplomatic support also influences the positions of many other countries towards Israel and is especially important in the UN Security Council. The Israeli public understands this, ranking relations with the US as more important to Israeli security than any factor other than the military power of Israel itself, including territorial and peace agreements.15 One of the few points of cross-party consensus in the US is the need to focus more on containing China. For many, pivoting to Asia requires reducing the American military footprint in, and shifting US resources away from, the Middle East. According to advocates of this approach, this makes sense because the US is very close to being self-sufficient in terms of energy.16 The US still has strategic interests in the Middle East Yet the US still has major strategic interests in the Middle East. The region accounts for one-third of global oil production and about half of proven oil reserves. While the role of renewable energy is set to expand, it is not projected to crowd out fossil fuels in the global energy market until sometime between 2050 and 2070.17 Energy independence protects against a tar- geted embargo, but oil prices are determined by global supply and demand. Consequently, independence cannot shield the US from the economic and political chaos that a cut in supply of these resources to the global economy for a significant period would produce. International trade accounts for over a quarter of America’s GDP, and many of its most important trading partners are in Asia, which remains heavily dependent on Middle Eastern energy. Even allowing for the increasing availability of diverse sources of oil within a global market, the US retains a strategic interest in preventing a hostile power, such as Iran, from gaining control of a dominant share of regional energy resources. The US also has a standing strategic interest in preventing a hostile state from obtaining WMD.18 Furthermore, the continued presence of US forces in the Gulf has implications for the balance of power in Asia. The US presence blocks China from establishing itself militarily in the Gulf, thereby preventing China from increasing its economic leverage over America’s Asian allies. It also affords The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 127 the US potential leverage over China, which gets 40–50% of its oil from the Gulf. Eventually, Asian states may be able to rely more on alternative sources of energy, but in the short to medium term, the possibility of a cut in supply from the Middle East could increase China’s willingness to take aggressive risks in the Far East. Overall, then, the US retains a vital interest in ensuring a stable, pro-American balance of power in the Middle East. Israel remains a key player in maintaining that balance. US support for Israel has been tied to an internationalist grand strategy characterised by active global leadership and robust alliances – an approach that has dominated US foreign policy since 1941. Barack Obama was certainly an internationalist, though notably wary about using military force and particularly about fighting another war in the greater Middle East. Trump favoured a less internationalist strategy, though the Republican Party remains divided on the issue, and coincidentally shared Obama’s distaste for protracted military engagement in the region. Indeed, even some of the most high-profile advocates of an expansive US Middle East policy have changed their minds.19 The Biden administration too favours restraint in the region, and is cutting back on America’s military presence there, withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan and ending their combat mission in Iraq. But Biden is a resolute internationalist, and this selective retrenchment does not signal a withdrawal from the region, much less isolationism. Biden has sought to repair and reinvigorate relations with America’s allies. Both Israel and the US are committed to preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons and to containing it across the region. Iranian attacks on shipping in the Gulf in August 2021 highlighted this interest, as they touched on the primary strategic rationale for the American presence there: to ensure freedom of navigation and maintain the flow of oil.20 In terms of capabilities, Israel is well placed to contribute significantly to the containment effort. Its extensive airstrikes have held back Iranian forces in Syria. An audacious Israeli intelligence operation in Tehran secured a trove of valuable material about the Iranian nuclear programme.21 More generally, the US military remains eager to benefit from Israel’s technological innovation and combat experience – for example, its use of cutting-edge artificial-intelligence technology during the 2021 conflict with Hamas.22 128 | Jonathan Rynhold Furthermore, in the current political context, Israel’s relative strategic value to the US is enhanced because of a decrease in the number of alternative partners and a dramatic decline in the regional political costs of bilateral cooperation. With Egypt preoccupied with domestic challenges, and Turkey’s reliability as an ally highly questionable, Israel’s relative strategic utility to the US has grown. In addition, the Biden administration will give greater weight to human-rights violations in its foreign policy than did the Trump administration. This consideration counts against Erdogan. Moreover, Biden, unlike Trump, will not blithely overlook human-rights issues with respect Saudi Arabia in the wake of its brutal intervention in Yemen and the implication of Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman in the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, which means Riyadh too will be less central to the United States’ regional approach. However, the Biden administration’s dim view of its Gulf Arab partners’ human-rights records will not diminish its scrutiny or criticism of Israel’s human-rights abuses. Of major strategic significance is the normalisation of relations between Israel and Bahrain, Sudan and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) under the Abraham Accords. Since the Arab Spring, strategic cooperation between Israel and the Gulf states has developed in the shadow of the common threats posed by Iran and radical Sunni terrorist groups. Israel’s relationship with the UAE is notably warm, with tourism, business and academic connections developing quickly, and solid public Emirati support arising for the improvement of relations with Israel.23 Indicative of this shift is the Pentagon’s repositioning of Israel from European Command’s to Central Command’s (CENTCOM) area of responsibility, which covers the Middle East.24 Previously, Arab opposition precluded such a move. The presence of an Israeli military representative at CENTCOM headquarters should enhance coordination and cooperation between the US and its allies in the region. US aid to Israel affords it substantial influence over Israeli policy. Indeed, this was one of the advantages that Henry Kissinger, as US secretary of state, envisaged when he pushed for dramatic increases in aid to Israel in the early 1970s. In the same vein, the Obama administration upgraded its intelligence relationship with Israel to unprecedented levels, both to reassure Israel and The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 129 to constrain it from striking Iranian nuclear facilities. A major reason much of the Israeli defence establishment opposed a military strike on Iran was the damage it would do to Israel’s relations with the US.25 Strategic challenges and potential sources of tension There are four potential sources of tension in the special relationship on the horizon: the sale of advanced weaponry by the US to its Arab allies, Chinese involvement in the Israeli economy, Iran, and the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Only the last two are unlikely to cause serious problems. The normalisation of relations between Israel and the UAE led quickly to the US agreeing to sell to the Emirates the most advanced fighter jet, the F-35. Although some in the US Congress and elsewhere have worried that this will degrade Israel’s qualitative military edge, which the US is mandated to maintain, that is unlikely to be the case. As the US has customarily argued, it is better for Israel that the US supply Arab states because it effectively allows both the US and Israel greater control over their military operations. The United States can either withhold certain advanced features of weapons systems from Arab states or provide Israel with additional weapons systems to compensate. The Biden administration’s emphasis on avoiding complicity in the kind of attacks undertaken by the Saudis in Yemen in recent years should also assuage concerns that Washington might furnish Riyadh with weapons of maximum lethality. Likewise, the Biden administration is more sensitive than the Trump administration was to Israeli concerns that the US might advance Saudi Arabia’s nuclear-weapons ambitions by selling it nuclear infrastructure.26 Tension between Israel and the US over Israel’s relations with China is not new, but has now expanded beyond the issue of Israeli arms sales, which was resolved to Washington’s satisfaction over a decade ago. The new wrinkle is China’s involvement in major Israeli infrastructure projects as part of its Belt and Road Initiative, and heavy Chinese investment in advanced Israeli technology. China has become an increasingly important factor in the Israeli economy, which is heavily reliant on international trade. Between 2010 and 2020, Sino-Israeli trade grew by more than 400%, making China Israel’s third-largest trading partner. The US was very critical 130 | Jonathan Rynhold of Israel’s granting to a Chinese company the tender to build a new terminal at Haifa Port, which the US Navy uses. In May 2020, however, Israel agreed not to permit a Hong Kong-based company to build the largest desalination plant in the world, which is to be constructed next to an air base where US troops are stationed.27 A Pentagon-sponsored 2020 RAND Corporation report identified many other areas of concern, and the US is demanding much more rigorous Israeli oversight into Chinese involvement in critical elements of the Israeli economy.28 But Israel will probably adapt its policy to alleviate US concerns, as it has in the past. Differences between the allies are sharpest over Iran. Swiftly after Biden took office, the administration began negotiating a return to the JCPOA, from which Trump withdrew in 2018. The Obama administration considered a nuclear deal a central American goal and interest. Israel appeared determined to derail it. Most Israelis preferred Trump’s policy of maximum pressure, as did most of America’s allies in the Gulf. Still, the substantive gaps between the governments are smaller, and the degree of consultation larger, than in the Obama–Netanyahu era. Firstly, the Israeli government has rejected Netanyahu’s strategy of confrontation with the US administration. Instead, it is resigned to Washington’s reviving the deal in some form and is seeking to influence the terms under which the US might re-enter it, advocating the retention of as many sanctions as possible and the continued threat of force as a deterrent.29 While Netanyahu would not have been satisfied with anything less than a complete end to the Iranian nuclear-weapons programme, the Israeli defence establishment is open to the possibility that an improved Iran deal could work.30 The Biden administration has publicly recognised that there will come a point at which advances in Iranian capabilities since it left the agreement will mean that the original terms of the deal are no longer fit for purpose, although Israel believes it is closer to that point than does the US.31 There is US–Israeli agreement in principle on the necessity of reaching a ‘longer and stronger’ deal that addresses the flaws in the original agreement by extending its duration and its reach to include delivery systems and Iran’s destabilising activity in the region. The new Israeli government is also seeking to coordinate with the US about possible responses to Iranian The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 131 violations, and possibly to secure weapons from the US that would assist an Israeli strike.32 However, Israel remains concerned that without the continued pressure of substantial sanctions and the threat of force, there is no chance of reaching such an agreement. Secondly, the Biden administration appears more guarded than the Obama administration about its ability to effectively socialise undemocratic countries such as Iran and China into the liberal-international order. Its preferred language refers to leadership of the ‘free world’, which is Cold War terminology.33 As to Iran, that scepticism will have been reinforced by the replacement of the relatively moderate Hassan Rouhani as the Iranian president by the ultra-conservative Ebrahim Raisi, who was responsible for the execution of thousands of political prisoners in the 1980s. Thirdly, both Israel and the US are extremely concerned about Iran’s development and use of precision-guided missiles and drones, which massively Israel will have less influence over US policy upgrade its strategic threat to vital infrastructure, especially water and electricity supplies, and challenge the freedom of operation of the US Air Force in the region.34 The two countries are cooperating on the development of countermeasures, and there is likely to be bipartisan support for extra aid for Israel for this purpose.35 Moreover, the administration has announced its intention to impose new sanctions on the Iranian drone and precision-missile programmes, excluding them from negotiable sanctions.36 In the meantime, however, Hizbullah’s build-up of Iranian precision weapons in Lebanon could push Israel towards a pre-emptive strike, which could place a serious strain on the US–Israel relationship, especially as such a war is likely to be far more ferocious, with far more casualties, than previous Israeli engagements have been.37 Regarding the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, Israel will have far less influence over US policy than it had during the Trump administration. At the same time, the United States’ and Israel’s respective assessments of how to proceed are closer than they were during the Obama years. Even so, however, the gap between the Biden administration and at least half the Israeli government on the ultimate shape of a peace settlement remains wide. 132 | Jonathan Rynhold Unlike the Obama administration, which sought to resolve the conflict and saw Israel as the main problem, the Biden team is pessimistic about each side’s willingness and ability to move forward. Biden also lacks Trump’s personal political motivation to make regional normalisation a priority, and the peace process is no longer a policy priority for Democrats.38 Instead, the administration is looking to manage the conflict and to improve the situation on the ground in order to enhance prospects for a two-state solution. This is reasonably consistent with the Israeli emphasis on shrinking rather than resolving the conflict, while deferring the big questions on which the US and Israel are deeply divided.39 Practically speaking, both actively seek to prevent the collapse of the increasingly weak Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank, as the alternatives are chaos or Hamas.40 In this spirit, Biden has restored humanitarian aid, as well as diplomatic and security dialogue with the PA, which the Israeli security services favour. Israel has also increased the number of work permits for Palestinians and cut back on intrusive intelligence-gathering methods in the West Bank. The administration is aware that this Israeli government is far more moderate than the previous one or any possible alternative, which constrains it from making any gestures towards the Palestinians that could destabilise that government.41 Both Israeli and American law conditions the transfer of economic aid and tax revenues to the PA on its ending the ‘pay to slay’ practice whereby it pays a stipend to the families of Palestinians in prison for murdering Israelis.42 Given its deep ideological divisions, the Israeli government has resolved to pursue a restrained settlement policy, but the question of how to deal with new unauthorised settlement outposts would generate internal tensions within the government, and with the Biden administration. The pro-Israel lobby and the American Jewish community Most of the US Jewish community remains attached to Israel and committed to its security. Approximately 90% of Jewish voters identify as ‘proIsrael’.43 While increased intermarriage has led to distancing from Israel, countervailing trends – the demographic growth of the Orthodox and a huge increase in young American Jews visiting Israel under the Birthright The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 133 programme – have offset these factors to some degree.44 For more than 70%, it is personally important that the US continue to provide financial aid to Israel, and support for boycotting, divestment and sanctions is negligible.45 During Operation Protective Edge against Hamas in Gaza in summer 2014, when missiles rained down on Israeli civilians, the overwhelming majority of American Jews, including younger and liberal ones, thought Israel’s actions were justified, in stark contrast to young liberals among the general American public.46 Yet American Jews continue to overwhelmingly support Democrats despite the widespread perception that the Republicans are more proIsrael.47 In principle, most American Jews will not support a presidential candidate whom they believe is not committed to maintaining American support for Israeli security. In practice, however, Israel is well down the list of issues that American Jews have prioritised in determining their vote in presidential elections. Israel is merely a threshold issue: so long as a candidate is viewed as sufficiently pro-Israel, the bulk of the Jewish electorate will decide their vote based on other issues.48 In determining that threshold, Americans Jews do not defer to the dominant Israeli view. Obama was unpopular in Israel, yet American Jews overwhelmingly voted for him twice. While a large majority of Israelis approved of the way Trump handled US– Israeli relations, a clear majority of American Jews opposed him.49 Traditionally, the organised American Jewish community observed a consensual norm not to air disagreements with Israeli policy in public. Since the late 1980s, however, this norm has eroded as pro-Israel American Jewish organisations have decided who and what policies to support in Israel based on their own ideological and religious predilections.50 Almost 90% of Jewish voters believe it is compatible to be both ‘pro-Israel’ and critical of Israeli government policies, and a majority favours restricting US aid so that Israel cannot spend it on settlements in the West Bank.51 Even establishment Jewish organisations have come out publicly against some Israeli policies. During summer 2020, the Israeli government declared its intention to unilaterally annex parts of the West Bank allocated to Israel under Trump’s peace plan. Subsequently, in unprecedented statements, mainstream pro-Israel organisations such as the Anti-Defamation League 134 | Jonathan Rynhold came out publicly against annexation, while AIPAC indicated to pro-Israel members of Congress that it would not oppose criticism of Israeli government policy on this issue.52 The dilution of Israel’s ability to lever American Jewish emotional attachment into political support was powerfully exposed in the conflict over the Iran deal. Both Israeli and American Jews view a nuclear Iran as a major threat to Israel. But, whereas most Israelis opposed the 2015 Iran deal, polls indicated that American Jews were divided. If members of Congress know that there are significant pro-Israel forces on both sides of an argument, this significantly weakens the power of AIPAC. As a former political director at the organisation explained, ‘AIPAC’s great success derives from its capacity to define what it means to be pro-Israel’.53 This capacity is declining. There is not much any Israeli government can do about institutionalised divisions over Israeli policy in the American Jewish community, but the adoption of a bipartisan approach should at least make the relationship smoother and easier to manage. Tellingly, the most important determinant of American Jewish attitudes towards the deal was their level of support for Obama and the Democratic Party, not their degree of support for Israel or of confidence in the efficacy of the deal. By becoming so closely associated with the Republican opposition at a time when visceral partisan antipathy had intensified, Netanyahu severely damaged the integrity of his message with American Jews. In the longer term, the increasingly powerful role of ultra-Orthodox parties in Israeli politics constitutes a challenge. More than half of American Jews belong to non-Orthodox movements of Judaism. Consequently, the negative way in which Israeli governments, under pressure from their ultra-Orthodox coalition partners, have related to the non-Orthodox could dissuade many American Jews from getting involved in pro-Israel activity.54 Former US ambassador Michael Oren has argued that this issue has greater potential to alienate American Jews from Israel than any other.55 Here the new Israeli government can make a difference. It does not include any ultraOrthodox parties, it has allocated an unprecedentedly generous budget for boosting non-Orthodox movements of Judaism and it has promised to reopen the Western Wall compound reserved for their use.56 The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 135 Bipartisanship under threat For the past 20 years, support for Israel has shot up among Republicans, and the party’s base is likely to remain strongly pro-Israel for the foreseeable future. Although the surge in Republican support for Israel was not matched among Democrats, they continued to sympathise with Israel over the Palestinians by a margin of at least 2:1.57 Since 2015, however, support for Israel among Democrats has fallen sharply. American politics has become extremely polarised along overlapping ideological and party lines. Younger generations are more liberal, and this has had a major impact on the ideological make-up of the Democratic Party. For many years, liberals have been the ideological cohort least supportive of Israel. In addition, Democrats have become increasingly dovish. Virtually all Americans opposed the use of force by Hamas and Hizbullah against Israel. Unsurprisingly, a large majority of Republicans approved of Israel’s military operations against them and considered Israel to have employed an appropriate level of military force. But a plurality of Democrats disapproved, and they were increasingly divided on the issue.58 Their attitudes diverged significantly even from left-wing Israelis, the vast majority of whom thought Israel’s use of force was justified.59 Thus, in the future, Democrats are increasingly likely to disapprove of Israel’s use of military force. Dovish attitudes among Democrats have also produced major differences with Israelis over the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Owing to Palestinian militancy and discord since the collapse of the Oslo process in 2000, Israelis have become deeply sceptical that the conflict can be resolved in the short or medium term. In contrast, most Democrats, while still firmly in Israel’s corner overall, are consistently optimistic about conflict resolution and advocate pressure on Israel rather than the Palestinians.60 Indeed, since 2015 there has been an unprecedented decline in Democrats’ sympathy for Israel over the Palestinians. They now sympathise about as much with the Palestinians as with Israel.61 Growing dovishness and liberalism – long-term trends spread over decades – cannot alone explain this, as the decline in the pro-Israel margin of sympathy has been sharp, occurring since 2015. There appear to be three interconnected reasons, all related to Netanyahu. 136 | Jonathan Rynhold Firstly, Netanyahu is responsible for intertwining support for Israel with US partisan politics. This effort has seized on Republicans’ increasingly intense opposition to a two-state solution and support for Israeli settlements, but diverged from AIPAC and the established pro-Israel lobby’s core rule of bipartisanship – which is logical and prudent, since no party wins every US election and both parties have a long history of strongly supporting Israel.62 Starting in the 1990s, Netanyahu worked closely with Republicans in Congress and courted American conservatives.63 Over time, he tilted more decisively and openly towards them, and Democrats perceived him as intervening in favour of Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney over Obama in 2012. While Netanyahu’s conservative predisposition registered inside the Beltway and with the foreign-policy intelligentsia, the high-profile debate over the Iran deal made his partisan Republican orientation open and flagrant. This coincided with a steep increase in general US political polarisation, inducing Democrats once supportive of Israel to become less sympathetic with it regardless of the merits of the specific issue.64 In March 2015, just prior to the Israeli elections, Netanyahu inveigled an invitation to address Congress from John Boehner, the Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, in an effort to persuade Congress to veto the Iran deal. Netanyahu’s strategy backfired. The speech in Congress looked like a Republican manoeuvre against the president and made the Iranian issue a partisan one.65 Subsequently, Netanyahu’s standing among Democrats dramatically declined.66 This correlated with the decline in sympathy for Israel. Even so, Netanyahu continued with his Republican strategy. He and Trump supported one another to gain domestic political advantages, which cast Israel as bound to a president whose approval rating among Democrats was consistently in single digits.67 Secondly, also in March 2015, Netanyahu formed the most right-wing Israeli government since 1990, unequivocally retracting his endorsement of a two-state solution in line with a substantial majority in his coalition. According to a 2010 survey by the Israel Project, however, the most positive thing about Israel for Democrats was that it ‘supports a two-state solution where both Israelis and Palestinians can live in peace’.68 When Netanyahu seemed on the verge of annexing a large chunk of the West Bank in 2020, The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 137 nearly 200 Democratic representatives signed a letter opposing it. A similar letter was co-signed by many Democratic senators, including three of the most pro-Israel – Chuck Schumer of New York, then the Senate minority leader; Bob Menendez of New Jersey; and Ben Cardin of Maryland – all three of whom had opposed the Iran deal. Thirdly, identity politics have intensified on the progressive-left side of American politics. In the last decade there has been a large increase in the percentage of Democrats who consider entrenched racism a major problem in America, expressed especially through the Black Lives Matter movement. This attitude has undergirded a sharp increase in sympathy for the Palestinians among liberal Democrats, who associate racial discrimination in America with the plight of the Palestinians vis-à-vis Israel.69 Netanyahu’s behaviour strengthened the resonance of this narrative. During the 2015 election, Netanyahu called on Israeli Jews to go out to vote to counter Israeli Arabs who were voting ‘in their droves’. The Obama administration condemned this statement. Subsequently, Bernie Sanders called Netanyahu a racist.70 Prior to the 2021 Israeli election, in a desperate effort to remain in power, Netanyahu connived to ensure that the Jewish supremacist Itamar Ben-Gvir entered the Knesset, which would not have occurred without his personal intervention. An emboldened Ben-Gvir and his followers incited demonstrations with racist chants in Jerusalem in May 2021, triggering an explosion of violence by Palestinian extremists in Jerusalem and Hamas in Gaza. The fighting spread inside pre-1967 borders, where Jewish and Arab thugs destroyed property and attacked innocent civilians in the worst sectarian clashes since 1948. The breakdown of order in mixed cities such as Lod and Acre raised the prospect of a complete collapse in cross-community relations between Israel’s Jewish and Arab citizens. A reversible trend? The new Israeli government has the potential to significantly improve both Jewish–Arab relations and US Democrats’ attitudes to Israel. A majority of Democrats still hold a favourable view of the state of Israel and believe that helping to protect Israel should be an important goal of US foreign policy.71 Biden rather than Trump is now the most prominent pro-Israel politician 138 | Jonathan Rynhold in America. Netanyahu is gone and the new government is committed to a bipartisan approach to relations with the US. The presence of many supporters of the two-state solution in the governing coalition may also help arrest the decline in US sympathy for Israel, though this effect will be limited because the new government is probably incapable of taking major steps in that direction. The greatest asset the Israeli government has for countering the progressive narrative of racial discrimination against Arabs may be its inclusion of an Arab party, Ra’am, headed by Mansour Abbas. This is a revolutionary development in Israeli politics, and particularly remarkable given that Bennett is a former leader of the Council of Settlers in the West Bank while Ra’am is a conservative Islamic party. The Arab public has long wanted its representatives to be involved in Israel’s governance, but the Palestinian issue until now had remained an obstacle. Abbas’s willingness to set aside the nationalist issue and focus on improving the quality of life in the Arab sector opened the door to his joining the government. His visit to a burnt-out synagogue in Lod, which he promised to rebuild, was a powerful symbol that Bennett and other right-wing members of the coalition have drawn on to legitimise the alliance. In a gesture of his own, Bennett apologised, live on prime-time television, for having previously called Ra’am’s leader a supporter of terrorism and admitted he was wrong.72 The government budget is set to more than triple the allocation for the Arab sector, which will be under Abbas’s direction.73 Yet regardless of who is to blame for the failure of the Oslo process or eruptions of Israeli–Palestinian violence, and irrespective of any amelioration of Israeli–Arab relations within Israel, the outright death of the two-state option and ongoing Israeli control over the resources of most of the West Bank and curtailment of Palestinian freedom of movement will pose huge problems for an arguably growing liberal camp in American politics. Israel’s willingness to continue to make good-faith efforts towards forging a twostate solution is critical to keeping that group on board. While the centre-left half of the Israeli government understands this reality, the Israeli public appears to be less enlightened on account of its deep scepticism that the Palestinians constitute a good-faith partner and the erroneous impression The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 139 left by the Abraham Accords and the Trump administration that Israel could have its cake and eat it. * * * In the past, the strategic aspect of the special relationship between Israel and the United States was the most controversial. With the dramatic improvement in relations between Israel and America’s Gulf allies, its salience has diminished. Israel’s reliability and military prowess, the persistence of common interests and the high level of institutionalised cooperation suggest that the other foundations of the relationship should remain solid. An issue certain to produce tension, of course, is Iran. But the relationship has overcome many crises over policy in the past, and in all likelihood will survive even serious clashes over policy towards Iran. Once the strongest pillars of the relationship, shared values and domestic politics are now under the greatest strain. The main source of this strain has been Israel’s imprudent involvement in America’s zero-sum partisan politics. The new Israeli government is poised to address this problem. The longer Netanyahu remains out of power, and the weaker the far-right and ultra-Orthodox elements are in future Israeli governments, the more likely it is that US Democrats’ negative perceptions of Israel can be durably reversed. In the absence of progress towards a two-state solution, however, they will continue to challenge the special relationship. Notes 1 See Jonathan Lis, ‘US Vetoes Security Council Resolution on Israel–Gaza Crisis for Third Time’, Haaretz, 17 May 2021, https:// www.haaretz.com/world-news/. premium-u-s-vetoes-unsc-resolutionon-israel-gaza-crisis-that-doesn-tmention-hamas-rockets-1.9816409; and Ben Samuels, ‘Biden: I Don’t Believe Israel Has Significantly 2 Overreacted to Gaza Rocket Fire’, Haaretz, 13 May 2021, https:// www.haaretz.com/us-news/. premium-biden-i-don-t-believe-israelhas-significantly-overreacted-to-gazarocket-fire-1.9807210. See Jonathan Lis, ‘Biden Vows Iran Won’t Get Nuclear Weapon on His Watch as He Meets Rivlin at White House’, Haaretz, 28 June 2021, https:// 140 | Jonathan Rynhold 3 4 5 6 7 www.haaretz.com/israel-news/. premium-rivlin-meets-biden-at-whitehouse-expected-to-raise-concern-overnew-iran-deal-1.9950040. See Amos Harel, ‘U.S. Attentive to Israel’s Iran Concerns, but the Ball Is in Tehran’s Court’, Haaretz, 2 July 2021, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/. premium.HIGHLIGHT-u-s-attentiveto-israel-s-iran-concerns-but-the-ballis-in-tehran-s-court-1.9961485; and Lahav Harkov, ‘Bennett Aims for “No Surprises, No Daylight” with Biden Administration’, Jerusalem Post, 21 June 2021, https://www.jpost.com/ israel-news/bennett-aims-for-nosurprises-no-daylight-with-bidenadministration-671672. See, respectively, A.F.K. Organski, The $36 Billion Bargain: Strategy and Politics in U.S. Assistance to Israel (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990); John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007); and Camille Mansour, Beyond Alliance: Israel in US Foreign Policy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994). This section draws on Jonathan Rynhold, The Arab–Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), chapter 1. Justin McCarthy, ‘Iran, North Korea Liked Least by Americans’, Gallup, 3 March 2020, https://news.gallup.com/ poll/287153/iran-north-korea-likedleast-americans.aspx. Shibley Telhami, ‘American Attitudes Towards the Middle East and Israel’, Brookings Institution, 4 December 2015, https://www.brookings.edu/ research/american-attitudes-toward- 8 9 10 11 12 the-middle-east-and-israel/; and Shibley Telhami, ‘American Views of the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict’, Critical Issues Poll, University of Maryland, 2018, https://sadat.umd. edu/sites/sadat.umd.edu/files/ UMCIP%20Questionnaire%20Sep%20 to%20Oct%202018.pdf. Peter Beinart, ‘I No Longer Believe in a Jewish State’, New York Times, 8 July 2020, https://www.nytimes. com/2020/07/08/opinion/israelannexation-two-state-solution.html. See Robert C. Lieberman, ‘The “Israel Lobby” and American Politics’, Perspectives on Politics, vol. 7, no. 2, June 2009, pp. 235–57; and Jonathan Rynhold, ‘Is the Pro-Israel Lobby a Block on Reaching a Comprehensive Peace Settlement in the Middle East?’, Israel Studies Forum, vol. 25, no. 1, Summer 2010, pp. 29–49. See Michael Eisenstadt and David Pollock, ‘Asset Test 2021: How the US Benefits from Its Alliance with Israel’, Policy Notes 98, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 24 February 2021, https://www.washingtoninstitute. org/policy-analysis/ asset-test-2021-how-us-can-keepbenefiting-its-alliance-israel. Roby Nathanson and Ron Mandlebaum, ‘Aid and Trade: Economic Relations Between Israel and the United States’, in Robert O. Freedman (ed.), The United States and Israel: Six Decades of US–Israeli Relations (Boulder, CO: Westview, 2012), pp. 124–32. See Charles Freilich, ‘Can Israel Survive Without America?’, Survival, vol. 59, no. 4, August–September 2017, pp. 135–50. The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 141 13 14 15 16 17 18 See, for example, John Bolton, The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2020), p. 180; and Arie Egozi, ‘Israel Braces for Renewed Terrorism Coming from Taliban-led Afghanistan’, Breaking Defense, 16 August 2021, https://breakingdefense.com/2021/08/ israel-braces-for-renewed-terrorismcoming-from-taliban-led-afghanistan/. See Jonathan Spyer, ‘Turkey, Erdogan’s Arc of Destabilization in the Middle East’, Jerusalem Post, 2 July 2020, https://www.jpost.com/ middle-east/turkey-erdogans-arcof-destabilization-in-the-middleeast-633690. Yaeli Bloch-Elkon and Jonathan Rynhold, ‘Israeli Attitudes to the Obama Administration’, in Efraim Inbar and Jonathan Rynhold (eds), US Foreign Policy and Global Standing in the 21st Century (Abingdon: Routledge, 2016). See Charles L. Glaser and Rosemary A. Kelanic, ‘Getting Out of the Gulf: Oil and US Military Strategy’, Foreign Affairs, vol. 96, no. 1, January– February 2017, pp. 122–31. International Renewable Energy Agency, ‘Global Energy Transformation: A Roadmap to 2050’, IRENA, 2018, https://www.irena. org/-/media/Files/IRENA/Agency/ Publication/2018/Apr/IRENA_Report_ GET_2018.pdf. See F. Gregory Gause III, ‘Should We Stay or Should We Go? The United States and the Middle East’, Survival, vol. 61, no. 5, October–November 2019, pp. 7–24; and Steven Simon and Jonathan Stevenson, ‘The End of Pax Americana: Why Washington’s Middle East Pullback Makes 19 20 21 22 23 24 Sense’, Foreign Affairs, vol. 94, no. 6, November/December 2015, pp. 2–10. See Thomas Wright, ‘The Quiet Reformation of Biden’s Foreign Policy’, Atlantic, 19 March 2020, http://www.theatlantic. com/ideas/archive/2020/03/ foreign-policy-2021-democrats/608293. See Jared Szuba, ‘Pentagon Doesn’t Rule Out Response for Gulf Shipping Attack’, Al-Monitor, 4 August 2021, https://www.almonitor.com/originals/2021/08/ pentagon-doesnt-rule-out-responsegulf-shipping-attack. See David E. Sanger and Ronen Bergman, ‘How Israel, in Dark of Night, Torched Its Way to Iran’s Nuclear Secrets’, New York Times, 15 July 2018, https://www.nytimes. com/2018/07/15/us/politics/iran-israelmossad-nuclear.html. See Amos Harel, ‘In Washington, Israeli Army Chief Shares Lessons from Gaza Conflict’, Haaretz, 25 June 2021, https://www.haaretz.com/ israel-news/.premium-in-washingtonisraeli-army-chief-shares-lessonsfrom-gaza-conflict-1.9938576. See David Pollock, ‘Good News from the Gulf, for a Change’, Fikra Forum, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 29 July 2021, https://www.washingtoninstitute. org/policy-analysis/ good-news-gulf-change. See Assaf Orion and Mark Montgomery, ‘Moving Israel to CENTCOM: Another Step into the Light’, PolicyWatch 3,425, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 28 January 2021, https://www.washingtoninstitute. org/pdf/view/16477/en. 142 | Jonathan Rynhold 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 Author interviews, 2013. See Emma Graham-Harrison, Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Julian Borger, ‘Revealed: Saudi Arabia May Have Enough Uranium Ore to Produce Nuclear Fuel’, Guardian, 17 September 2020, https://www. theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/17/ revealed-saudi-arabia-may-haveenough-uranium-ore-to-producenuclear-fuel. See Lahav Harkov, ‘US Asking Israel to Eliminate China Ties in Sensitive Areas’, Jerusalem Post, 20 May 2020, https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/ israel-requested-indemnity-afterus-requested-cuts-on-trade-withchina-628530. Shira Efron, Karen Schwindt and Emily Haskel, ‘Chinese Investment in Israeli Technology and Infrastructure: Security Implications for Israel and the US’, RAND Corporation, 2020, https:// www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/ RR3176.html. See Jonathan Lis, ‘Israel Can No Longer Influence Iran Nuke Deal, Top Official Admits’, Haaretz, 5 July 2021, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/. premium.HIGHLIGHT-israeli-officialwe-have-no-ability-to-influence-theiran-nuclear-agreement-1.9969082. See Ben Caspit, ‘Israel–Iran Conflict Enters Tense Waiting Period Until US Election’, Al-Monitor, 23 June 2020, http://www.al-monitor. com/pulse/originals/2020/06/ israel-us-iran-syria-donald-trump-joebiden-hassan-rouhani.html. See, for example, Christiane Amanpour, ‘US: Iran Has Not Yet Made Irreversible Nuclear Advances’, interview with Rob Malley, CNN, 14 32 33 34 July 2021, https://edition.cnn.com/ videos/world/2021/07/14/amanpourrob-malley-us-iran-nuclear-talks. cnn; ‘Lapid and Gantz Said to Warn US: Iran Is Close to Nuclear Threshold’, Times of Israel, 25 July 2021, https://www.timesofisrael. com/israel-said-to-warns-us-iranis-close-to-nuclear-threshold/; and David Sanger, ‘Biden Promised to Restore the Iran Nuclear Deal. Now It Risks Derailment’, New York Times, 31 July 2021, https://www.nytimes. com/2021/07/31/us/politics/biden-irannuclear-deal.html. See Harel, ‘In Washington, Israeli Army Chief Shares Lessons from Gaza Conflict’; Harel, ‘U.S. Attentive to Israel’s Iran Concerns, but the Ball Is in Tehran’s Court’; and Sebastien Roblin, ‘Israel’s Wish List: Here’s the $8 Billion in U.S. Weapons It Wants to Buy’, Forbes, 18 September 2020, https://www.forbes.com/ sites/sebastienroblin/2020/09/18/ on-heels-of-accord-with-bahrainand-uae-israel-seeks-8-billion-in-usweapons/?sh=50f4a43018cf. See Thomas Wright, ‘Between Restoration and Change’, Brookings Institution, 1 October 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/ order-from-chaos/2020/10/01/ between-restoration-and-change/. See Anne Gearan, ‘Biden, Pulling Combat Forces from Iraq, Seeks to End the Post-9/11 Era’, Washington Post, 27 July 2021, https://www. washingtonpost.com/politics/bideniraq-911-era/2021/07/25/619c8fe6-ecb111eb-97a0-a09d10181e36_story.html; and Ian Talley and Benoit Faucon, ‘U.S. Plans Sanctions Against Iran’s The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 143 35 36 37 38 Drones and Guided Missiles’, Wall Street Journal, 29 July 2021, https:// www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-planssanctions-against-irans-drones-andguided-missiles-11627556400. See Seth Frantzman, ‘How Israel and the US Are Taking Iran’s Drone Threat Seriously’, Jerusalem Post, 28 April 2021, https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/ israel-and-the-us-are-taking-iransdrone-threat-seriously-666546; and Marc Rod, ‘Bipartisan House Group to Express Support for Supplemental Aid to Israel’, Jewish Insider, 2 June 2021, https://jewishinsider. com/2021/06/bipartisan-house-groupto-express-support-for-supplementalaid-to-israel/. Talley and Faucon, ‘U.S. Plans Sanctions Against Iran’s Drones and Guided Missiles’. See Ben Caspit, ‘Israel Weighs Risks, Options for Dealing with Hezbollah’s Precise Missiles’, Al-Monitor, 30 July 2021, http://www. al-monitor.com/originals/2021/07/ israel-weighs-risks-options-dealinghezbollahs-precise-missiles; Rynhold, The Arab–Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture, chapter 3; and Shibley Telhami, ‘American Attitudes Towards Middle East Policy’, Critical Issues Poll, University of Maryland, June 2021, https://criticalissues. umd.edu/sites/criticalissues.umd. edu/files/American%20Attitude%20 towards%20Middle%20East%20 Policy-%20June%202021.pdf. See ‘Public Wary of U.S. Taking a Major Role in the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict’, AP-NORC, 23 June 2021, http://www.apnorc.org/projects/ public-wary-of-u-s-taking-a-major- 39 40 41 42 role-in-the-israeli-palestinian-conflict; and Shibley Telhami, ‘American Attitudes Toward Domestic Politics and Foreign Policy’, Critical Issues Poll, University of Maryland, March 2020, https://criticalissues.umd. edu/sites/criticalissues.umd.edu/ files/UMCIP%20March%202020%20 Questionnaire.pdf. See Harkov, ‘Bennett Aims For “No Surprises, No Daylight” with Biden Administration’; and Herb Keinon, ‘What Will Happen When Bennett Meets Biden in Washington?’, Jerusalem Post, 30 July 2021, https:// www.jpost.com/israel-news/ politics-and-diplomacy/what-willhappen-when-bennett-meets-withbiden-in-washington-675324. See Amos Harel, ‘How Bennett Found Himself Trying to Save the Palestinian Economy’, Haaretz, 23 July 2021, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/. premium.HIGHLIGHT-how-bennettfound-himself-trying-to-save-thepalestinian-economy-1.10021053. See Tovah Lazaroff, ‘13% Hike in Work Permits for Palestinians Prior to PM–Biden Parley’, Jerusalem Post, 28 July 2021, https://www.jpost.com/ breaking-news/1500-additionalpalestinians-to-be-given-workpermits-inside-of-israel-675112; and Keinon, ‘What Will Happen When Bennett Meets Biden in Washington?’ See Adam Rasgon and David M. Halbfinger, ‘Seeking Restart with Biden, Palestinians Eye End to Prisoner Payments’, New York Times, 19 November 2020, https://www. nytimes.com/2020/11/19/world/ middleeast/biden-palestinianprisoner-payments.html. 144 | Jonathan Rynhold 43 44 45 46 47 48 Jewish Electorate Institute, ‘Poll: Domestic Issues Dominate the Priorities of the Jewish Electorate’, 22 May 2019, https://www. jewishelectorateinstitute.org/ poll-domestic-issues-dominatethe-priorities-of-the-jewishelectorate/?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=p md_60219e47fd0013e415bcbfcca 9d6de442d82b290-1629118688-0gqNtZGzNAmKjcnBszQi6. See Rynhold, The Arab–Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture, chapter 7. Jewish Electorate Institute, ‘National Jewish Survey’, July 2021, https:// www.jewishelectorateinstitute. org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/ JEI-National-Jewish-Survey-ToplineResults-July-2021.pdf; and ‘Jewish Americans in 2020’, Pew Research Center, 11 May 2021, https:// www.pewforum.org/2021/05/11/ jewish-americans-in-2020/. See Jeffrey M. Jones, ‘Americans’ Reaction to Middle East Situation Similar to Past’, Gallup, 24 July 2014, http://www.gallup.com/poll/174110/ americans-reaction-middle-eastsituation-similar-past.aspx; and Michelle Shain et al., ‘Discovering Israel at War: The Impact of TaglitBirthright in Summer 2014’, Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies, Brandeis University, February 2015, https://www.brandeis.edu/cmjs/ birthright/discovering-israel-war.html. American Jewish Committee/Global Voice, ‘AJC 2019 Survey of American Jewish Opinion’, 2 June 2019, https:// www.ajc.org/news/survey2019. Mark Mellman, Aaron Strauss and Kenneth Wald, ‘Jewish American Voting Behavior 1972– 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 2008: Just the Facts’, Solomon Project, 2012, https://www. jewishdatabank.org/content/upload/ bjdb/599/N-Jewish_American_Voting_ Solomon_Project_2012_Main_Report. pdf; and American Jewish Committee/ Global Voice, ‘AJC 2020 Survey of American Jewish Opinion’, 2020, https://www.ajc.org/survey2020. American Jewish Committee, ‘AJC 2018 Surveys of American & Israeli Jewish Opinion’, 10 June 2018, https://www.jewishdatabank. org/content/upload/bjdb/ AJC-2018_polls_Comparative_ Surveys_of_Israeli_and_US_Jews.pdf. See Rynhold, The Arab–Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture, chapter 7. Jewish Electorate Institute, ‘July 2021 National Survey of Jewish Voters’, 13 July 2021, https://www. jewishelectorateinstitute.org/ july-2021-national-survey-of-jewishvoters/?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=pmd_ e821a05c1a9f4405186b584b59aa8d34dc31ed36-1629120588-0-gqNtZGzNAk2jcnBszQrO. See Ron Kampeas, ‘AIPAC Tells US Lawmakers It Won’t Push Back if They Criticize Annexation’, Times of Israel, 11 June 2020, http://www. timesofisrael.com/in-first-aipac-givesus-lawmakers-green-light-to-criticizeisrael-on-annexation/. Aaron David Miller, The Much Too Promised Land: America’s Elusive Search for Arab–Israeli Peace (New York: Bantam, 2008), p. 95. American Jewish Committee, ‘AJC 2018 Survey of American Jewish Opinion’, 10 June 2018, https://www. ajc.org/news/survey2018. See Michael Oren, Ally: My Journey The Future of US–Israeli Relations | 145 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 Across the American–Israeli Divide (New York: Random House, 2015). See David Horovitz and Lazar Berman, ‘Minister: Reviving Western Wall Compromise Is on Cabinet Agenda, Backed by PM’, Times of Israel, 3 August 2021, https://www. timesofisrael.com/minister-revivingwestern-wall-compromise-on-cabinetagenda-backed-by-pm/. Rynhold, The Arab–Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture, chapter 3. Ibid. See Israel Democracy Institute, ‘July 2014 Peace Index’, press release, 29 July 2014, https://en.idi.org.il/ press-releases/12790. Lydia Saad, ‘Key Trends in U.S. Views on Israel and the Palestinians’, Gallup, 28 May 2021, https://news.gallup.com/ poll/350393/key-trends-views-israelpalestinians.aspx. Pew Research Center, ‘Republicans and Democrats Grow Even Further Apart in Views of Israel, Palestinians’, 23 January 2018, https://www.pewresearch.org/ politics/2018/01/23/republicans-anddemocrats-grow-even-further-apart-inviews-of-israel-palestinians/. Rynhold, The Arab–Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture, chapters 2–3. See Jonathan Rynhold, ‘The View From Jerusalem: Israeli–American Relations and the Peace Process’, Middle East Review of International Affairs, vol. 4, no. 2, June 2000, https:// ciaotest.cc.columbia.edu/olj/meria/ meria00_ryj01.html; and Steven Erlanger, ‘Netanyahu, in U.S., Woos Conservatives’, New York Times, 20 January 1998, https://www.nytimes. com/1998/01/20/world/netanyahu-inus-woos-conservatives.html. 64 65 66 67 68 69 In the twenty-first century, there has been an unprecedented increase in negative affective partisanship, which inclines those in one party to reject the other party’s positions, regardless of any assessment of the substantive merits of the issues themselves. See Shanto Iyengar and Masha Krupenkin. ‘The Strengthening of Partisan Affect’, Advances in Political Psychology, vol. 39, no. 1, February 2018, pp. 201–18; and Kenneth A. Schultz, ‘Perils of Polarization for US Foreign Policy’, Washington Quarterly, vol. 40, no. 4, Autumn 2017, pp. 7–28. See ‘AIPAC Official: PM’s Congress Speech Hurt Iran Deal Opposition’, Times of Israel, 3 September 2015, https://www.timesofisrael.com/ aipac-official-pms-congress-speechhurt-iran-deal-opposition/. See R.J. Reinhart, ‘Americans’ Views of Benjamin Netanyahu Little Changed’, Gallup, 24 May 2019, https://news.gallup.com/poll/257795/ americans-views-benjaminnetanyahu-little-changed.aspx. Gallup, ‘Presidential Approval Ratings – Donald Trump’, https://news. gallup.com/poll/203198/presidentialapproval-ratings-donald-trump.aspx. See Rynhold, The Arab–Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture, chapter 3. See Imani Jackson, ‘How Palestinian Protesters Helped Black Lives Matter’, USA Today, 1 July 2016, https:// eu.usatoday.com/story/opinion/ policing/spotlight/2016/07/01/ how-palestinian-protesters-helpedblack-lives-matter/85160266/; Samantha Neal, ‘Views of Racism as a Major Problem Increase Sharply, Especially Among Democrats’, 146 | Jonathan Rynhold 70 71 Pew Research Center, 29 August 2017, https://www.pewresearch. org/fact-tank/2017/08/29/views-ofracism-as-a-major-problem-increasesharply-especially-among-democrats; and Ishaan Tharoor, ‘The Growing Solidarity Between #BlackLivesMatter and Palestinian Activists’, Washington Post, 15 October 2015, https://www. washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/ wp/2015/10/15/the-growing-solidaritybetween-blacklivesmatter-andpalestinian-activists/. ‘Sanders Calls Netanyahu a “Racist”, Biden Slams PM’s “Outrageous” Behavior’, Times of Israel, 20 December 2019, https://www.timesofisrael. com/sanders-netanyahu-is-racist-usmust-also-be-pro-palestinian/. See Kathy Frankovic, ‘Israel and the Copyright © 2021 The International Institute for Strategic Studies 72 73 Palestinians: Where Do America’s Sympathies Lie?’, YouGovAmerica, 10 May 2021, https://today. yougov.com/topics/international/ articles-reports/2021/05/19/ israel-and-palestinians-where-doamericas-sympathi; and Saad, ‘Key Trends in U.S. Views on Israel and the Palestinians’. See Gil Hoffmann, ‘Bennett: Mansour Abbas Courageous Leader’, Jerusalem Post, 3 June 2021, https://www.jpost. com/breaking-news/bennett-abbascourageous-leader-670068. See Mazal Mualem, ‘Israeli Budget Approved in Victory for Arab Coalition Party’, Al-Monitor, 5 August 2021, https://www.al-monitor.com/ originals/2021/08/israeli-budgetapproved-victory-arab-coalition-party.