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Feb 19, 2014 09:17 pm | Paul R. Pillar
Since the wise setting aside of a
negotiation-undermining bill that would have imposed still more
sanctions on Iran, some members of Congress have been feeling itchy as a
result of not getting their regular fix of votes that they can portray
as support for Israel. Their unease is perhaps a testimony to the
continued strength of the lobby that pushes for such votes, despite its
recent setbacks on the sanctions bill and a couple of other issues. So
some members of the House of Representatives have sent a letter
to their chamber's leadership asking that Israeli prime minister
Benjamin Netanyahu be invited to address a joint session of Congress
when he is in Washington next month to speak to AIPAC's annual mass
meeting. “Doing so,” they say in the letter, “would send a clear message
of U.S. support to Israel.”Actually, the support involved would not be to Israel but instead to a particular Israeli government. In any event, one noteworthy attribute of the letter is the partisan make-up of the signatories: 79 Republicans and 17 Democrats. It is another indication of the increasing association of the lobby with only one side of the aisle, which cannot be very reassuring to the lobby. Possibly once the composition of the signatory list started to become clear some Republicans refrained from signing on to avoid making the partisan split appear even more lopsided.
read morehttp://server1.nationalinterest.org/blog/paul-pillar/prime-minister-youre-no-winston-churchill-9908
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