Back in 1978, the lobby flexed its muscle over an idealistic president.
Here’s a long piece (for a blog post) I wrote recently on the 1978 Camp David accords for the website mondoweiss. It takes me back: I had actually supported and worked for Carter in 1976, in part because I admired Brzezinski, a professor of mine at Columbia. Carter seemed the most conservative Democrat (besides Scoop Jackson, who seemed weird for reasons I understand better now than then). By the time of Camp David (September 1978) I was already moving to the right, and certainly not paying much attention to the Middle East. Like everyone else, I accepted the Egypt-Israeli deal as a good thing. Like a large majority of Americans, I had no deeper sense of the negotiations; certainly I did not worry about the blocking of Palestinian aspirations which ensued there. Within a few years, I would be writing for Commentary!
Comments