Believe it or not, I didn't actually want to engage the Walt and Mearsheimer book primarily through knocking back arguments that they're anti-semitic. In fact, I'm quite pissed the debate has devolved into this. What I wanted to do was have a serious discussion over a sprawling, controversial book, in which I could make a nuanced argument defending the portions I agreed with and puncturing the arguments I found uncompelling. And there were more than a couple in W/M's book, including the chapter on Iraq.
But I've not been able to have that discussion. We've not been able to have any discussion over the book at all. We've had a lot of discussions over the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which people seem to have mistaken for this book, but that's different. And what's more infuriating is that the silencing attack levied at Walt and Mearsheimer is that they, and their thesis, are "anti-semitic," which is to say they hate me for my intrinsic Jewishness, and that I, in sharing some of their conclusions, hate my race. The slurs being directed against W/M's political analysis are, in other words, being offered in my name, and in my defense. This expands the issue: The attacks on Walt and Mearsheimer are not being made on behalf of their critics, but on behalf of Jewry.
This is offensive. Growing up, classmates of mine -- putative friends, even -- would accuse me of "Jewing" them out of something, or refer to a plan that got screwed up as having become all "Jewed." That's anti-semitism. It's repulsive, and it's pervasive, and it's real -- it's about what "Jews," regardless of their individual characteristics, are.
