The gathering storm

Posted by Alec Russell at 28 Jul 06 14:49

It would be wrong to suggest there has been much of a debate here about America’s policy towards Israel and the Lebanon. There hasn’t. But I sense it is just starting to get going.

Israel's air raids on Lebanon have not sparked debate

I will pass on to British readers a couple of interesting and rather different perspectives. David Frum, the former Bush speechwriter, made two posts particularly worth noting this week, about the death of the UN peacekeepers and about David Cameron, William Hague and the region.

Steven Clemons, the foreign policy director of the New America Foundation thinktank popped up on his blog today after observing a rare implicit criticism of Israel by a congressman, Senator Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island.

I say, rare, inasmuch as with just a few months to go before the mid-terms it takes a forthright politician to brave the wrath of the pro-Israeli fundraising lobby.

I had a taste of such fury when I suggested in an oped the other day that the Bush administration’s record in the region was not particularly praiseworthy. I found myself on the receiving end of a torrent of emailed abuse. That’s enough from “Old Etonian Communists” like you I was told.

For the record that is wrong on both counts, although maybe I should lay claim to membership of the former club, in view of how David Cameron appears to be giving the brand a new lustre….