Iran, Israel & a Masterclass in US foreign policy - with Walter Russell Mead

Call Me Back - with Dan Senor

Ark Media

Society, October 7, Hamas, War, Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Israel, News Commentary, News, Politics, Elections, Palestine, Dan Senor, Government

4.8 • 2.3K Ratings

🗓️ 9 September 2022

⏱️ 77 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Are we getting closer to or farther away from an Iran deal? Walter Russell Mead of The Wall Street Journal has been following developments closely. I wanted to check in with him. But I also wanted to talk to Walter about his big new and groundbreaking book, called “The Arc of a Covenant: The United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People.” Walter has been immersed in writing this book for over a decade – it covers the history of the U.S.-Israel relationship, but it’s much more than that. It’s also a book about the history of US foreign policy. What has been America’s calculation behind U.S. support for Israel? Is it based on shared values – a fellow democracy in a dangerous region, defending a country born out of the ashes of the Holocaust? Or has U.S. policy been based on realpolitik – because Israel advances U.S. geopolitical interests? Or is it a blend of all of the above? What role does U.S. domestic politics play in all of this, if at all? Walter’s book frames our discussion not only about the history of the U.S.-Israel relationship, but the future of the relationship, and the future of U.S. foreign policy. Walter is at the Hudson Institute, he is the Global View Columnist at The Wall Street Journal and a professor at Bard College. He was previously the Henry Kissinger fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. The Arc of a Covenant: The United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People: shorturl.at/bdhpz

Transcript

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0:00.0	If you say the deal is dead, you really do have to say, okay, so what are we now going to do?
0:06.4	Iran is full tilt moving to build a bomb.
0:10.2	Where is Biden going to go?
0:12.8	As long as the negotiations are going forward,
0:15.5	it looks like you have an Iran policy.
0:18.6	But you take away even the fig leaf of negotiations
0:22.4	and you have to declare what you're going to do
0:25.1	now that negotiations have failed. I honestly don't think they want to do that. Are we getting closer to or farther away from an Iran deal?
0:45.0	Walter Russell Mead of the Wall Street Journal, who's been a guest on this podcast before, has been following developments closely.
0:51.0	I wanted to check in with Walter about Iran, but I also
0:54.7	want to check in with him about his new big and groundbreaking book called The
0:58.9	Arc of a Covenant, the United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People.
1:04.0	Walter has been immersed in writing this book for over a decade.
1:07.6	I've actually read earlier drafts years ago.
1:10.2	It covers the history of the U.S. Israel relationship, but it's also a book about the history and future of US foreign policy.
1:18.0	We tend to romanticize the history of the US-Israel relationship.
1:22.0	It is true that President Truman's
1:23.6	administration supported Israel in its Declaration of Independence, but the US
1:28.7	also maintained an arms embargo on Israel during its war of independence.
1:33.0	Israel fought that war with check rifles, not US arms.
1:38.0	It was actually the Kennedy administration that was the first US administration
1:42.0	to sell Israel any weapon system.
	...

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