As Faiza Shaheen, the Labour candidate dropped by Keir Starmer on the fringes of east London and Essex, recently discovered to her detriment, the mere acknowledgement of an ‘Israel lobby’ can land you in hot water. It plays to the antisemitic trope of the Jewish puppet-master pulling the strings of power behind the scenes – or so the accusation goes. But, in demystifying the practice of ‘lobbying for Zionism’, Ilan Pappe does exactly the opposite.
This is not a story of clandestine practices and back-room deals, but a comprehensive history of lobbying and advocacy, most of which happens in plain sight, characterized in recent times by the airbrushing of war crimes and the weaponization of antisemitism against Israel’s critics. By enhancing our understanding of what is already visible, Pappe both punctures the myths of antisemitic conspiracy theorists and exposes the insincerity of much of the lobbying.
