The October 28, 2025, debate between comedians Dave Smith and Steven Crowder on Louder with Crowder over AIPAC and the Jewish lobby reveals a profound misunderstanding of the real power dynamics behind US foreign policy in the Middle East. Crowder has a defensible position. However, calling for Trump’s impeachment, Dave Smith absurdly argues that Trump’s actions toward Iran were driven by Israeli influence—an idea that presumes a kind of Jewish control over American decision-making, one given scholarly heft John Mearsheimer (Professor of Political Science ast the University of Chicago) and Stephen Walt (Progessor of International Relations at the Kennedy School at Harvard University) in their book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, published in the summer of 2007. This interpretation, however, overlooks the deeper geopolitical and historical context in which US policy has developed. And, in all fairness, Smith’s argument is a drastic oversimplification of Mearsheimer and Walt’s analysis.
The roots of what we refer to as “neoconservatism” lie not in Jewish identity but in the evolution of Cold War liberalism—or progressivism more precisely. I explained this in 2004, in an analysis published first in Gesellschaft zerstören—Der Neoliberale Anschlag auf Demokratie und Gerechtigkeit, which was translated the following year into English and published by Pluto Press (which was at the time carried by the University of Michigan Press) under the title Devastating Society: The Neoconservative Assault on Democracy and Justice. (The book was later translated into Arabic and Indonesian and widely read around the world.) Readers can find on this platform an essay laying out my argument: War Hawks and the Ugly American: The Origins of Bush’s Middle East Policy. I show there that many of the figures who came to be called neoconservatives (or “the crazies,” as intelligence analysts called them behind closed doors) had been progressives and anti-communist Democrats in the tradition of Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson during the 1970s. Their concerns centered on maintaining American global dominance, particularly in regions vital to energy security. That some of these intellectuals happened to be Jewish is incidental; the driving force was the defense of US hegemony, not ethnic or religious allegiance, although, as I explain elsewhere, Christian Zionism gave the policy some cover (see Christian Neo-Fundamentalism and US Foreign Policy).
The real focus of US strategy is the Middle East’s vast energy reserves and the advance of transnational corporate interests and power. I explained the energy angle in another chapter published in Devastating Society, as well as in an article in Capitalism Nature Socialism in 2005. (To read that article, go here: The Neoconservative Assault on the Earth: The Environmental Imperialism of the Bush Administration. I also explain much of this in War Hawks and the Ugly American: The Origins of Bush’s Middle East Policy.) Saudi Arabia emerged as a crucial ally because of its oil production and its role in stabilizing global energy markets. Iran and Iraq, both with enormous petroleum resources, were also key to the broader geopolitical puzzle. Beyond them lay the mineral-rich Caspian Sea Basin, a region of growing importance in the late twentieth century. Within this framework, Israel’s strategic value derives not from cultural ties or religious affinity but from its geographic and military position as part of a regional network that included Jordan and Saudi Arabia.
Jordan in particular became an essential hub for American intelligence and military coordination. The largest CIA installation in the Middle East is located there (keep in mind that CIA installations are secret, so this is not an official claim), serving as part of CENTCOM’s operational base (US Central Command). During visits to Jordan in the mid-2000s, including meetings with diplomatic officials, and my ongoing analyses of the situation, it became even clearer to me that the US presence in the region was oriented toward projecting power eastward—into Afghanistan, Iran, and Iraq. This long-standing strategy reflects an interest in controlling the flow of resources and countering rival influences, especially Russian and Chinese interests in Central Asia. This also explains NATO and the United States’ provocation of Russia in its current conflict with Ukraine. (See History and Sides-Taking in the Russo-Ukrainian War; The US is Not Provoking Russia—And Other Tall Tales; The Urgent Necessity of Purging the Government of Deep State Actors and Warmongers; Progressivism and the Plea for War; Robots and Zombies Assemble! We Must Have War!)
(As an aside, why I am so heavily shadow-banned on social media is because of my critiques of US foreign policy, not only in the book and article noted previously, but in other essays and lectures delivered at the United Nations University in Amman, Jordan, in 2006 and 2007. I document my travels to Amman in Journey to Jordan, November 2006, and Journey to Jordan, April 2007. In hindsight, Freedom and Reason began somewhat as a travel blog. My essay Christian Neo-Fundamentalism and US Foreign Policy was the basis for one of my lectures there.)
The invasion of Afghanistan in the early 2000s, while publicly justified as a response to the 9/11 attacks (while I do see some justification for our actions there, I opposed the full-scale invasion of that country), also served this strategic purpose. It provided the United States with a military foothold near the Caspian region, where energy and mineral wealth were at stake. This was consistent with earlier maneuvers, such as the Carter-Brzezinski strategy of the late 1970s, which lured the Soviet Union into a costly war in Afghanistan. Through these efforts, the United States sought to contain both Russian influence and regional instability, maintaining its dominant position in the energy corridor. (For background, see my essay Sowing the Seeds of Terrorism? Capitalist Intrigue and Adventurism in Afghanistan, which uses content analysis to expose the corporate state media’s attempt to obscure the history of the Afghanistan war and the longstanding covert operations there, including the recruitment of Osama Bin Laden. See also Jimmy Carter, Trilateralist, Entering Hospice; Everybody Loves Jimmy Carter.)
When it comes to Iran, Trump’s policy was shaped by two interlocking goals: preventing Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons and maintaining the balance of power that undergirded US strategic dominance in the region. To be sure, Israel had its own interests in containing Iran, which posed a direct and immediate threat to its national security. Yet, contrary to the assumption of Smith and others, Israel was not dictating American actions. If anything, US intervention limited Israel’s push toward full-scale regime change, as well as the Greater Israel Project, which was also constrained by the ceasefire Trump negotiated between Israel and Hamas (a ceasefire I opposed, for the record). Washington’s strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities effectively prevented escalation while securing US objectives in the region.
Figures like Mark Levin, Ted Cruz, and Lindsey Graham (often associated with the neoconservative wing of the Republican Party) supported—and still support—more aggressive regime-change policies. However, these positions reflected a continuation of the US hegemonic strategy rather than evidence of Israeli control. And they are not part of Trump’s foreign policy reset, which makes Smith and his ilk’s claims and call for Trump’s impeachment all the more absurd. Israel’s national goals have aligned with American interests at times, but Israel remains a secondary player in the larger geopolitical framework dominated by Washington’s pursuit of energy security and global dominance. Israel is not so much an ally of the United States as it is a protectorate. Trump is making sure that country is not also a liability.
Dave Smith’s argument thus rests on a false premise—and is moved by a cabalistic theory of Jewish power that has infected many who have previously supported Donald Trump and the MAGA movement (Candice Owens, Tucker Carlson, and others). The argument absurdly overstates Israel’s influence and attributes US imperial ambitions to Jewish ambition and power rather than to the logic of American hegemony. The Middle East strategy—stretching from Saudi Arabia through Israel and Jordan to Afghanistan—has never been about serving Israeli interests. It has always been about securing the global position of the United States in an energy-rich region critical to maintaining its superpower status and advancing the globalist project of world corporate domination. To claim Israel is behind all this more than smacks of antisemitism.
freedom and reason 