Cutting Through: February 9, 2021
Hawks With Their Knives Out
In his newsletter this week, Peter Beinart takes a deep look at our mutual friend Matt Duss. I strongly recommend you read it to find out who Matt is, his background, and the inspiration behind his political views. They’re important, as Matt—currently serving as Bernie Sanders’ foreign policy advisor—is poised for a key spot in the State Department, if recent reports are to be believed (Matt is keeping quiet about it, understandably, even from those who know him personally, so I have no insight to offer on this development).
To supplant Peter’s excellent piece, I wanted to share a bit of my own experience of Matt Duss. After we knew each other for a number of years, he hired me about six years ago to work with him at the Foundation for Middle East Peace. We worked together for more than two years, until Matt left the Foundation to begin his work in government with Bernie Sanders.
My work with Matt provided me with invaluable experience, contacts, and a much deeper understanding of the process of policy formation and the good, bad, and the ugly of Washington policymaking and the culture it operates in and creates.
But more than anything, I benefited from Matt’s insight, strategic thinking, and compassion. He made me recognize that I was not nearly as good as I thought I was at looking at issues from all sides while maintaining my own ethical standards, because he was so good at doing that. After two years, I felt much better equipped to see the humanity, strengths, and foibles of everyone involved in a given issue.
But one thing I know I’ll never be as good as Matt at is his ability to face truly outrageous behavior and maintain his equilibrium.
In 2015, Matt was asked to testify before the House Subcommittee on National Security, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform about the impact of BDS. In the middle of his testimony then-Rep. Steve Russell (a Republican from Oklahoma, unsurprisingly) interrupted Matt and began quizzing him about his family. Specifically it was about his brother and father, both of whom had worked, in various capacities for Palestinian rights and aid, among other worthy causes.
It was stunning. I was shocked and needed to check with colleagues who had worked for many decades in DC to find out if they had ever seen anything like it; they had not. Russell interrogated Matt in a scene of guilt by association straight out of the McCarthy hearings. Matt kept his composure and asserted that he is testifying not his father and brother whom he was proud of. Eventually, Russell left in what looked much more like a petulant huff than the dramatic flair he had obviously intended.
Matt concluded his testimony with dignity, and I think you had to know him to even detect how perturbed he was by the incident.
I, on the other hand, was livid. I immediately set to discussing with a colleague in the media field how we might best respond, how to gather allies. It was obvious from Russell’s interrogation that he had been fed a highly biased view of Matt and his family based on a truly scurrilous hit piece that had been done on them a couple of years earlier by a right-wing rag called the Washington Free Beacon, a publication that never met a journalistic ethic it could stand to be in the same room with and which made FOX News seem truly fair and balanced by comparison.
In the end, it was Matt calming ME down, and quietly explaining to me why a simple statement, succinct and reserved, was the best response. Even at that, the statement was released quietly, and we did little to draw attention to it. Matt wanted to move on.
It was the right move for all concerned, of course, but the equilibrium Matt displayed throughout that episode was stunning to me. He was offended and certainly angry about it—after all, two of the dearest people in the world to him had been dragged through the mud in the most scurrilous way, and that insult was used in an attempt to smear Matt in the most insidious and despicable way. But he never let those reactions get the best of him, not for a second.
That, my friends, is the kind of person, the sort of temperament, we should all want in our diplomatic corps.
The attacks that have come Matt’s way since rumors of his appointment to a position at State surfaced have been just as scurrilous. On Monday, the Jewish News Syndicate referred to Matt in its headline as a “Sanders adviser with anti-Israel history.”
JNS neglected to offer a single example of Matt’s supposed anti-Israel bias. They refer to an ugly episode in 2012 when the Canter for American Progress fired most of their reporters at Think Progress for allegedly using antisemitic language (they didn’t, but one person used the phrase “Israel Firster” to refer to some of Israel’s more zealous supporters). Many of those who were let go have gone on to prominent careers in blogging, journalism, and related endeavors. Matt, in fact, was kept on at CAP long after that episode. He left of his own accord years later.
The rest of JNS’ “evidence?” That Matt met with Hanan Ashrawi, who recently resigned from the Palestinian Authority and has met with many American leaders over the years, including sitting presidents; that Matt called the murder of an Iranian nuclear scientist “terrorism” (he did not. They refer to this tweet, where Matt said, “Responding to the Fakrizadeh assassination by reaffirming the commitment to rejoin the JCPOA would be a good way to send the message that terrorism doesn't work.”); and that Matt quite correctly criticized the CEO of the American Jewish Committee, David Harris, for comparing Ilhan Omar to Marjorie Taylor Greene. In fact, Matt’s language was remarkably similar to that of many members of Congress objecting to the same thing.
Far from establishing anything negative about Matt, these points highlight his integrity. Matt has known many people in the Biden camp for years. I have no doubt (again, this is my supposition, not based on anything I have discussed with Matt) that he knew he might be in line for a position in the Biden administration. Another person might have kept their head down. It would have been quite easy to do so, especially since Bernie Sanders’ ascension to the chair of the Budget Committee understandably shifts his focus far from foreign policy.
That’s not what Matt does. And yes, we’re friends, and you might think I’m biased, although you might not think so if you saw the two of us debate about the relative greatness of various guitar players.
Matt and I don’t agree on every policy issue. But he listens, he considers, he is always looking to learn and refine his views. Most of all, he approaches policy with the idea of a solution based on what is possible and what is ethical, never losing sight of either.
I have no doubt that is precisely why the hawks and right-wing zealots hate him so much.
Except for Palestine: Book Release and events
We’re only a few days away from the release of my book with Marc Lamont Hill, Except for Palestine: The limits of Progressive Politics. You can order it from Marc’s independent bookstore here.
The buzz around the book has been amazing, especially for a non-fiction book with a niche appeal like this one. I am so excited about this.
Marc and I are doing a number of podcasts and live events to mark the book’s release. Here is a list of what we have done and scheduled so far.
Occupied Thoughts Podcast: Peter Beinart w/ Marc Lamont Hill & Peter Beinart. Listen Here.
Unsettled Podcast: Marc Lamont Hill and Mitchell Plitnick: The Limits of Progressive Politics. Listen Here.
UPCOMING EVENTS
Monday February 15, 5:00 EST: Book Launch Event With Mitchell, Marc, Dima Khalidi, and Angela Davis. Register Here.
Friday February 19, 6:00 EST: Politics & Prose Live!: Marc Lamont Hill and Mitchell Plitnick — Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics - with Michelle Alexander. Register Here.
More events are being scheduled. To keep informed about Marc’s and Mitchell’s upcoming podcasts, interviews, and live events, follow us on Twitter, @MJPlitnick and @marclamonthill. We tweet events multiple times, so if you follow us, you won’t miss them. You can also follow me on Facebook.
Recent Articles
The Israeli human rights group, B’Tselem, recently announced a major shift in its positioning when it declared that it viewed Israel as an apartheid state. I examined the impact of this for Palestinian rights and for the Biden administration for The Nation.
In a piece for Medium, I argue that the US’ democratic institutions did not save us from Trump, but that Trump exposed just how weak a safeguard they are. Only Trump’s own foolishness and megalomaniacal inability to restrain himself saved us, and that is unlikely to be the case next time. I offer some ideas on what to do about it.
New York City mayoral candidate Andrew Yang, and several of Joe Biden’s recent appointees have stated that the BDS movement is antisemitic or is based on antisemitism. It’s simply not true, and it betrays the weakness of the arguments against BDS that they even make the claim. Nonetheless, the claim has found some purchase, so I thought it would be worthwhile to refute this nonsense, which is not only offensive to the many supports, including many Jews, of BDS, but is an affront to victims of antisemitism throughout history.
Finally, Joe Biden’s statements, and those of his team, about Israel and Palestine point rather sharply toward the likelihood that the new president wants to turn American policy back to the pre-Trump days. That would be the days of a peace process that was an historic failure and produced a worse situation for Palestinians than ever before it and killed hope for a resolution. Not really something that should be revived. I explore this at The New Arab.
Recommended Articles
How the ADL’s Israel Advocacy Undermines Its Civil Rights Work
By Jacob Hutt and Alex Kane, Jewish Currents, February 8, 2021
In Game Changer, Int’l Criminal Court will take up Israeli War Crimes and Apartheid in Palestine
By Juan Cole, Informed Comment, February 6, 2021
Why Shin Bet torturers don’t have to worry about punishment
By Yael Stein, 972 Magazine, February 2, 2021
February 6, 2021
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