The Iran Lobby Goes After Dr. Walid Phares

Ever since his selection as Sr. Policy Advisor to Donald Trump, attacks on Professor Walid Phares are been intensifying from a group of writers and journalists who have been unabashedly for the Iran deal, which Phares strongly opposed and which Trump opposes and wants to renegotiate. Mother Jones started the ball rolling by re-heating an old article in which Adam Serwer (now an editor at Buzzfeed) strongly implied that Phares was an ideologue for the Lebanese Christian Phalange militia movement formed to protect the fast dwindling Christian community in Lebanon, who were besieged by both the Sunni PLO and the Shi’a Hezbollah at the time. As I commented previously, the central crime for the Left is Phares’ perceived defense of Christianity. The horror!

Phares has since taken the time to explain to me that he has always been an academic, public intellectual and was never a member of the Phalange in any capacity, but rather was the founder of a small social democratic party represented in the coalition in Lebanon. The source of Serwer’s story was a Hezbollah propagandist and a disgruntled former colleague who had been fired from an NGO aligned with a group Phares once worked with. Something else he brought up is the increased confidence and strength of the Iran Lobby in this country since the nuclear deal was signed. The attacks on Phares all seem to be originating with media outlets and journalists who fought for the Iran deal in the square of public opinion.

The author of a hit piece on Phares in the Washington Post is Ishaan Tharoor who also wrote extremely favorably of the nuclear deal. Daniel Larison chimed in to attack Phares in the American Conservative and here he is touting the nuclear deal as a “real success” in the same publication. As’ Ad Abukhaul called Phares “scary” in this Salon article, continuing Salon’s unwavering support for the deal. Ben Smith jumped on the “Phares is scary” bandwagon back in 2011 when he tapped as an advisor to Mitt Romney, and low and behold, here he is in Buzzfeed suggesting Obama may have earned his Nobel Prize for the Iran deal. Phares is right, the pattern is clear; the Iran Lobby clearly wants him out.

Over the past 26 years—since Dr. Phares immigrated to the United States—the record of his accomplishments has been impeccable: publishing, advising governments, serving as expert with courts and as a media analyst. Donald Trump is very unlikely to be influenced by a bunch of journalists who want him to alter his choice of Phares as Sr. Policy Advisor at the behest of the Iran Lobby.

In my opinion, Trump could not have made a better choice.