Israel Matzav

A word of caution to J Street

At Jewlicious, Rabbi Yonah sends out words of caution to J Street, the pro-suicide lobby (my characterization, not his), which he sees as getting a little too cocky after their starring role at President Obama's meeting with 'Jewish communal leaders' a couple of weeks ago.

J Street is running hot and full of themselves after the Jewish summit with Obama, when their approach was the one favored by the Obama administration. I am reminded of the phrase from Pirkei Avot: Be careful in your relations with the government; for they draw no one close to themselves except for their own interests. They appear as friends when it is to their advantage, but they do not stand by someone in their time of stress.

When J Street’s approach fails to bring good polling numbers to the Obama camp, I am guessing that they will no longer have the ear of the inner circle.

J Street believes that American pressure is the answer! This will somehow convince Hizbollah and Hamas to give up their stated aim of destroying Israel, bring a democratic government to run a Palestinian state, get all the Arab states of the region to join in one big love hug with Israel, get Yesha to forget the Torah, and even make the lion lie with the lamb.

J Street has forgotten their Torah/Bible studies. Jews are a stiff necked people, and we don’t like people telling us what to do. Even God can’t tell us. And Israelis have an extra dose of stiff neckedness. American pressure has already hardened most Israelis and as we mentioned only 6% of Israelis back Obama’s policies. The current policies are likely to continue intransigence. As soon as the Obama folks have had enough of no results on the middle east, J Street’s star will no longer shine over the White House. There are millions of pro-Israel Christians whose support Obama needs much more.

I mean no ill will towards our brothers and sisters at J Street, I am not calling them names. I just think that their approach will get us nowhere fast.

Unlike Rabbi Yonah, there is very little that would thrill me more than seeing J Street fall flat on their faces. But his lecture is likely to fall on deaf ears for two reasons.

First and foremost, the Obama administration has a quasi-religious belief that Israel is

an aggressive, Western imperialist power exploiting indigenous people of color who simply wish to be free--in other words, the Rev. Wright-Bill Ayers-Rashid Khalidi view of the Middle East.

Because of the nature of that belief, the Obama administration is unlikely to give up on forcing Israel to endanger its security by creating a 'Palestinian state' on all of the territories that it liberated in 1967. And since J Street is the most visible Jewish organization that promotes that view of the world and that has managed to portray itself as mainstream, it is unlikely, at least so long as the Obama administration is in power, that they will lose the White House's ear.

That does not mean that I believe that the Obama administration will ultimately succeed in moving Israel off its current 'stiff-neckedness' as Rabbi Yonah calls it. Certainly not so long as the Netanyahu government is in power.

Second, J Street does not need to fear that the Obama administration will abandon them and their position to seek the support of the pro-Israel Christians. Most pro-Israel Christians are solid Republican voters, and have many other issues with Obama that are not connected to Israel. He has very little hope of obtaining their support even in the unlikely event that he abandons his current pressure on Israel.

Unfortunately, J Street is in the catbird's seat among American Jewish organizations, at least so long as this administration is in power.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:38 AM