Israel Matzav

American Jewish Committee rips Bennett

The American Jewish Committee has sharply criticized Industry and Trade Minister Naftali Bennett for declaring the 'two-state solution' dead.

“Minister Naftali Bennett's remarks, rejecting outright the vision of two states for two peoples, are stunningly shortsighted,” said AJC Executive Director David Harris. "Since he is a member of the current Israeli coalition government, it is important that his view be repudiated by the country's top leaders."

“Bennett contravenes the outlook of Prime Minister Netanyahu and contradicts the vision presented earlier this month to the AJC Global Forum by Minister Tzipi Livni, chief Israeli negotiator with the Palestinians,” Harris continued. "Livni stated clearly that a negotiated two-state settlement is the only way to assure that the State of Israel will remain both Jewish and democratic. That is a view we at AJC have long supported.”

"We are under no illusion about the difficulties of achieving a two-state accord," Harris concluded. "But Bennett's alternative scenario offers only the prospect of a dead-end strategy of endless conflict and growing isolation for Israel."

Someone needs to remind the AJC that twice as many Israelis supported Bennett as supported Livni in the last elected, and that most Likud supporters (not to mention those of other, more right wing parties) likely agree with Bennett.

Labels: Abu Mazen, American Jewish Committee, American Jewish leadership, Binyamin Netanyahu, Naftali Bennett, two-state solution, Tzipi Livni

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:28 PM 4 comments

Soccer Dad's Middle East Media Sampler

Sorry, I collapsed in exhaustion last night before I could get this up.

Here's Soccer Dad's Middle East Media Sampler for Wednesday, March 20.

The New York Times, the American Council for Judaism and Israel

Last year a former New York Times reporter, Neil Lewis wrote a defense of the New York Times' coverage of Israel. (.pdf) Lewis writes of Arthur Hays Sulzberger:

Whatever complicated personal themes may have floated in Arthur Hays Sulzberger’s private seas can only be guessed at. (The most common — and plausible — speculation is that he, like many established and wealthy American Jews of German heritage, was profoundly uncomfortable, or simply snobbish, about the more recent waves of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe who were seen by them as less cultured.)
So, while downplaying in The Times to a ludicrous degree the Jewish identity of the victims of some Nazi horrors (an editorial about the Warsaw Ghetto uprising somehow managed to omit that it was a ghetto of Jews), Arthur and Iphigene worked diligently to help distant relatives still in Germany emigrate to the United States. They surely understood these people were in danger from Hitler because of something more than their “choice” to subscribe to the Jewish, rather than say, the Lutheran, religion.
But it was out of this tradition that Arthur Hays Sulzberger positioned himself as an avid anti-Zionist even going so far to make speeches on the subject. He consistently opposed proposals ranging from the modest, like the (never realized) raising of an international Jewish military force, to the grand, the founding of a Jewish nation - state in the Middle East.

(Lewis's description of "an international Jewish military force" as "modest" is curious.)

Lewis quotes Laurel Leff's "Buried by the Times" favorably. Leff's book documents how the New York Times covered (or didn't cover) the Holocaust. Indeed Lewis is rather critical of the failure of the paper to give proper coverage to the Holocaust. However, Lewis seems less bothered by Sulzberger's anti-Zionism.

In this interview, Leff argues that the Sulzberger's anti-Zionism affected the paper's coverage of the Holocaust and the founding of Israel:

Groner: One of the notable conclusions that struck me about your book was how strongly committed Arthur Hays Sulzberger was to the anti-Zionist credo that became associated with the American Council for Judaism. You provide meticulous documentation for the conclusion that Sulzberger was not merely a non-Zionist but was actively opposed to the creation of a Jewish state, and was even opposed to establishing Palestine as a refuge for hundreds of thousands of Jews trapped in Nazi-occupied Europe. Did those findings provide a major foundation for your thesis that the Times intentionally downplayed the news of the Holocaust as the news came in?
Leff: Yes, it did. Going into the project, I had assumed that Sulzberger was a fairly typical assimilationist German Jew, meaning that he acknowledged he was Jewish but had only the most tenuous connections to the religion and to the community. It was only when I started poking around in Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver's papers, a copy of which are at Yale University, that I realized how deeply Sulzberger was involved in the fight against a Jewish state. Silver led several Zionist organizations during World War II. In Silver’s papers I found minutes of meetings where Jewish officials plotted to combat the Times’ anti-Zionism, as well as its downplaying of incidents such as the sinking of the Sturma. (Having been refused admission to Palestine, the unseaworthy boat sank, killing all but one of the 768 refugees aboard.)
Even more surprising, I found evidence that Sulzberger was actively engaged in the fight both publicly—making speeches, publishing letters in Jewish publications, writing widely circulated, angry letters—and privately, by lobbying U.S. and British officials and keeping a close watch on the Times’ news coverage. This contradicted not only my assumption that Sulzberger had no ties to the Jewish community, but also that, as publisher, Sulzberger didn’t involve himself in partisan causes or in the news side of the business.
...
That led me to explore his and his family’s Jewish background, his relationships with Jewish groups, including the American Council for Judaism and Rabbi Stephen Wise’s World Jewish Congress, his connections to other prominent Jews such as Felix Frankfurter and Henry Morgenthau, and his correspondence with U.S. government officials, including Cordell Hull and Sumner Welles. As a result, I concluded that his attitude toward Judaism, including his anti-Zionist orientation, affected his and his newspaper's approach to reporting and editorializing on the ongoing destruction of European Jewry.

The American Council for Judaism was against the founding of the state of Israel.

According to the organization, Sulzberger was among its founders.

Many prominent figures in American life were involved in the Council’s earliest days. It was Arthur Hays Sulzberger, publisher of The New York Times, who introduced the phrase “Americans of the Jewish faith” into the Council’s statement of principles. Rabbis who joined the Council led some of the nation’s leading congregations. Among them were Samuel H. Goldenson of New York, Irving Reichart of San Fransisco, Edward N. Calish of Richmond, David Marx of Atlanta, David Lefkowitz of Dallas, Henry Cohen of Galveston, Henry Barnston of Houston and Julian Feibelman of New Orleans.

Why is it relevant now? In recent weeks, the New York Times has featured articles by anti-Zionists such as Joseph Levine and Ben Ehrenreich. Yousef Munayyer a supporter of a single state has regular column online. In 2010 the New York Times ran an admiring profile of the American Council for Judaism. Aside from the imbalance that one can see in the opinion pages of the New York Times, one can only wonder what motivates the paper to espouse anti-Zionism so openly with little dissent.

Though Laurel Leff doesn't go this far, I have to believe that Arthur Hays Sulzberger's anti-Zionism still dictates much of editorial policy of the New York Times. In the past regular columnists like William Safire and A. M. Rosenthal and, currently, Shmuel Rosner are exceptions. Anti-Zionism is in the DNA of the New York Times. Author's note: I saw a reference about Sulzberger and the American Council for Judaism in a comment to one of my recent posts. Though I can't find the comment now, I'd like to thank the author for providing me with the idea.

Labels: American Jewish Committee, anti-Israel media bias, anti-Zionism, Middle East Media Sampler, New York Times, Soccer Dad

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:46 PM 0 comments

Dems to US Jews: If you don't stick up for yourself, we won't either

A great editorial directed at the American Jewish community in the New York Sun:

There is no sugar-coating the point. The Senate has just confirmed the most truculent cabinet officer in respect of Israel in more than a generation because important institutions and leaders shrank from making an issue of it.

This is a story that is painful for many people to talk about. It would be inaccurate to suggest that the only objection to putting Mr. Hagel in at the war department had to do with Israel. He would be inadequate, even were Israel not an issue. There is a broad sense within the Jewish community — as there is among a number of non-Jewish senators who permitted his nomination to go to the floor — that Mr. Hagel has proven himself incompetent and disingenuous.

Yet there’s no gainsaying the special concern that his hostility to Israel has raised among the Jewish leadership. And one of the stories that is being spoken of in private is how humiliated the leaders of the Jewish community feel. Nearly all of them — not all, but nearly all — were opposed to the elevation of Mr. Hagel to the Pentagon. But only one of the Jewish defense agencies spoke out forcefully against him.

That was the Zionist Organization of America, which is the oldest pro-Israel organization in America, having been founded in 1897, the same year in which Theodor Herzl convened at Basel, Switzerland, the First Zionist Congress. It opposed the Hagel nomination early, forthrightly, and unapologetically. The result, according to the ZOA’s president, Morton Klein, is that it received objections from several leaders worried about the consequences for the Jewish community of such a public position.

Mr. Klein believes the Hagel nomination would not have been confirmed had the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the Anti-Defamation League, and the American Jewish Committee taken a formal public position against Mr. Hagel. All three agencies have had many heroic moments. But they stood down on Mr. Hagel. Said Mr. Klein: “Several senators — and important ones — said to me: ‘If Aipac, ADL and AJCommittee — especially Aipac — had come out and lobbied against Hagel, he would have been stopped.”

Read the whole thing. 

Any word yet who will run against Schumer?

Labels: ADL, AIPAC, American Jewish Committee, Barack Hussein Obama, Charles Schumer, Chuck Hagel, John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Zionist Organization of America

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 4:53 PM 0 comments

Boo. Hoo. Schumer says Hagel almost cried

Trying to justify his decision to support Chuck Hagel's nomination for Secretary of Defense, Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) told a breakfast meeting on Tuesday that Hagel 'almost had tears in his eyes' when the two met to discuss the nomination.

“Look, I had doubts about Sen. Hagel when his name was first floated, and I expressed those publicly on ‘Meet The Press’ and other places,” Schumer said. “And the president called me and said, ‘Before you come out with any decision, please sit down and talk to him.’ That was only fair.”

Schumer said he spent 90 minutes asking Hagel questions — including about a “nuclear Iran” — and “he answered them very well.”

“He struck me as sincere, and you know, you have to be sitting there at the meeting obviously, but I also told him when he used the word Jewish lobby what it meant to Jewish people,” he added.

“And I told him what a double standard is. That Jewish people throughout the centuries have suffered a double standard. Everyone could be a farmer except Jewish people. Everyone could live in Moscow except Jewish people. I said when everyone else can lobby but all of a sudden when those of us who are pro-Israel lobby, it’s a negative, that’s a double standard. And I’m sure you didn’t mean it, but it harkens to the old days.

“And he really, you know, he almost had tears in his eyes when he understood. So I believe he will be good.”

Schumer noted that there is “not a major Jewish organization against” Hagel.

“The main fight on Hagel is coming from the neocons, who you know well. And they resent Hagel’s apostasy on Iraq. You may remember — the neocons helped push Iraq — and Hagel was one of the first Republicans to say Iraq wasn’t working. And he was right. But that’s where it’s coming from.

“So I have no qualms about my position,” Schumer added. “And as you can see now, Sens. McCain and Graham and Alexander have said they may not vote for him, but they’ll let the vote come forward.”

Labels: ADL, American Jewish Committee, Barack Hussein Obama, Charles Schumer, Chuck Hagel, Neocons

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:27 AM 0 comments

Hagel twisting in the wind?

Some of you might have thought that Lindsey Graham (R-SC) saying that he was satisfied with Chuck Hagel's 'explanation' of his statement that Jews control the State Department was the end of the battle over Hagel's confirmation. And it certainly looked that way when John McCain (R-Az) weighed in saying that he expects Hagel to be confirmed (Hat Tip: Memeorandum).

But Jonathan Tobin reports that the report on Friday that Hagel had told an audience at Rutgers University in 2007 that Israel controls the State Department has galvanized the American Jewish organizations whose silence has acted as cover for pro-Israel Democrats to support Hagel. Two of them, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee have now issued statements strongly questioning Hagel's fitness to be Secretary of Defense, and the result may be a whole new ballgame - including the withdrawal of Hagel's nomination - by the time the Senate returns to session next Monday.

On Thursday, Contentions called on some of the major Jewish organizations that have been conspicuous by their absence from the debate about Hagel to finally break their silence on the issue and to demand an explanation about the 2007 speech given at Rutgers University during which Hagel is alleged to have made the crack about the Israelis and the State Department. Last night, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported that both the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee have made such statements. The ADL told JTA Hagel needed to explain the remark but the American Jewish Committee went farther in saying that “further Senate deliberation is called for before any final vote is taken.”

These comments are part of the growing furor over Hagel that is not going to be defused by the nominee’s assurance to Senator Lindsay Graham that he “doesn’t recall” making the controversial statements about Israel and the State Department. The allegations about the Rutgers speech are credible not just because of the contemporaneous account of the event but also because of Hagel’s history of saying similar things about the “Jewish lobby” and disavowals of past stands favoring outreach to Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah. As Hagel “twists in the wind” — a Watergate allusion made today by Woodward —pressure is growing on pro-Israel Democrats to abandon him.

With each passing day during the Congressional recess over the next week, the Hagel deathwatch will become a bigger and bigger story. Though Democrats closed ranks behind the president’s choice in a partisan votes on Hagel last week the failure to block a delay of the decision on him via a filibuster on Thursday will give some of them the time to change their minds. Some of the pro-Israel senators like Chuck Schumer who have been using the silence of mainstream Jewish groups about his nomination as cover for their decision to go along with what they knew was a questionable choice are now on the spot. As John wrote in the New York Post on Friday, it’s time for Schumer to live up to his boast that he was the “guardian” of Israel in the Senate. In light of the latest revelations about the nominee’s record, that pose is meaningless if he doesn’t jump off the Hagel bandwagon.

It is true that many of the Republicans who voted to oppose cloture of Hagel on Thursday were doing so in order to try to force the White House to give up more information about what the president knew about the Benghazi terror attack. But the extra time gives members on both sides of the aisle to reconsider the Hagel fiasco.

If this nomination is defeated, the Jewish community owes the Washington Free Beacon a debt of gratitude. WFB has gone out and fought this nomination when everyone else gave up hope.

Labels: ADL, American Jewish Committee, anti-Semitism, Barack Hussein Obama, Chuck Hagel, John McCain, Lindsey Graham

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:26 AM 0 comments

Betrayal: AJC doesn't recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital either

JTA's Ron Kampeas has a post-mortem of how the Democratic party platform came not to include Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Kampeas includes this:

A Jewish official, speaking on background, said that at least three American Israel Public Affairs Committee officials were present during the entire period when the platform was drafted last month in Minneapolis. Other Democratic and Jewish officials confirmed AIPAC’s participation in the process. Wexler said he had consulted with AIPAC officials on parts of the platform but had not discussed Jerusalem with them.

A source close to AIPAC said that the group never saw the full platform language, and that AIPAC officials were not in the room when the platform was being drafted. The source noted that AIPAC in its written submissions had made the case for including a reference to Jerusalem as Israel's capital, but also noted that AIPAC regarded both party platforms’ final draft Israel sections as “strong.”

The Anti-Defamation League included language referencing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in its written submission to both platform committees; the American Jewish Committee did not.

If you look up the American Jewish Committee's submission to the Democratic National Committee, you will see that Kampeas is right. The word "Jerusalem" does not appear anywhere in that submission. Coincidence?

The AJC should get hell over this.

Labels: American Jewish Committee, Barack Hussein Obama, Campaign 2012, Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, National Democratic Party

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:29 PM 2 comments

But I thought there was no anti-Semitism at CAP

On Friday, Benny Weinthal reported that the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League and Harvard Professor Alan Dershowitz had all attacked the Emergency Committee for Israel for its full page New York Times ad asking why Jewish Federations are funding the anti-Semites at the Center for American Progress and Media Matters for America.

The AJC, which was quoted in the ad talking about perceived bias against Israel in several specific CAP media products, issued a statement saying, “No one from the sponsoring group [ECI], an ideologically-driven organization to judge from its ads and other public activities, sought AJC’s consent to include reference to us in today’s ad.”

CAP officials have “acknowledged the inappropriateness of such bias” and they have implemented personnel and policy changes, the AJC noted.

Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, told JTA that the ADL quote slamming CAP in the ad for anti- Semitism was issued before CAP dealt with prejudices against Israel in its publications.

“After we raised concerns, initially we felt that the Center for American Progress took the matter seriously and understood the anti-Semitic nature of raising dual-loyalty canards and made sure terms like ‘Israel-firster’ were deleted from the Twitter accounts of CAP staffers where they appeared,” Foxman wrote in an email to The Jerusalem Post.

Harvard law Prof. Alan Dershowitz told The Boston Globe that he did not authorize the use of his quote for the ECI ad. “MM is doubling down. MJ [Rosenberg] is seeking support from left. CAP is trying hard to undo damage. Very different responses from them requires different responses from their critics,” Dershowitz said in an email to the Post on Thursday.

Critics accuse MJ Rosenberg of using anti-Semitic language to denigrate supporters of Israel.

So CAP and Media Matters are going to be good boys from now on and they're not going to do anything anti-Semitic. Right? Well, here's Benny an hour later.

A Center for American Progress Mideast writer Matt Duss generated criticism on Wednesday for a tweet that praised an article slamming Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu for "religious incitement" because he gave President Obama the Book on Esther for the Purim Holiday.

Duss later clarified his tweet by issuing a statement saying, "The Iranian regime
regularly states as a goal the destruction of the state of Israel, and therefore, Israel clearly has legitimate concerns about Iran and its nuclear ambitions. My tweet only meant to say that biblical analogies may be unhelpful to the current moment if they do not distinguish the Iranian regime from all Iranians. Of course, I did not mean to suggest criticism of the story of Esther."

Rabbi Abraham Cooper from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, who had a conference call with CAP officials on Thursday, told The Jerusalem Post that the tweet was discussed. "I explained during the call that what spurred my comment was the fact that last Purim there were demonstrations in front of Esther and Morechai's Mausoleum in Shushan who depicted the book of Esther as the story of a Jewish genocide against Persians. This was followed by online discussions in Farsi pushing this perversion of history."

"The Bottom line is that the young generation of bloggers and tweeters, must be
accountable for their words...and in this case the parroting of someone else's words depicting the gift of Megillat Esther as 'religious incitement' is a slur against a religion and the leader of Israel. I am happy to hear that this was not Mr. Duss's intention but it was also clear that in referencing Robert Wright's disgusting article, he knew virtually nothing about Purim."

The ECI ad was published on March 1. When - exactly - did CAP (and for that matter Media Matters) stop being anti-Semitic between March 1 and March 9?

What's more likely is that Rabbi Cooper and the Wiesenthal Center are the only watchdogs against anti-Semitism who aren't in bed with the Democratic party and don't place the interests of the Democratic party and Barack Obama above fighting anti-Semitism.

I know - it's not politically correct to say that, but it's the truth.

Labels: American Jewish Committee, Anti-Defamation League, anti-Semitism, Barack Hussein Obama, National Democratic Party, Simon Wiesenthal Center

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:11 PM 0 comments

Progressive first 'Jewish' organizations losing donations

YidWithLid writes that Jewish political organizations that place progressivism before Jewish values are experiencing a significant drop in donations.

Two Jewish Organizations that that put progressive politics before their mission, the ADL and The AJC have seen their donations plummet during the past five years. Apparently the money is shifting toward single-issue organizations especially Israel advocacy groups.

The Anti-Defamation League has lost more than $20 million in annual contributions over the past five years, going from more than $73 million in 2006 down to $51 million in 2010, according to its latest tax filings. That is a 30% fall-off, before taking inflation into account.

Similarly, the American Jewish Committee, which brought in $62 million in donations in 2005, raised only $38 million in 2010. In the last half of 2009 — the only part of that year the group reported due to a shift from fiscal to calendar year — the group raised $10.6 million in donations.

The excuse given by the the Institute for Jewish and Community research (based in San Francisco-'nuff said) is that younger donors want to have more control of their dollars so they are moving their cash to single issue-oriented organizations.

The organizations on the rise include AIPAC, The Israel Project, and Stand With Us all Israel advocacy groups.

Read the whole thing.

Heh.

Labels: ADL, AIPAC, American Jewish Committee, StandWithUs, The Israel Project

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:22 AM 0 comments

Burning bridges with Obama?

In the Jewish Week, Gary Rosenblatt writes about the aborted attempt by the ADL's Abe Foxman and the AJC's David Harris to sign a 'unity pledge' on Israel, which included a commitment not to criticize the incumbent's policies (something Rosenberg glosses over).

What Harris and Foxman didn’t say, but what is surely on the mind of mainstream pro-Israel groups, is that if Obama is re-elected next year, he will be free to carry out foreign policy initiatives in a second term, without political constraints. So it behooves the American Jewish community to be on good terms with him rather than burn its bridges in seeking his defeat.

Harris correctly observes that “the partisans are playing with long-term fire for short-term political gains.” That’s why the rest of us should realize that the more our political interests and favors are spread out, the more broad-based American support for Israel will be.

The fear of burning bridges with Obama might be on Foxman and Harris' minds, or they might just be looking for a way to support the Democratic party. But this President is by far the most hostile President ever to Israel, and if God forbid he is reelected, it won't matter for Israel whether the Jewish community burned its bridges with him. That's why I believe that it's important that we go all out to defeat him.

Moreover, Rosenberg is correct that we should realize that our political interests and favors should be spread out. The last thing about which I am worried is that American Jews will give too much support to the Republicans. It has never happened before and it won't happen now.

Labels: Abe Foxman, ADL, American Jewish Committee, Barack Hussein Obama, Campaign 2012, David Harris

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 4:39 PM 5 comments

Israel should be a US campaign issue

In The Wall Street Journal, Doug Feith goes after those American Jewish groups that are trying to remove Israel from the 2012 Presidential campaign (Hat Tip: Memeorandum; for those who don't have Wall Street Journal subscriptions, you can find the full article here). Feith argues, correctly, that Israel has always been an issue in American political campaigns for both the Congress and the Presidency.

But since when have American supporters of Israel believed that a candidate's attitudes toward Israel should be kept out of electoral politics? Since never.

In 1984, pro-Israel groups exerted themselves to block the re-election of Illinois Republican Sen. Charles Percy, the prominent chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who was an outspoken critic of Israel and champion of U.S. engagement with the Palestine Liberation Organization. Percy lost and, in an election night interview, attributed his defeat to the Israel lobby. Other politicians who met a similar fate include Reps. Paul Findley (R., Ill.) and Cynthia McKinney (D., Ga.).

When running against President George H.W. Bush in 1992, Bill Clinton took full advantage of Mr. Bush's testy relationship with Israel. As the New York Times reported in March 1992: "Some leaders of American Jewish groups predicted today that President Bush would pay in the November election for his demand that Israel freeze settlements."

One such leader spoke of the "anger and dismay in Jewish communities over Bush Administration policy that is increasingly perceived as one-sided and unfair against Israel," adding "I imagine it will be translated into an unwillingness to vote for this Administration or contribute funds." By the way, the speaker was Jess Hordes, Washington director of the ADL.

Feith goes on to review the relationship between President Obama and Israel, and concludes that if the ADL and AJC - the two groups that wanted the 'unity pledge' - really want to unify American Jewry, they should call on it to oppose President Obama's Israel policies.

When Mr. Netanyahu addressed Congress in May, most Democrats, including the leadership, joined in the numerous standing ovations that were obviously intended to contrast the affection for Israel on Capitol Hill with the bad feeling emanating from the White House.

So anyone truly intent on preserving unity among Israel's friends could do so by building on the substantial bipartisan opposition to Mr. Obama's policies on Israel. Instead, the AJC and the ADL are working to protect Mr. Obama.

Indeed.

Labels: ADL, American Jewish Committee, Barack Hussein Obama, Campaign 2012, Douglas Feith

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:38 PM 1 comments

ADL backs down on pro-Obama pledge

Jonathan Tobin reports that ADL Executive Director Abe Foxman is walking back his call for a 'unity pledge' that would take criticism of President Obama's Middle East policies off the Jewish community table for the 2012 election. This is from the first link.

But according to ADL head Abe Foxman, it’s all a big misunderstanding. He now says in a press release that the purpose of the pledge is “to put Israel ahead of politics” while “avoiding harsh and personal rhetoric or tactics in the form of attacks on political opponents’ positions on Israel.” But if that was all it was about, then perhaps that’s what the pledge would have said in the first place. The controversy over the pledge was not the result of what Foxman calls “distortion” by his critics; the fact is, he was caught red-handed in a thinly veiled partisan ploy.

The problem with the “Unity Pledge” is it echoed Jewish Democratic demands we have been hearing for years about shutting down Republican efforts to point out left-wing animus for Israel as well as the Obama administration’s predilection for picking fights with Israel. Obama’s decision to distance the United States from Israel, his stand on Jerusalem and his ambush of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu in May were all factors in the Republican victory in the special election in New York’s 9^th Congressional District last month. That result and polls showing a decline in Jewish support for Obama have panicked Democrats. The decision of the ADL and the AJC to issue a statement that would serve to legitimize efforts to silence debate about Israel by condemning its use as a “wedge issue” departed from not only their non-partisan status but also undermined their stance as Jewish defense organizations.

ADL’s subsequent statement in which they “strongly encourage measured and thoughtful expressions of different points of view regarding U.S. policy toward Israel” helps undo some of the damage their pledge has done. Foxman’s comments should also serve to chasten Democrats who seek to remove Obama’s record on Israel from public debate next year. As for the pledge, it should be amended to remove the line about “wedge” issues or scrapped entirely.

The fact that Foxman was forced to backtrack speaks volumes about the erosion of Obama's support in the Jewish community. It's actually quite surprising.

Labels: American Jewish Committee, Anti-Defamation League, Barack Hussein Obama, Campaign 2012, Emergency Committee for Israel, Israel as wedge issue, Republican Jewish Coalition

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 6:48 PM 1 comments

American Jewish 'leadership' goes in the tank for Obama

How's this for abdicating your responsibilities: The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and American Jewish Committee (AJC) have called on American Jews not to criticize Barack Hussein Obama's record on Israel.

Fortunately, the Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI) and the Republican Jewish Coalition have already said no. The Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee have joined together in an effort to encourage other national organizations, elected officials, religious leaders, community groups and individuals to rally around bipartisan support for Israel while preventing the Jewish State from becoming a wedge issue in the upcoming campaign season.

...

The Jewish community has had a strong interest in ensuring that American support for Israel is one of the critical strategic issues that unites rather than divides parties and officials. U.S. – Israel friendship should never be used as a political wedge issue. At a time when Israel is confronting new dangers and challenges in a fast changing Middle East, the United States must continue to project to the world the solid support of the American people and their elected representatives for Israel’s rights and quest for peace and security. U.S. leadership in the efforts to achieve an agreement resolving the conflict that results in two states—the Jewish state of Israel and a Palestinian state, living side by side in peaceful coexistence—is more critical than ever.

Now is the time to reaffirm that Israel’s well-being is best served, as it has always been, by American voices raised together in unshakeable support for our friend and ally.

And the wolf will live with the lamb and the leopard will play with the goat.... But those who know just how bad Obama's record on Israel is are saying no.

The Emergency Committee for Israel will not sign the pledge. ECI’s chairman, William Kristol, issued the following statement:

Here’s the Emergency Committee for Israel’s answer to Directors Abe Foxman and David Harris: You must be kidding.

Indeed, this attempt to silence those of us who have “questioned the current administration’s foreign policy approach vis-a-vis Israel” will re-energize us. Nor, incidentally, should those who support the administration’s approach to Israel be bashful about making their case. Directors Harris and Foxman need a refresher course on the virtues of free speech and robust debate in a democracy. Their effort to stifle discussion and debate is unworthy of the best traditions of America, and of Israel.

And here's the Republican Jewish Coalition.

The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) responded today to a call from the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee, asking Jewish groups to pledge not to use Israel as a "political wedge issue" or, in the words of ADL's Abe Foxman, to "avoid polarizing debates" and refrain from questioning "the current administration's foreign policy approach vis-à-vis Israel".

RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks stated in response:

"An open and vigorous debate on the questions confronting our country is the cornerstone of the American electoral process. Allowing the American people to see where candidates stand, pro and con on critical issues, is the hallmark of our free and democratic political system. For this reason, the RJC will not be a signer to this pledge.

"This effort to stifle debate on U.S. policy toward Israel runs counter to this American tradition. Accordingly, the RJC will not be silenced on this or any issue."

You can all guess which side I am on. But the real issue here is why the American Jewish 'leadership' insists on treating the Democratic party as the sole party of the Jews. One of the reasons the Left and the Democratic rank and file have become so anti-Israel in recent years is that they think we have no place else to go.

Labels: American Jewish Committee, Anti-Defamation League, Barack Hussein Obama, Campaign 2012, Emergency Committee for Israel, Israel as wedge issue, Republican Jewish Coalition

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:44 AM 6 comments

American Jews waking up to reality of Obama

According to the American Jewish Committee's annual survey, American Jews are finally starting to understand that their President is an incompetent boor. Here are some highlights of the survey (written by me).

Majorities disapprove of Obama's performance as President generally, and his handling of the US - Israel relationship in particular. Far more American Jews approve of Israel's Right wing government, led by Binyamin Netanyahu, than approve of President Obama. Obama does not break 60% of the Jewish vote against any Republican candidate - a number that could be fatal to his reelection chances, as it was to Jimmy Carter's.

Significantly, most American Jews disapprove of the establishment of a 'Palestinian state' 'in the current situation.' A huge majority disapprove of 'Palestinian' unilateralism at the United Nations, but a large majority also oppose dividing Jerusalem, and a mere 8% favor dismantling all of the 'settlements' as part of a 'peace agreement.' Large majorities agree that the conflict is existential and that the United States should withhold aid from the 'Palestinian Authority' if it forms a unity government with Hamas. And 96% believe that the 'Palestinians' should be required to recognize Israel as a Jewish state as part of a final peace settlement.

A majority disapprove of Obama's handling of Iran, and a huge majority believe that there is little or no chance of sanctions against Iran working. A majority would support US military action against Iran (which Obama would never do) if sanctions fail, and an even larger majority would approve of Israel doing so.

A plurality of American Jews think the US is losing in Iraq, and a large majority think it's losing in Afghanistan.

The Republican Jewish Coalition issued a statement in response to the survey.

“The AJC poll reinforces what we saw in the special election in New York’s 9th congressional district two weeks ago – that President Obama is losing Jewish support,” said RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks. “In fact, the approval numbers that President Obama got in this poll put him at near-Jimmy Carter levels of disapproval among American Jews. For the first time, a plurality or majority of respondents disapproved of the President’s handling of key issues such as the economy and the U.S.-Israel relationship. These numbers show why Democrats are scrambling to shore up their support in the Jewish community.”

Brooks concluded, “These results demonstrate on a national scale what the vote in NY-9 showed us on a local scale. Despite the Democrats’ spin to the contrary, there can be no dispute now that President Obama has a serious problem among Jewish voters.”

Shmuel Rosner agrees. Among eight insightful observations he makes about the survey is this one:

If the President’s team was exposed to numbers similar to the ones presented in the AJC poll, it makes the effort invested in the Jewish community in recent weeks much more understandable. If these are the real numbers of Jewish support than NY-9 was not an outlier, it was reality.

Read the whole thing (it's quick).

Labels: American Jewish Committee, American Jewish support for Israel

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:43 AM 3 comments

Say it ain't so: AJC won't get involved in arguing that Jerusalem is Israel's capital

I have discussed the Zivotofsky case, in which Jerusalem-born 9-year old Menachem Zivotofsky seeks to exercise his right to have Israel listed as his country of birth on his US passport, several times, most recently here.

Many American Jewish organizations are filing amicus curiae (friend of the court) briefs, which are due this week. Shockingly, the American Jewish Committee is not only filing a brief in opposition to the Zivotofsky's, but it is arguing that Israel has no right to designate any part of Jerusalem as its capital. That, like everything else, must be 'left to negotiations' in the view of the AJC.

But there is not unanimity in the Jewish community over this issue. Marc Stern, associate general counsel of the American Jewish Committee, said his organization believes “all issues in the Israel-Palestinian conflict have to be settled at the negotiating table and not the U.S. Supreme Court or the UN with unilateral declarations. For that reason we not participating in this case because we think it is inconsistent with our general view that peace will come to the Middle East at the negotiating table and at no other forum.

“It doesn’t mean that we don’t think West Jerusalem isn’t part of Israel,” Stern continued. “We do and we have our office there, and we say it is Jerusalem, Israel. But this is about official declarations, and official declarations don’t come about because somebody goes to court.”

But no one other than the government of the United States and the 'Palestinian rejectionist' groups has ever suggested that 'west' Jerusalem would not be part of Israel and could not be Israel's capital. The peace processors keep telling us that 'two states for two peoples' will each have their capital in Jerusalem. And none of the Jewish hospitals in Jerusalem are across the 1949 armistice lines (even Hadassah Mount Scopus is built on land that remained part of Israel between 1948-67). Menachem Zivotofsky was born in 'west' Jerusalem.

In fact, the issue in this case is not the 'peace process' or who will control Jerusalem. The issues are whether the State Department has the right to act contrary to a law passed by Congress and whether private citizens have the standing to contest the State Department's behavior when they are directly affected.

Moreover, in a remarkably similar case, the State Department acceded to Congress' desire.

The government argues that agreeing to such a change now would in effect compel the president to recognize Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem — “one of the most sensitive and longstanding disputes in the Arab-Israeli conflict” — resulting in major foreign policy ramifications.

But Alyza Lewin and her father, Nathan, who are representing Menachem, said in court papers filed last Friday that the government’s claim is “greatly exaggerated.” They pointed out that the U.S. in 1994 enacted a “virtually identical statute” regarding Taiwan over the vehement objections of China, which claims sovereignty over the island.

“The Department of State altered its earlier rule to comply with the statute and there was no perceptible effect on United States’ foreign policy,” according to their court papers.

At the same time, the brief said, Israel is “a recognized nation that Palestinians and the Arab world have learned to accept. … [The State Department] bars only supporters of Israel — overwhelmingly Jews who have a religious attachment to the land — from identifying their birthplace in a manner that conforms with their convictions.”

Marc Stern has it wrong (and our mutual friends who read this blog are invited to tell him so). This has nothing to do with the 'peace process.' It has to do with the right of Israel and Israelis to be treated like every other country in the World by the United States. Doesn't America's #1 ally at least deserve that much?

Labels: American Jewish Committee, Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, Marc Stern, Menachem Binyamin Zivotofsky

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:32 PM 2 comments

Is this really the Israel you know?

Here's a promotional interview for something called Project Interchange at the American Jewish Committee.

Let's go to the videotape.



So why are they introducing 'Palestinian' leaders to the foreign dignitaries? Why do we have to promote them?

Labels: American Jewish Committee, Project Interchange

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 8:23 AM 0 comments

Killing Israel to 'save' it?

JTA's Ron Kampeas reports that some American Jewish organizations have decided that they cannot defend Israel unless they openly criticize it. I have no problem with that, but I do have a problem with the issue on which they have chosen to take their stand: The demand for transparency by NGO's.

The American Jewish Committee and the Union for Reform Judaism have delivered broadsides in recent days against recent Israeli government initiatives targeting nongovernmental groups in Israel that monitor human rights. Last week, the Knesset approved in a preliminary reading a bill that would investigate the funding sources of nongovernmental groups that monitor and criticize the Israeli army.

“The Knesset’s action today contravenes the democratic principles that are Israel’s greatest strength,” AJC Executive Director David Harris said after Israel’s parliament voted Jan. 5 to investigate human rights groups. “Israel’s vibrant democracy not only can survive criticism, but it also thrives and is improved by it.”

Echoing demands from Israel’s left, the AJC and the Reform body instead called for across-the-board transparency in Israel.

In its statement the Reform movement suggested that such actions make it more difficult to defend Israel in other forums.

“The recent initiative undermines Israel's place in the global community and is a source of concern to the Jewish community throughout the world and to Israel's friends everywhere,” the statement said.

That was a theme picked up by the Anti-Defamation League, which in a statement posted on its website did not directly address the proposed Knesset law but expressed concerns about the “highly disturbing trend” of “Israeli intolerance.”

“Inflammatory statements have a negative impact on attitudes toward Israel around the world, even in friendly countries like the U.S.,” the ADL statement said. “More important, however, is the impact they have within Israel, undermining the democratic fiber, creating a mean-spiritedness in society and enlarging already significant communal rifts."

The significance of such statements was in their bearers -- mainstream American Jewish organizations, which are more accustomed to slamming Israel’s critics. In the past, these groups have targeted manifestations of bigotry by marginal Israeli groups, Israeli government discrimination against non-Orthodox religious streams and, in some cases, remarks by Israeli officials about the country’s Arab citizens.

What’s new is the concern by U.S. Jewish groups that discrimination and a diminishing of democratic values is becoming mainstream in Israel.

The proposed new transparency law applies to all NGO's that take money from abroad, but for the most part, it is only the Left's NGO's that are receiving money from foreign governments. On the other hand, the bill passed last week does limit itself to investigating the Left's NGO's, and many of those who have been pushing for NGO transparency feel that their cause has been set back by that bill. It certainly has if no one can tell the difference between the two bills and the NGO transparency bill baby gets thrown out with the investigation bath water. But that law may have passed its first reading (it's not law yet) in an effort to inject urgency into the matter. Not every law that passes a first reading passes a second and third reading and is enacted.

Requiring NGO transparency is good government. The US has laws that require organizations that take money from foreign governments to register as foreign agents, Europe has laws that require organizations that take money from foreign governments to register as foreign agents, so why when Israel does the same thing is it wrong?

There's more to it than that, and you should read the whole thing. We have brought a lot of this on ourselves (there's a criticism!) by deluding ourselves and our allies that we could make 'peace' with the 'Palestinians' on terms that allow us to continue to live here. That's unlikely to happen in any of our lifetimes.

Labels: American Jewish Committee, Im Tirtzu, NGO funding, Union for Reform Judaism

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:38 AM 2 comments