J Street has found a wedge issue: support for "60 Minutes"' amazing broadcast last Sunday on the end of the 2-state solution. J Street is driving the wedge here, crying out to all American Jews to celebrate Bob Simon's work, thereby crying out, Which side are you on?? Camera is taking the other side: Simon's Smear.
J Street is too middle of the road for me, but its power can be witnessed in this attack by the New Republic, reflecting the simple fact that J Street has connections to the Obama administration–several of J Street's funders/advisers were big fundraisers for the President– and TNR fears that J Street will sway Obama toward a new hearts-and-minds approach. I.e., there is a fight to define a new middle ground. At last.
Another sign that the battle has moved left: AIPAC's paralysis. Lately AIPAC has failed to take a stand on things that in the bad old days it would get righteous about. Like, George Mitchell's appointment. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? You'd expect AIPAC to either welcome Mitchell or condemn him. Not a word. It is paralyzed between two poles: pleasing the new administration and its own neoconservative base (Sheldon
Adelson), neither of which it
can afford to alienate. AIPAC did with Mitchell what it did lately with Obama's Al Arabiya interview: basically cherrypicked his statements to find the one neocon statement in them, about Iran. Thereby misrepresenting the essential thrust of the new administration–olive branch–so as to give its diehard followers red meat. The bottom line: a loss of the ability to frame the debate in the Jewish community, and thereby a loss of influence. (Phil Weiss)
