Natasha of Haaretz does a more thorough job than I did yesterday on the thoroughly-depressing poll #s from the American Jewish Committee. Norman Podhoretz says, Why are Jews Liberal? The answer: They’re not! Excerpt, with [commentary]:
a national poll finds that 56 percent of American Jews support a U.S. military strike against Iran. [What are the #s on Americans generally; I'll bet far lower]
The annual Survey of American Jewish Opinion, commissioned by the American Jewish Committee, revealed a 14 percent rise in the number of U.S. Jews in support of such a military strike, whose aim would be to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. [Only] 36 percent of those polled – self-described adult Jews were against such an attack.
[By the way, Jewish participation in the military is the lowest among Americans by religious group, as I've reported. If your daughter was in the military in Iraq, would you want us to be attacking Iran? This is the moral hazard of privilege, as the Israelis understand; almost all kids serve there, though Palestinians, being second class citizens, don't have to.]
Asked whether Israel should attack Iran, 66 percent of those polled said they would support such a move.
Despite the general liberal stance of U.S. Jews, 58 percent of those polled said that they believed that within the framework of a permanent peace agreement with the Palestinians, Israel should not compromise on the status of Jerusalem as a united city under Israeli jurisdiction. 75 percent also said that they agreed with the statement "The goal of the Arabs is not the return of occupied territories but rather the destruction of Israel." Only 19 percent said that they disagree with the above statement. [The end of the two-state solution; the lobby won't loose its grip. Let's see how progressive J Street is at its conference...]
Are there numbers on Jewish support for the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars? What about for Lebanon 2006?
I don’t buy this line that the organized Jewish have been historically ‘liberal’. I think we should only use that term if it’s sincere. Like if they were liberal because they truly believed all people were equal (all people includes Arabs and the Palestinian Arabs). If they applied this ‘Liberal’ sensibility from a universalistic point of view and principle.
Otherwise, it’s much more convincing (especially now) that they simply supported policies that had a mutual benefit. So they did these things that could be considered for the cause of ‘social justice’ because it benefited them.
I mean, did anyone talk about Palestinians or about the conflict in I-P during the 60s? That’s Abbie Hoffman and all that jazz. Did any of those hippies say anything about this stuff back then? Wouldn’t they know? They were Jewish, so it must have been in their peripheral view at least.
I remember seeing this old Jewish woman on DemocracyNow! talking about how ‘we’ (Jews) were ‘the ones who…’ – and then she read off a list of accomplishments of ‘social justice’. She then used the shallow and tepid characterization of Israel’s actions as simply, ‘wrong’.
Yea, that’s original. It’s like the ‘not in our name’ signs at protests and rallies. It’s becoming so stale and benign because nothing else has grown out of these ideas. It all comes after the Palestinians are reduced to what? 28% of their historic homeland? To the point where Uri Avnery doesn’t support a BDS movement?
This is a joke, and it’s a joke because of ‘Jewish identity’ and nothing else. We didn’t hold back when it came to South African (which was not as bad when compared w/ I-P according to some South African dissidents) apartheid, but we do so when it comes to Israel.
>*Are there numbers on Jewish support for the Iraq..?*
2003 Israelis who thought America was right or wrong to invade Iraq?
2007 Poll: 71% of Israelis want U.S. to strike Iran if talks fail
link to forward.com
rel=”nofollow”>Poll Finds Jewish Political Gap
Although bob, you quoted the article accurately, I believe the last sentence should read: Among those who attend services once or twice a YEAR, 53% disagreed with the decision and 38% agreed.
This is the poll cited by M&W in their book. I’ve always suspected it reflected a loss of nerve on their part and was meant to defuse complaints that they were too critical of the Jewish community (i.e., “antisemitic”). But it’s completely bogus when you look into it. It compares different polls (meaning different wording of the questions) taken at different times (meaning different implicit contexts for the questions). This is completely against all laws of sampling.
It is also completely counter to the results of the poll commissioned by the American Jewish Committee just before the invasion.
@D
From your link-
Interesting. Thanks.
Wow, that poll effectively says a majority of American Jews at the time approved of a war which they believed was likely to result in increased terrorism and more war. I’m not sure if I should question their intellect, their motives, or both.
Well – After Ahmadinejad’s election victory in last June – a poll conducted by pro-Israel CNN showed that three out of four American participated – did not want the US to directly invene in election crisis – even though the Bush administration set-aside US$400 million to have a regime-change in Tehran.
During election 2008 – it’s reported that close to 80% Jewish votes went to Obama. The payback is that Obama’s administration has the largest number of pro-Israel Jews and Christians in the history of the US.
As for common Americans are concerned – I doubt if 75% of them even know where Iran is located on the map or whether “Khomeini” and “Khamenie” are two different persons or the same person!!
Just curious, since you obviously keep these statistics: How many pro Israel Jews and Christians are in the Obama administration and what was the previous high before the Obama administration?
No problem dear. I love sharing knowledge. Let an ex-Jew answer your question:
link to realzionistnews.com
“The finding that 51 percent disagree with the Obama administration’s call for a “stop to all new Israeli settlement construction” stands in contrast to earlier polls by J Street, the pro-peace process lobby and political action committee, which were interpreted as showing strong Jewish support for U.S. pressure on Israel to advance the peace process and other surveys showing limited sympathy for settlers and settlements.
Even a very slim plurality of Reform Jews — 46 percent — said they disapproved of the settlement squeeze (74 percent of the Orthodox disapproved).
Why the apparent shift?
“There’s clear evidence American Jews don’t like Israel being pressured,” said Colby College political scientist L. Sandy Maisel, a close student of Jewish politics. The early administration focus on settlements, he said, struck even many Jews who voted for Obama as misplaced.”
link to thejewishweek.com
More on the AJC poll: link to israelnationalnews.com
There’s something unseemly about pressuring the light unto the nations.
Is it racist to insist that Arabs cant be trusted?
What do I do with the knowledge that 75% of American Jewish people are racist?
Honestly? That only puts them in line with the rest of the caucasian population that are non-Jewish. Why single the Jews out in that regard?
Any evidence 75% of white American gentiles are racists? Seems to me all the evidence is quite the contrary.
PS: Is the gentile caucasian population the light to the jews? Do they claim to be?
Citizen, I am a non-Jewish caucasian American. Maybe I don’t have a poll to back me up but I can tell you from observational experience of my school mates, family, coworkers, neighbors, etc. that the number is pretty damn high.
Well, I have the opposite personal experience. BTW, would Obama be POTUS without the white vote? Does that vote support your 75% figure of white racism?
Where I live, it was a lot more of the scared white vote — it was just that McCain and Palin were so incredibly terrible and out of touch that they made white people more afraid of them then of a black President. The whole economic crisis and McCain’s ineptitude in the face of it had a lot more to do with it, unfortunately, at least where I’m from.
I’m glad your experiences were different than mine, and I wish mine were more in line with yours. I suppose perhaps I’m being too cynical but I think maybe we can compromise and speculate that 50% might be a closer approximating than 75%? Believe me, racism is still very strong, especially among white Americans.
Cliff, I am glad you asked that about Abbie Hoffman and his view of Israel –
“Wallach: Is Judaism part of your mentality?
Hoffman: I’m not about to deny my Judaism, and I’m not about to let B’nai B’rith and real hawks on Israel define what Judaism is.”
Abbie saw Israel as an expression of imperialism
Is there anything else on Abbie Hoffman and Israel? Is that one line in an interview he did just before he died…all?
Anyways you aren’t seeing the big picture and my point:
Are American Jews (and essentially ANYONE, but since this ‘claim’ is trumpeted as a defense mechanism and source of ‘pride’ and ‘exceptionalism’) meaningfully ‘liberal’ or ‘progressive’?
We all know what PEP means. And the issue we are concerned about is not some far off, place. It’s the JEWISH State and it’s Palestinian ‘problem’. So it’s not as though the Zionists can ask us why we’re so concerned w/ X rather than Y. This is an issue that involves them, explicitly.
I have no doubt that the legacy of these movements for ‘social justice’ have left a residue of meaningful idealism in the Jewish community. There are Jews like Anna Baltzer who have been inspired by these values.
But I think by and large most American Jews have some kind of attachment for Israel. It doesn’t have to be fanatical, but it’s something. And in any relevant sense, there is NO meaningful dissent within the Jewish community. If there WAS, then something would change. It hasn’t.
Israel is destroying it’s own reputation by being itself in the information age. It was always this despicable.
Anyways, I think this LAME myth of Jewish yada yada being about ‘social justice’ is just that – a myth. It’s another example of Jewish exceptionalism.
I mean it’s quite sadistic as well. The relationship between Israeli Jew and Palestinian Arab is that of MASTER to slave. And Zionists like that empowerment. They like playing God w/ the Palestinians. They control them. They lord over them.
It’s the power AND this victim-hood PR scam that separate Jewish nationalism from other forms of nationalism and other nationalistic identities. The power of cinema/television and living in a society such as ours, that can be exploited as it has been by such ambition/organization and underhanded tactics (emotional blackmail; shoving the Holocaust down everyones throat – as if NO ONE ELSE has ever suffered ever in the history of suffering).
Yet the more despicable Israel is seen to be, the more support it gathers from the US government – explicitly supporting its war crimes, its nuclear proliferation. There does not seem to be a point where the majority stands up to say, Enough, Israel has gone too far, it has to be stopped.
My mother babysat Abbie Hoffman in the early 50′s.
She continued contact with his sister and mother until the 80′s. Abbie was Jewish, even occassionally practicing in ways though not committedly. I’m expect that he attended seders for example.
He changed after he had to go underground. He grew up.
That’s a nice bedtime story, Richard.
I’m not an expert on polling and I don’t know the history and reputation of the AJC polls, but I am always suspicious of polls commissioned by partisan organisations, especially when the results are consistent with that organisation’s views and goals. According to this poll, a majority of American Jews support all of the positions of the AJC. How convenient. The final question has 69% of respondents saying that the feel fairly to very close to Israel. That can’t be right.
It is a poll taken at the right wing shuls, where they all genuflect toward Israel seven times a day
There is a big problem with all polls on what Jews think. There is a segment of the Jewish population that is effectively unreachable. Me for example. I guess if pollsters were to hang out at weddings they might manage to get my opinion. Also, if they were to phone up random Jewish sounding names they might get me but my name is not all that common and not all that Jewish sounding – though there once was a town in Latvia that had my family name…
I guess that they could hang out in shopping malls – though I don’t go to them very much either. I prefer to buy local and small.
I don’t attend synagogue, and I am not on “Jewish” lists. My social life is elsewhere. The group of Jews who are unreachable are not randomly distributed. Jews who are anti-zionist are far more likely to be unreachable than Jews who are zionist.
This is ridiculous! Isn’t it obvious that anyone who wants to do a poll of Jews makes damn sure to aproach the correct cross section of Jews. Since there is no master list, and since there is no point at which a person officially starts or stops being Jewish, it’s easy! No one can say Boo!
It’s simple; and I’m sure the polling folks know where to go to get the Jews they want. Works both ways.
It’s like the blind men and the elephant. Where ever a person makes contact with Jews and Judaism, at a “tea party” or at a Communist Party meeting, that then becomes “the Jews” to them.
And no poll os Jews is meaning ful unless it is factered in some way with the declining number of people who identify as Jewish. Which BTW, what they would probably say about you, Edwin.
And I wonder how many Gentiles who make contributions or are members get polled as “Jewish”.
Are there rerally that many Jews in America that the story can’t be told in terms of individuals?
Scary, Ron Paul ties together the total collapse of the dollar upon Israel striking Iran; armed violence in USA streets:
link to prisonplanet.com
I don’t approve of Ron Paul’s political stances and he has said some disagreeable things in the past. However… when he’s got his finger on something, credit where credit is due.
Ron Paul was the only person in the running on the Republican side who — while I would never vote for him — I at least found the idea of him as President tolerable. At least he’s honest (for a politician) and polite.
Polls, by and large, are shams. They almost always reflect the message the sponsor is paying the pollsters to produce.
In any event, Phil makes an excellent point. Why isn’t a poll conducted of Americans across the board? Who cares if it’s true that 56% of Israel-first Jewish Americans thnik we should go to war with Iran? So, pull your sons and daughters out of the Ivy League and enlist them in the Armed Forces. Do I hear a collective gasp?
” So, pull your sons and daughters out of the Ivy League and enlist them in the Armed Forces.”
And fight and train on Saturdays? Never, they would die before they would violate the Sabbath.
“Who cares if it’s true that 56% of Israel-first Jewish Americans thnik we should go to war with Iran?”
It looks like you don’t have a good grasp of U.S. politics.
Here’s on a related matter, Bibi’s hawkish speech at the UN:
link to intifada-palestine.com
To answer Cliff’s question, liberal Jews were committed pacifists until 1967, when many enlisted in the IDF.
I’m getting a little tired of this myself, AF, but how many liberal Jews were “committed pacifists” pre-1967 (although it stands to reason that pacifist Jews would have been liberal), and how many of those very same liberal-pacifist Jews enlisted in the IDF in 1967? What is this statement based on?
I said many because it’s anecdotal not exact numbers. But I’d love to see a study comparing US Jews’ service in the US military with their service in the Israeli military, specifically Vietnam vs. the Six Day War. I don’t know whether such a study could be done, since its results might be criticized as anti-Semitism. But it should be done.
AF – Many may not be an exact number, but it is a quantity. Your statement about liberal Jews included no such quantifier. What are both of these judgements based on? When you say “committed pacifists”, do you mean that they opposed the war in Vietnam, or that they were opposed to all war? Do you know for a fact the “many” who enlisted in the IDF were among the very same liberal Jews who had previously been “committed pacifists”? Why would you want to do a study comparing service in a war that lasted 16 years and a war that lasted a week? I hope you would adjust for class, education, income, relative ease in avoiding the draft, etc.
@AF: I thought that conscription in the IDF is a 2 year minimum? That would make the study not possible
Regarding US enrollment: “Only some 3,000 out of 1.4 million active duty servicemen and women are Jewish, about two-tenths of one percent. When it comes to Marines, the numbers are even more startling. It’s one out of 1,000. One-tenth of one percent. That gives new meaning to the term “minority.”
link to jewishjournal.com
You guys love that statistic, huh? It’s based on servicemen and women who checked “jewish” on an optional religious form. The number is estimated to be about four times that. Still small, but not THAT small!
Shmuel, if they could avoid the US draft, couldn’t they also avoid serving in the IDF?
Eg. no academic deferments in Israel, except for Yeshivah students, and specialty studies – followed by immediate conscription and longer service, in that field. Today it is much easier to avoid the draft in Israel than it was in ’67, and about 50% of Israeli kids don’t serve. The army just makes a fuss when you call yourself a pacifist or refuse to commit war crimes.
I meant American Jews.
American Jews would not be subject to the Israeli draft unless they immigrated to Israel (immediate citizenship upon arrival, according to the Law of Return, and immediate liability to the draft – subject to age and health requirements). So your proposed study would be about American Jews who volunteered to serve in the IDF in ’67 without immigrating to Israel, as compared to American Jews drafted to serve in Vietnam?
Oh for Christ’s sake, Phil, just get rid of the guy.
You have got to decide whether this is going to be a place for disseminating warmed over right-wing anti-Semitism or not. Up to you.
“liberal Jewish pacifists, who switched in 1967″ Oh for Christ’s sake.
Of all the forms of annoying internet troll, surely the worst is the little helper who berates the owner on how to moderate his own site.
About the only validity to the 67′ reference is that of “born again” Zionists. That is, some had no interest whatsoever in Israel before the war of 67′, but when Israel became the fateful “strategic interest” dollar signs went off and people scrambled to cash in on it. If you read our “classic” literature previous to this date you will have a hard time finding a passing mention, of course, after the 67′ war Israel became a going “interest.”
Mooser, what happened to the ‘Judaism is about social justice’ crowd then? Anna Baltzer makes the point that Judaism is ‘about’ social justice when she distinguishes it from Zionism.
But then, where are all these Jewish intellectuals who supported the civil rights movement and yada yada yada?
If you are only ‘liberal’ on issues that do not confront your OWN identities and biases, then you are NOT a liberal – you are PEP or a general HYPOCRITE
you’re a gatekeeper Mooser.
look, this blog has been around for awhile now, Phil never has more than 200ish comments. Glenn Greenwald can get up to 500ish
but we have a good crowd here for the most part
you CANT avoid talking about Jewish this and Jewish that when it comes to I-P
you want to ban people for saying ‘Jewish’ [whatever] now?
But then, where are all these Jewish intellectuals who supported the civil rights movement and yada yada yada?
That is the question.
oh and let me also add that im pretty sure if we follow your standards of discussion Mooser (don’t mention ‘Jewish’ identity at all, completely disassociate Jewish identity – which in an of itself is complex, and by no stretch of the imagination do people imply it’s a monolith when they say Zionism is *A* as opposed to *THE* construct of ‘Jewish identity – from Zionism. Zionism is the ideology of a race of aliens who crash landed on Earth in the late 1940s! They have been parading around as Jews and really have nothing to do w/ ‘Jewishness’ – which btw, I will not explain what it exactly IS, I will just say it is generally ‘good’ in a vague and intellectually shallow manner. ANTISEMITE!) :
then this blog will be left to pseudo-concerned Leftists like syvanen, possibly LeAnder?, v… (you were the one who extrapolated a one-line answer in an interview done towards his demise – Abbie Hoffman – as some kind of ‘rebuttal’ to my question of why the Abbie Hoffman crowd never said anything about Israel?), and you, our resident Palestinian cause gatekeeper.
Has anyone here referenced the Torah or Talmud? I’ve seen that tactic done w/ Islam where some nutbag will take a passage out and then say SEE! I TOLD U SO! essentially.
That’s not what is happening here. We are talking about culture and identity. How this construct of Jewish identity informs the politics of a certain motivated/organized segment of the American Jewish community
didnt edward said put out a book about PALESTINIAN identity? I mean thats important. Palestinian identity needs to be clearly explained. these concepts are important when one of the CORE issues we are dealing with – either directly or indirectly – is the nation-state model of social organization.
intellectual feast
we’re not on CNN, but we’re not Charlie Sheen/moron Alex Jones fringe either. We get 100 comments often, and 200 at best. We have a regular group here who are quite informed.
we may stumble when it comes to issues of ‘Jewish power’ and identity but that’s because we ARE being careful and these topics aren’t well understood
i tried saying this earlier, but this is an everchanging conciousness (on this blog, but any on-going discussion has one amongst the people participating)
and these ideas are not fully formed. so it wont be pc at first, but through trial and error, forces pushing against each other (you against us, not in a tribal way but difference of opinions way) -> we will become better informed. i really am sick of all this whining about it.
no one here is violent and no one here is going to start making websites called ‘Judeofascism’ – that was ONE guy in the history of this blog.
now on the flip-side Mooser, how many ‘Islamofascism’ guys have we had here? During Gaza it was a damn festival of hate. we had all kinds of Zionists here. from the Nurse Ratched/Dolores Umbridge kind of Zionist (‘Suzanne’) to the circus clown/Dershowitz Zionist (Chris Barrel-roll) to the la-la-la-la-la-i cant hear you-la-la-la-la Zionist (Julian and Richard Witty)
yet, we dont get any posts about THAT do we? No. it only got so bad that phil made a GENERAL post about vulgar language and such. he didnt single any out.
in fact, Phil defended Witty and made him an honorary member of the blog. the token Zionist.
now, i dont think Witty should ever be censored because he is polite and being absolutely neutral rhetorically for a moment, he has to deal w/ all of us (i dont think thats particularly courageous though, this is a GOOD blog and Phil is a good writer, that’s the attraction)
anyways, long story short – THESE PRETZELS…..ARE MAKING ME….THIRSTAAAAY!
I guess I’m terribly naive. I thought that when AF wrote about Jewish pacifists prior to 1967, he was describing the good old days.
The idea that a lot of Jewish liberals used to be pacifists is appealing to me. Beats the present situation.
Shmuel, all you are doing is giving him a chance to refine his talking points, to hone them so they sneak in just under the wire. Me, at this point I would just let his completely afactual and bigoted views alone, I won’t validate them with a response.
Have you had no experience with second-hand anti-Semites. I’ve had more than enough, and I get more than I need in ordinary life. I don’t need it here.
I have no desire to spend time un-packing every single John Birch and Father Coughlin canard all day. Don’t you guys know there’s a war on?
Mooser, you complain a lot about all the antisemitic suffering you are forced to endure. I believe you once posted that you don’t like talking about Zionism with gentiles because of all their antisemitism. Either you live in a very tough neighborhood, or you have very thin skin. Do you mind me asking where do you live?
Mooser, your comedy routines are growing tired.
It’s interesting to note that the only thing you seem to take seriously is defending your “tribe.” Everything else is fair game. The war, Zionists, anti-Zionists, you name it: all can be the butt of a good old Mooser joke. But you get real serious when you sense any inkling of what you feel is “antisemitism.” Fascinating.
By the way, what are “second-hand anti-semites?” Are there third-hand anti-semites? How about fifth-level Jew-haters, how do you do with those?
Why don’t you give us your list of permissible language and we’ll all try to live up to it. We’ll defer to you as judge and jury.
The problem regarding our current appoach to Iran is part of a pattern; I don’t it getting weaker, but stronger:
link to counterpunch.org
Wow, Ahmedinejad may actually be . . . Jewish!? Talk about self-hating . . .
link to nydailynews.com
Why would anyone suppose that this revelation would be unwelcomed by Ahmadinejad? When has he ever spoken against Iranian Jews?
The people flogging this report with such glee are conflating Israel with Jews – isn’t that supposed to be anti-Semitic?
Thank you! Indeed. I still get phenomenally aghast at the whole lack of logic when dealing with Ahmedinejad. It’s like no matter what we find out is real about him, it’s always hammered into the frame of his so-called anti-Semitism.
“He had a Holocaust denial conference!” “…that was attended by Jews?” “Oh… well… they must be anti-Semitic Jews?”
“What? Ahmedinejad might be Jewish?! But that means… he must be an anti-Semitic Jew!”