Michael Goldfarb of the neoconservative Weekly Standard (which is run by William Kristol, who fears a loss of power) is leading the campaign to undermine J Street’s conference in two weeks. Here he picks up reports that another congressman, Arkansas’s Mike Ross, is not going to be attending the fete. Then he reveals his role, shitstirrer:
THE WEEKLY STANDARD put a call in to another member of the Arkansas delegation, Senator Blanche Lincoln, asking her staff whether they might have been the victim of the same confusion — whether they intended to lend the senator’s name to an organization that advocates for engagement with Hamas and against sanctions on Iran. We will update when her office responds.
I guess Goldfarb has his work cut out for him, calling a lot of folks these next couple weeks. Funny enough, this is what non-Zionists did to Herzl 115 years ago, when he was starting his Zionist conferences, tried to undermine him at every turn. On its site, J Street says, accurately:
Since our founding, accusations about J Street and our leadership have morphed from whispered lies to stated fact in attacks on J Street in various right-leaning publications, organizations, and blogs.
I was surprised to hear Netta (of Maya and Netta the refuseniks) say at the Green Fest in Washington D.C. that J Street is not all it is made up to be. Will have to look through my notes taken during their talk but she really whacked J Street
Was just looking through my notes that I took during the Netta and Maya’s talk at the Green Fest in D.C. Medea Benjaman and Jewish Voices for Peace sponsored their talk
Netta “J Street is problematic” not as fair as it should or could be
Maya said a great deal about feeling like an outcast in her own country. That because of their stance Maya and Netta would not be able to access certain scholarships etc.
they both agreed that there is a massive amount of “misinformation” having to do with the I/P conflict in this country.
Maya talked about being in prison and hearing she said what ‘could not be repeated” Rabbis say the most radical, violent and racist things against Palestinians that she had ever heard.
One thing that gave me hope during their talk was that Maya said she was a rabid Zionist just three years ago. No longer
Netta did not have so much hope for Peace in this conflict.
Two inspiring and remarkable young women. I told them both that I hoped they would be Israeli leaders/policy analyst/ officials in Israel some day. These two young women gave me hope for peace
Here is an excerpt from something Jeff Blankfort wrote to Phil Weiss in March 2009, posted by Phil here:
link to mondoweiss.net
Writes Blankfort:
“… J Street has no backbone. In fact, the [J Street] poll shows what I have been trying to say: it won’t be Jews that are going to lead America out of this morass. It’s going to be folks like Freeman, like Mearsheimer and Walt, and people we have yet to hear from who are beginning to say, ‘we’re fed up and not going to take it anymore.’”
Responds Weiss:
“This is why I say, Look what J Street is up against, hardened attitudes inside the Jewish community. Build the bridge between progressive communities, and many Jews will cross it. You can’t do this work without Jews. Hey Blankfort, you’re Jewish.”
I agree with Blankfort, who expresses a view I have stated many times on this blog: The Zionist forces are too strong within the American Jewish community for progressive voices therein to prevail on Palestine. It’s going to be up to the goyim – and there’s no telling what that will mean in the end for the Jewish community (except that it won’t be pogroms).
I think I have to agree with Phil on this point.
I personally don’t believe that we can change American policy towards the I/P conflict without having a large change of heart from the Jewish American community. I also don’t think its going to be that difficult to achieve as well. Just look at the impact that Phil alone has.
Although I explained my opinions on this subject more fully down below in this thread, I would say here that I don’t agree with either of your assertions above, if taken literally.
The behavior of the ethnocentric, undemocratic Israeli government and society will continue to be so egregiously in conflict with basic American ideals and moral values, and the “special relationship” will be so obviously harmful to American welfare and interests, that an eventually strong anti-Israel movement in this country is inevitable. The only questions are, how soon will that come, and who will lead it.
If it comes soon enough, the movement of the many will be led by progressive Jews. If they wait too long to take the lead, it will be led by others.
I would also say that it won’t be at all easy for progressive Jews to get the better of entrenched Zionist organizations without more help from outside the tribe. There will be reflexive apprehension and resistance spurred by “outsider” involvement, but that price can be paid and overcome. (Imagine, being an “outsider” in matters of crucial importance to one’s own country.)
If it comes soon enough, the movement of the many will be led by progressive Jews.
It is being led by them, I think, but it is broadening, and that is a good thing, and inevitable, as you point out.
The question for me is how “the movement”–regardless of its composition–will actually be able to reduce Zionist power in the U.S. and pockets of Europe.
Fed up is a good way of putting it, CMI. In another thread, Phil insisted that the current “pathology” of American Jewry is not “irremediable” I don’t think anyone here suggested it was (irremediable), but my question is, if it does change, will the change result from humanitarianism or self-interest?
…if it does change, will the change result from humanitarianism or self-interest?
Does it matter, as long as it happens?
These publications – TNR and Weekly Standard – seem to serve as monitoring devices for Zionist/colonialist campaign contributors who want to make sure they are getting value for their investments.
Speaking only about bringing an end to the Israeli occupation and some land for Palestinians to confidentally call their own, and with some substantial semblence of liberty and justice a la core USA values, I can’t imagine anyone in the world with basic awareness of the sole superpower USA’s special relationship with Israel believing that the USA
is not needed to effectively achieve this dream. The USA is 98% non-Jewish. Therefore it seems most rational to think non-Jews are needed to effectively achieve this dream. OTH, given the long history of no progress, it seems equally obvious the other 2%
are in the USA’s driver seat. There’s a reason why W & M had to go outside their
own country to get The Lobby published. And a reason why Phil left the Observer
and resorted to creating his own blog. And why the former USA president Carter,
actual peace-maker for Israel on his resume, is now shunned by so many influential
people since publishing his book on the I-P situation. Why? Freeman.
“…that because of their stance Maya and Netta would not be able to access certain scholarships etc.
they both agreed that there is a massive amount of “misinformation” having to do with the I/P conflict in this country [USA].”
I would add, at least as far as the USA is concerned, also a massive witholding of information. Given both the impact on one’s career and the manipulations of
propaganda, criticism = demonization, both in the USA and Israel, I see a major
war across the whole Middle East before I see any real progress. Once that happens, all bets are off, not only for the Palestinians, but for Israel–and the USA will be holding a big bag of s*** with what’s left of its shredded arms.
link to thenation.com
Adam and Phil incisively discuss J Street’s choices:
This is the treacherous landscape that J Street has stepped into, where it has been outflanked on occasion by both the right and the left. During the Gaza conflict, it issued a statement condemning not only Hamas but Israel, too, for “punishing a million and a half already-suffering Gazans for the actions of the extremists among them.” It was a brave stance for a fledgling Jewish organization trying to build mainstream support, and it brought down the wrath of community gatekeepers. Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, wrote in the Forward that the statement displayed “an utter lack of empathy for Israel’s predicament,” calling it “morally deficient, profoundly out of touch with Jewish sentiment and also appallingly naïve.” Ouch.
More recently J Street has tacked in the other direction. During the Toronto festival it quietly began collecting signatures for a letter blasting the protest as “shameful and shortsighted.” Although never released as a letter, the initiative didn’t endear J Street to the growing grassroots movement. Which is not to say that progressives are not hopeful about its emergence. Rosenberg points out that in its more than fifty-year existence, AIPAC never got the positive publicity J Street got after just one year–a long, favorable portrait in The New York Times Magazine. “All the constellations are coming together. [Executive director] Jeremy Ben-Ami and Daniel Levy have a plan and a message, and they know how to work the media,” he says.
J Street is trying to position itself so that it is the only game in town for liberal Jews, affording Jewish advocates for the two-state solution the big political tent they’ve been lacking to this point. Rabbi Yoffie, for instance, will be addressing the J Street national conference, overlooking his ferocious criticism of the organization in January. “Let’s have a broad and generous definition of what constitutes pro-Israel,” he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, in explaining his pragmatic shift.
The conference is sure to combine culture, youth and politics in such a way as to make AIPAC look about as à la mode as the former Soviet Union. “This is a watershed moment in terms of how people look at institutions,” says Isaac Luria, J Street’s campaigns director. “The old legacy institutions are dying.” Nadia Hijab says this has been J Street’s main achievement, transforming the terrain for left-leaning Jewish groups by taking on the traditional lobby in the mainstream political arena, mobilizing money and message. “J Street is a positive development as an alternative to AIPAC,” Hijab says. “It’s not comparable to AIPAC yet, but in the American context it is very smart.”
Political dynamism is precisely what J Street hopes to display at its policy conference. Expected speakers include Senator John Kerry and former Senator Chuck Hagel; 160 members of Congress will serve as hosts for J Street’s first annual Gala Dinner. It might not rival the famous “roll call” of luminaries attending AIPAC’s annual conferences (more than half of Congress showed up last May), but it is an impressive show of firepower all the same.
The ultimate issue is whether J Street will have any effect in bringing about a two-state solution, an idea that, despite official support, has been neglected in Washington nearly to the point of abandonment. Dana Goldstein is thrilled by the possibility that the rubber will finally meet the road. “J Street has had a great influence on intellectual progressives in DC,” she says. “There is now a lobby group that engages ideas that have been out there without political will. They are the political arm to this movement.”
Some critics on the left argue that conditions on the ground have already made the two-state solution unreachable. There are more than 500,000 Israeli settlers occupying the West Bank and East Jerusalem, with more arriving every day, and Gaza remains under siege. Add to this the political scene inside Israel, where Netanyahu has balked at Washington’s request for a settlement freeze, and you could say that in the sixteen years since the Oslo Accords were signed, the possibility of two states in historic Palestine has never been as far off as it is today.
Abunimah sees the new organization as having little impact. “A kinder and gentler AIPAC does not represent serious change,” he says. “J Street is supposed to represent a tectonic shift, but it operates within the peace process paradigm and doesn’t challenge it at all.” Still, J Street has clearly panicked conservative Jews. And the Israeli embassy fired a warning shot across J Street’s bow in October, when it warned that the lobby group was working against Israel’s interests.
For its part, J Street knows these are desperate times for the liberal goal of a two-state solution. As Israel becomes more and more isolated globally, the Israeli government and the traditional lobby have only gotten more intransigent. At the AIPAC policy conference last spring, its executive director warned that Israel’s enemies were establishing a “predicate for abandonment” that only AIPAC’s faithful could reverse. Don’t expect such hysteria at the J Street conference, but behind all the hoopla, the organization will similarly be trying to preserve the old ideal of a Jewish state. “Getting Israel another thirty F-16s won’t help us combat the legitimacy issue [with] people who are trying to undermine the right of Israel to have a state.” Luria says. “Jews need a state. And that legitimacy window–the cracks in that window are getting wider. They’re dangerous. Dangerous.”
Meanwhile, Netanyahu is already breaking his promise to limit “settlements”– theft of Palestinian land: “Despite promises to Obama, construction continues in dozens of W. Bank settlements.”
link to haaretz.com
Count me as one of the critics (though I avoid the left/right paradigm) who “argue that conditions on the ground have already made the two-state solution unreachable.” I also agree with Abunimah in that J-Street is nothing more than AIPAC-lite.
That said, this is an important article, being that it’s in The Nation, which has a decent-sized reader base. It will surely bring even more people to Mondoweiss, where the all-important “taboo” subjects are discussed openly.
The Palestinians need strong advocates in the US standing up for Palestinian rights, not merely another pro-Israel Zionist organization trying to restrain Israel from destroying itself.
That is, for a progressive it is not enough to be “for” some kind of “two-state solution” with crumbs rammed down the throats of the Palestinians by the Israelis and a subservient US government.
Would you consider Goldstone to be another pro-Israel Zionist individual trying to restrain Israel from destroying itself? Would most people who favor a two-state solution fall into the same camp?
I would. Goldstone today condemned the UN for not censuring Hamas as well as Israel.
If they did not, they should have. While Hamas’ crimes pale before Israel’s, those they have committed should be condemned. There must be a single standard for judgment.
Thanks for asking. No to both your questions. I said “another pro-Israel Zionist organization”, and was referring to the public face the organization chooses to present, not to the many worthy individuals within it. And I would never in a million years diss Goldstone.
Let me take this opportunity to correct any impression I may have left, with this comment and my first one at the top of this thread, that I don’t think that the participation of progressive Jews in the anti-Zionist, pro-Palestinian, set-Israel-on-the-right-track (whatever you want to call it) movement is essential. It is essential but not sufficient. It will take a much wider and more active participation by non-Jews as well – something that is now discouraged, to say the least.
Most logically and naturally, this wider non-Jewish participation should come from the political Left. But the longer progressive Jews pussy-foot around the necessity of putting real pressure on the Israeli government, the more time will elapse, the more damage to America will result, and the more likely it will become that right-wing groups in America will take up a much harder line toward Israel and Jewish prominence in American life.
Also, I want to say that I am among those cheering J Street on. I simply would like to see it take more aggressive progressive stances, and challenge other progressives to join in. If it is actually true that most American Jews are progressive in their hearts, then this should be a good strategy.
I don’t think that the participation of progressive Jews in the anti-Zionist, pro-Palestinian, set-Israel-on-the-right-track (whatever you want to call it) movement is essential. It is essential but not sufficient.
I’ve written about this before. J-Street supports continuing U.S. aid to Israel, aid which goes directly to destroying the Palestinians. It talks of a “two-state solution,” but never gives any indication of how a viable Palestinian state could be achieved, given the facts on the ground, nor what that Palestinian “state” would be in reality. Given J-Street’s overwhelming support of Israel and refusal to condemn any of its policies, a Palestinian “state,” could there even be one physically, would be completely subservient to Israel (given current Israeli policies which J-Street refuses to bring to light).
Additionally, in reading J-Street’s literature, it is completely Zio-centric. It speaks of moderate Palestinians who “we need” and offers nothing in the way of presenting a balanced view of the conflict or offering a perspective of Palestinians as human beings (as opposed to pawns in a game of Israeli survival), something that I think is imperative in any campaign to change hearts and minds.
Given the above facts, I cannot in good conscience support J-Street personally. But I do recognize that if this is the road the Jewish community needs to go down to eventually “see the light,” for lack of a better term, than it is, as CMI states, “essential.” But certainly “not sufficient.”
Meanwhile our taxpayer dollars go to keep Americans ill-informed. Here, the Michigan
PBS station sticks it to Alison Weir, one of the few non-Jews in the USA who has been working for years to inform both her 98% fellow non-Jewish Americans and the much more powerful (on the I-P issue) 2% who comprise the remaining 2%:
link to ifamericansknew.org
I hope people will help us fight this CENSORSHIP by University of Michigan radio!!
If enough people phone the station, this controversy will become sufficiently newsworthy to generate news stories!! People could phone the pledge line and very POLITELY say why they are NOT pledging – 888.258.9866
And also phone the station and ask them to stop the censorship! 734.764.9210
Thank you for helping us end censorship on Palestine!
Best,
Alison
I notice that this site is one that Democratic Underground also forbids posters to quote from.
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