J Street’s leaders repeatedly said they are part of a "movement." The funny thing is that movement within leftwing Jewish life was galvanized by the Gaza slaughter. But J Street says not a word about Gaza. In fact, in reaching for the Jewish center, it threw the Goldstone report, and the human rights of a persecuted people, under the bus.
Last January, J Street rightly condemned the Gaza slaughter, and was promptly attacked by Eric Yoffie of the Union for Reform Judaism for doing so. J Street decided it didn’t want to alienate Yoffie, so it invited Yoffie to speak at the conference last week– where he repeatedly condemned the Goldstone report, to some boos. The last, showstopping speech at the conference was from Victor Kovner, the NY liberal lawyer. He said "Never again" will Jews be silent when the Israelis elect racists. If you search for Gaza in that speech, he never says it. The truth is that many Jews who have seen the siege of Gaza say, Never again to ghettoizing a people on the basis of race. But yesterday J Street publicly supported another attack on the Goldstone report, the Congressional resolution that smears Goldstone’s efforts.
I bet that many of J Street’s own people are disturbed by Gaza — who wouldn’t be disturbed by a country that drops white phosphorus on school children?–but it is leaving Gaza out from a cold political calculation, that it needs to capture Bob Wexler and Mel Levine, the AIPAC center-right-left (is there any difference?). And older Jews. The heart of the Israel lobby. J Street’s political calculation is that it is trying to end the occupation. It will ignore Gaza–even as it pockets Gaza’s political capital in the U.S. Jewish community–so as to push on the last hope for the Jewish state, as speakers regularly said from the podium: the two state solution.
Leaving aside the two-state-solution’s merits or nonmerits for a moment, the political question, which Adam pointed out the other day, is that the movement is way ahead of J Street. The movement is a pluralistic one. It is composed of many Palestinians and non-Jewish Americans. Jeremy Ben-Ami in his welcoming speech wasn’t completely welcoming:
"We value the partnership and engagement and support of our non-Jewish friends – both here tonight and in our work overall. We need and appreciate allies and alliances, individual and institutional.
"But at heart they know – as we know – that the root of this movement and heart of this conversation has to be in the American Jewish community. For many of us as Jews, this conversation taps into our deepest personal feelings – of family, history and community."
Of course, this conversation (Israel/Palestine) also taps into Arab-Americans’ deepest personal feelings of family, history and community, as Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb reminded us. But they had a lesser role in the conference, just as they have no role in the political force that J Street says it’s taking on, the Israel lobby (one of whose Democratic leaders, Steve Grossman, says in that link that Obama has created an "emotional chasm" between himself and Jews). I remember that American blacks played a key role in ending apartheid in South Africa, out of solidarity. J Street is not including the Palestinian solidarity folks this time around. And just imagine if Palestinians were included. J Street would have to change its line on Goldstone.
Jeff Blankfort makes some of the same points:
It had to happen sooner or later, but J Street’s response to the debate over the House resolution (HR 867) condemning the Goldstone Report has exposed what should have been evident from the beginning: there is no safe, respectable, middle ground in the struggle for justice for Palestine. By not only not opposing HR 867, but by accepting the hardline Zionist position that the UN has a historical bias against Israel (as exemplified, no doubt, by its resolutions opposing Israel’s wars on Lebanon, its excessive violence against the Palestinians, and its opposition to Jewish settlements), J Street has lost whatever credibility it might have attained at its very successful conference.It has been pointed out that the base of the organization is further to the "left," the humanist position, than is Ben-Ami and the J Street leadership. This has created an untenable situation that cannot be papered over. It is already being exploited by the hardliners with the Weekly Standard’s editor Michael Goldfarb seeking to take down both J Street and the Goldstone Report. Here he has outed J Street Adviser Morton Halperin as assisting Richard Goldstone in distributing his critique of HR 867.. Ben-Ami will no doubt be called upon by Goldfarb’s comrade-in-arms, Jeffrey Goldberg to denounce Halperin and there will be no let up.
I’d like to see a discussion of alternative organizations, since J Street fails.
Where is an inclusive organization that will seriously address the important issues?
RE: “alternative organizations”
> Support the Goldstone Report! – SIGN THE ‘JEWISH VOICE FOR PEACE’ PETITION
> PETITION TEXT: The UN Goldstone report is a well-researched, fair-minded report. Israel and Hamas must conduct credible, independent investigations on war crimes and possible crimes against humanity or face the International Criminal Court. We demand accountability for all victims, respect for the rule of law, international law and human rights.
>TO SIGN THE ‘JEWISH VOICE FOR PEACE’ PETITION IN SUPPORT OF THE “GOLDSTONE REPORT” – link to supportgoldstone.org
“Never again to ghettoizing a people on the basis of race. But yesterday J Street publicly supported another attack on the Goldstone report, the Congressional resolution that smears Goldstone’s efforts.”
That “never again” statement often only applies to Jews for Jews. Many genocides have taken place since the brutal murders of 6 million Jews, 3 million Poles, and millions more.
It was interesting to hear Maya of the Refuseniks say that she thinks “J Street is over rated and problematic” She was not so fond of J Street.
I thought you said that you were there Phil.
On video, I saw multiple comments on Gaza, including the prominent discussion between Ben Ami and Yoffie.
Remind us again how you’re Phil’s friend when you constantly attack him and seek to undermine his credibility?
Did anybody openly condemn the actions that took place against Gazan civilians as crimes against humanity, Witty? What did you see on the video besides “Gaza” being mentioned.
At any rate, J Street seems to have gotten on the bus that’s being driven over the Goldstone report (and Goldstone, though he still seems to think clinging to the bumper means he’s somehow still on that bus)
Phil is more than friend to me. As I’ve said many times before, I relate to Phil (as any Weiss, but particularly Phil and his parents whom I know the best of their clan) as family.
Even if we argue. Even if we don’t see each other physically. If Phil were in real trouble, I’d be there.
My comments to Phil are partially an attempt to keep him from real trouble, particularly ethical.
If they are not talking about the Gaza what is the point. to think that J Street is allegedly more progressive. Ouch. Dismissing the Goldstone Report…pathetic and definitely not hopeful
Looks like J Street is trying so hard to be accepted as a good alternative to extremists Zionists that it is finding it easier to court them than to fight them. This is typical of most centre left leaning organizations who want to participate in the dbate but don’t want to be seen a “soft” on object of interest.
I am not surprised considering the leadership. Ben Ami in his opening speech mentioned “of my grandparents who built Tel Aviv out of the sand dunes”. Sand Dunes ??? Did he forget Jaffa or is it typical J Street double talk to appeal to Jewish listeners and show that underneath it all, J Street is just another Pro Israel organization and the only difference is the banners for peace, the problem the banners gather dust and will fade long before anyone from JStreet will try to rock the boat.
Ben-Ami is revealing himself to be more and more like Obama. There was the pre-election Obama and then there was the post-election Obama.
As for his historical revisionism, he sounds like yet another We-made-the-desert-bloom Zionist. Either that or he’s desperately trying to portray himself as having deep roots in the Middle East.
By the way, if you check his bio on J-Street’s website, it states that Ben-Ami’s father was born in Israel. Yet, in his speech he said that his grandparents built Tel-Aviv.
Tel-Aviv was supposedly founded in 1909. If it is true that his grandparents were in the holy land in the early 1900s, note how in all this he’s avoided stating that his grandparents were born in “Palestine”, or at least, lived in “Palestine.
The heart of the Israel lobby. J Street’s political calculation is that it is trying to end the occupation. It will ignore Gaza–even as it pockets Gaza’s political capital in the U.S. Jewish community–so as to push on the last hope for the Jewish state, as speakers regularly said from the podium: the two state solution.
I can’t believe that they are truly such fools. Do they think the Israeli blockade of Gaza is not part of the occupation, and properly seen as such by most of the planet? Do they think a stable two-state solution can be crafted, even given the facile assumption that the West Bank colonies could be removed, while ignoring Gaza?
If their objective is a two-state solution preserving Israel as a Jewish state, then permanent adoption of these notions guarantees failure. This must be a short-term political adjustment with the aim of keeping recruiting momentum going, with the aim of revisiting the issue when political and social conditions are more favorable.
with the aim of revisiting the issue when political and social conditions are more favorable.
If that’s J-Street’s strategy, then the Israeli/Palestinian conflict will not end any time soon. They will simply act as preservers of the status quo and very little will change. If their goal is to implement gradual change among their future base as they steer it further and further to the left, then that change will take decades.
Why do you think Witty supports J-Street so stridently?
Sandy Stone!!!!! How are things in the suburbs, matey?!?
u-turn st….. might be a better name for them..
No, I think “J Street” is still pretty appropriate for its mimicry of K Street — a haven for dishonest lobbyists chasing the bottom dollar.
Here is why J Street must be opposed and exposed as just another right-wing lobby, because otherwise it will attract naive leftists who aren’t aware of its pro-settlement, pro-oppression, pro-war positions on the issues, diverting them from other, more appropriate and honest organizations.
RE: “But at heart they [non-jewish USA supporters, Palestinian supporters) know – as we know – that the root of this movement and heart of this conversation has to be in the American Jewish community.”
Interesting that he presumes to know what said supporters know, especially in the context of once less hypocritical USA basic values, lop-sided USA foreign aid, lop-sided USA UN vetoes, and the ill-will thereby gleaned by the USA foreign policy around the world. Am I the only one who feels insulted, the only one who fells he’s
saying you 98% non-Jewish USA Americans, you Arab Americans, you Palestinians, all of you who may or do support us now–don’t really have a dog in this fight worthy
to enter the kennel?
fells=feels
And I haven’t even mentioned PNAC cum 9/11 cum Iraq war2 & next Iran? There’s linkeage there too.
Some relevant blog entries:
1. Gaza, Goldstone, Jewish Ethical Cluelessness
2. [AAFIA] The Zionist Islamophobic Police State
3. http://eaazi.blogspot.com/2009/10/apng-anger-at-holocaust-religion.html
Here is the garbeled blog entry: [APNG] Anger at USA, Israel, Holocaust Religion.
Unless action is taken against the Zionist Islamophobic Police State, it will grow in power, and it will not stop with Arab and Muslim American critics of Zionism or the State of Israel.
“It had to happen sooner or later, but J Street’s response to the debate over the House resolution (HR 867) condemning the Goldstone Report has exposed what should have been evident from the beginning: there is no safe, respectable, middle ground in the struggle for justice for Palestine. ”
You are accurate in describing J Street as rejecting the “which side are you on approach”. That is what is meant by the distinction between working for peace (consented agreement) and working for any partison approach whether pro-expansion, pro-Palestinian, pro-one-state, or anti-Zionist.
The poverty of the approach for a humanist, for a moralist, is that the approach is NOT an anti-exploitation approach, but an anti-Zionist one, a partison statement.
Is Phil in that camp?
That there is no basis for Jewish self-governance, self-association, dictated from an American assimilated former liberal.
Could we have two different definitions of humanist here?
Is Phil in that camp?
Richard, my impression is, if Phil ever needs help, many will be there for him, and of these many none will first ask him what camp he is in.
I do detest these inquisitorial questions.
For Phil, its a question of clarification.
Are you an advocate for the single-state, are you inquiring, or are you an advocate for the two-state?
Are you an advocate for the approach of persuasion of a consenting electorate, or prefer the approach of external force (BDS)?
The question for a humanist is whether they support the concept of optimizing self-governance.
It is a deception to state that the only way to oppose exploitation is the revolutionary, or condemnatory.
Come on Witty, you know very well what camp Phil is in. He wants Israel gone.
I’m perfectly certain. I would want him to say that, if it is true.
that was, I’m NOT perfectly certain.
There are three options:
1. Pro-Israel AND pro-Palestinian (J Street)
2. Pro-Zionist and anti-Palestinian
3. Pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel
You’re shifting your terms. That’s a foul.
J Street’s notion of being pro-Israel AND pro-Palestinian is to serve the entire cake to the Israelis and let the Palestinians have the crumbs when they’re finished.
Seriously, we are working for an end to the conflict. Calling for Israel to conduct an independent investigation of CastLead is perfectly reasonable.
Our focus is ending the conflict. Other people can play games and try to win arguments all they want. Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
I will say that we should continue to lobby the US to demand an end to the siege of Gaza, support UNRWA, ANERA but this conflict has gone on too long. We have to all do what we can to bring about a solution.
The best riposte to J Street/anti-Gladstoners/Gaza warmongers in a long, long time, by Larry Derfner, Jerusalem Post. link to z.pe I’m posting the whole thing. It’s that good.
Some victims we are
I’m sure Larry is urging reform, not revolution, not a single state, but a more humane Israel.
link to rawstory.com
The US House of Representatives is expected to vote Tuesday on a resolution calling on President Barack Obama to reject the UN’s Goldstone report, which accuses Israel and Palestinian militants of war crimes in Gaza.
The bipartisan proposal calls on President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “to oppose unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration” of the Goldsone report, dismissing it as “irredeemably biased and unworthy of further consideration or legitimacy.”
The measure also “reaffirms its support for the democratic, Jewish state of Israel, for Israel’s security and right to self-defense,” as well as “Israel’s right to defend its citizens from violent militant groups and their state sponsors.”
Named after former South African judge Richard Goldstone, who headed the inquiry committee, the UN report accuses Israel and Hamas militants of war crimes during the 22-day conflict that erupted on December 27, 2008.
When the fighting was over, 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were thought to have been killed.
The UN General Assembly will take up the Goldstone report one day after the US House of Representatives vote, which is sponsored by two Republicans and two Democrats.
Goldstone recommended that the report’s findings be referred to the International Criminal Court prosecutor in The Hague if Israel and Hamas failed to conduct credible investigations within six months.
Israel has strongly criticized the report as “unjust” and “flawed.”
What is unjust and flawed is the US Congress.
“That there is no basis for Jewish self-governance, self-association…”
Apparently not Witty, otherwise it would have appeared by this juncture in the true form of Judaisms historical values. It has not, but has proven itself to be a pariah which gets worse with time – an escalation of unjust colonial violence on the indigenous population of the land, and never ending theft. It is neither Jewish nor interested merely in self-governance, and the appeal of self-association is littered with a slow genocide with the support of a world super-power that has also proven itself unworthy of world leadership (this is why the two associate).
Perhaps it can yet come to a true democratic conclusion (whatever the final state may be), but it certainly has not done this through dialogue which is merely stalling for time as more atrocities are committed. Humanity cannot wait for some aberrant violent group which poses as “Jewish” to come to these conclusions through their sence of exceptionalism and their claim to be above the law. No more free pass, and a means of persuasion is on the table – BDS in earnest must be supported, and the people of the United States need to impress upon their “representatives” that their position on Israel will not be tolerated by us and the global community.
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