Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, just tweeted the following:
Jewish leaders are starting to say they have been called by WH that Hagel nomination is a done deal. Announcement shortly.
News
Ye olde smear campaign will be really ramped up now
I hope this is true.
Leaving Israel totally out of the fight over Hagel, he is still the right man, with the right beliefs about US foreign posture and defense.
I’ll believe it when I see it. Sounds uncharacteristically brave for Obama. On the other hand, his weak spine has been helped by a chorus of attacks against the neocons/AIPAC in the liberal spheres of the MSM.
As a lot of us debated yesterday on a different thread, even if Hagel goes down, this past week or so has been a watershed moment for discussions on Israel within the MSM. But remember, there’s always a reaction for every action… The lobby is still incredibly powerful, but it is slowly weakening. It does not have the aura of invincibility it once had. If Hagel does get the nod, the reputational damage to AIPAC and its neocon allies in the media is hard to overstate.
This will be quite amazing if it happens — a major breakthrough for Obama (in demonstrating to the world that he has a spine) and for American Mideast policy (in defying pressure from the Israel lobby).
What I imagine to be the political calculus in the White House: Israel is moving inexorably towards the extreme right (see Naftali Bennett). There is no conceivable way we can continue to support Israeli policies, especially in the occupied territories. An ugly political confrontation between the United States and Israel is inevitable. We need to get all our ducks in a row now. Ergo: Chuck Hagel is the right person for the SecDef job.
But still: let’s see what happens. This is still not nailed down.
Huum….on MTP this am O said he hadn’t made a decision yet.
Why would he call the ‘Jewish politicians specifically’ and say he had?
Did he really call them or are they just putting that out to try and keep up and ignite more attacks on him now that significant others have come out for him?
Wouldnt’ trust anything the JRC operatives say.