An important survey of Jewish opinion by the LA Jewish Journal says that American Jews are overwhelmingly for the Iran deal, even though they believe it endangers Israel. Here are the numbers. Incredible; they are a lot like the Iraq war, which the Jewish orgs supported but the Jewish street was against.
Jews support the deal 49 percent to 31 percent, while all Americans are only 28 to 24 percent in favor of the deal. (Notice the low number of general respondents; people are ill-informed.)
Here’s the headline. Should Congress vote to approve the deal? Jews say Yes, 53 percent to 35 percent. The overall American numbers are only 41-38.
Broken out by ideology and party. Liberals are for the deal 72-18. Democratic Party members: 70-20. Hear that, Chuck Schumer? You voted for the US to invade Iraq, when your Jewish constituents were against that.
And asked, Have you been to Israel?, even the visitors to Israel support the deal, 48-44 percent, compared to the ones who haven’t been there, 58-30.
Shmuel Rosner says it’s Jew versus Jew, America and Israel, and brings in the numbers saying the deal endangers Israel:
The two largest Jewish communities cannot agree on a major world development that could significantly change the state of the Jewish state.
Israel will discover today — much to many Israelis’ surprise (because they don’t much understand American Jews) — that it cannot count on the majority of American Jewry to fight the battle against the agreement alongside it… American Jews are just like Americans, as sociologist Steven Cohen, who oversaw the survey, writes: They are all skeptical about the deal, but their politics dictate the way they ultimately see it….
“Does the agreement make Israel safer or more endangered?” Cohen asked his Jewish-American respondents. And they have an answer for him: It endangers Israel.
So here, presumably, you have it all, encapsulated in one question: American Jews support the deal, even though they are skeptical about its outcome, and even though they understand that by supporting the deal, they contribute to making Israel less safe.
by the way, the Times of Israel reports that world Jewry is trying to tiptoe away from Israel because of all the civilian casualties and the endless settlement project, etc.
World Jewry is finding it increasingly difficult to support Israel due to its ongoing conflict with the Palestinians, leading many communities to shun discussing the Jewish state altogether, a new major study has found.
The trend is eroding the Diaspora’s support for the Jewish state, warns the report by the Jewish People Policy Institute think tank, to be formally published next week.
While most Jews sympathize with Israel’s needs to wage war in self-defense and believe that its army acts according to high moral standards, there is growing discomfort with some Israeli policies they believe unnecessarily perpetuate conflict, according to the 100-page report by the JPPI, which was made available to The Times of Israel.
Diaspora Jews are not convinced that Israel is doing enough to prevent military conflicts and are troubled by the number of civilian casualties they often produce, though they generally blame Israel’s enemies for the bloodshed.
Bottom line: the issue is going to break out in next year’s Democratic primaries, because American Jews are giving Americans permission to criticize the Jewish state. The issue is going to surprise establishment Dems the way that #BlackLivesMatters has and income inequality. Who will ride the wave?
What do American Muslims think?
How about blacks? Italians? Chinese? Irish?
We’ll never know, will we.
Otherwise very vocal ,assertive and motivated proactive Jewish majority is always very silent ,very inactive and inactive in relation to the sufferings of Gaza,Arabs,Iranians . This is despite their opinion . Opinion remain in the drawing board .
Even here they toe the line – in this case the majority believe the deal threatens Israeli security .
Its the silence that torpedoes the goal they are trying to reach at.
The big donors and megamouth rabid Zionist take,occupy,and adorn the podium to spread languages of hate,war,sanctions,and overt and covert threat to the dissenters ,to the peaceful -resolution -seeking voices,to the expert,to the politicians theologians,to the activists who dare to question their method,views,and monopolization of the venues .
The silent Jews majority does engage in political and social activities or as long as it doesn’t challenge the desired narratives of AIPAC or Israel.
“Diaspora Jews are not convinced that Israel is doing enough to prevent military conflicts.”
That’s laughable, rating war mongers on how much they’re doing to prevent war.
This is another case of Big Money overriding the public wishes. In a parallel case the NRA membership overwhelmingly supported banning large magazine clips, but the gun money people ignored them and dominated enough of Congress to overrule the people. In another parallel case, the mainstream media has been turned into a coverup and lie machine.
This kind of thing is why the anti-oligarchy, anti-bankster campaigns are so important. These campaigns need to be blunt and direct. Evil has captured key financial levers of power, and needs to be rooted out.
The remaining truly free market is in Congress, where Congressmen are for sale to the highest bidder.
There is a big rift happening. The emergence of Israel as a partisan issue – which may have been percolating but burst forth with Netanyahu’s recent appearance before Congress – can only weaken the Lobby significantly. It was amazing to see the Administration so thoroughly bashing Netanyahu for his election campaign comments.
So Phil you have every reason to be optimistic but I think you are too optimistic in talking about it as a breakout issue akin to Black Lives Matter or Occupy. In this campaign, even the Socialist is very pro-Israel (although he is strongly FOR the Iran deal). Occupy and Black Lives Matter, i.e. issues of economic justice and racial justice, have a strong place and history in the Democratic Party. Criticism of Israel – not so much. So it’s not going to happen. The Democrats up and down the ballot and across the land will be seeking money wherever they can get it, and there is just loads more on the pro-Israeli side, it seems.