Debra DeLee
The weekend saw two important statements from the left-center Establishment standing up for the CAP bloggers– the writers at the Democratic-Party-linked Center for American Progress who have dared to criticize Israel and are now under assault.
First, here is Americans for Peace Now, a statement by Debra DeLee:
We are deeply concerned about the ongoing attacks against staff of the Center for America Progress (CAP). We believe that these attacks do not reflect genuine concerns about anti-Semitism, or even the use of language that some people may find offensive. Rather, they appear to be part of an effort to stifle discussion on America’s Middle East policy, while using Israel as a partisan wedge issue, both inside the Democratic Party and between Democrats and Republicans.
…we believe that a vibrant public debate over issues related to peace and security for Israel and the Middle East – the kind of debate that takes place every day in the Israeli press – is vital for both Israel and the United States. We believe that the current charges of anti-Semitism are intended, cynically, to have a “chilling effect” on such debate. Such attacks cannot be allowed to succeed.
And here is Robert Wright at the Atlantic saying that the smear campaign is aimed at controlling the framing of the Iran issue.
Here is the real issue: Some people at CAP who haven’t used the term Israel-firster have committed a different sin–criticizing, sometimes harshly, the policies of Israel. And some defenders of those policies find it easier to stigmatize critics than to answer them…
is Abe Foxman, head of the ADL, saying that you’re anti-Semitic, or anti-Israel, if you judge that a nuclear-armed Iran wouldn’t launch a suicidal strike against Israel? Or if you judge that Israel has missed as many (or more) peacemaking opportunities as the Palestinians have? Sign me up, Abe.
These are stirring statements by mainstream voices. Yes I’ve left out APN’s Zionist lines and some moral agnosticism about Gaza and the occupation from Wright. As someone who wants the mainstream discourse to change to forestall an Iran war, and for the sake of justice in the Middle East, I hope these statements have given the CAP bloggers more secure footing in Washington.
Anyone following this controversy should note well Alex Kane’s pickup of the weekend: that the Obama administration is concerned about the CAP bloggers and conveyed that feeling to… some guy from the Simon Wiesenthal Center! As Kane notes, the White House is breaking bread with intolerant rightwingers who have opposed a mosque in Lower Manhattan and are meantime building a “Museum of Tolerance” on the site of an ancient Muslim graveyard in Jerusalem.
And why is Obama doing so? For the same reason that CAP is on the run for its honest bloggers. Because the Jewish community has not divided openly on these questions and has not licensed diversity in Establishment opinion. Because, face it, efforts to gain that community’s support (which helped Newt Gingrich to victory in South Carolina and yielded $500,000 to Obama in a fundraiser last Thursday) are central to any mainstream American political ambitions.
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“Sign me up, Abe.”
That’s the mindset we need. Foxman and his thought police bullies must be confronted and mocked, not fearfully followed.