In a lengthy piece portraying Raphael Warnock as a progressive, the NYT leaves out the 180 he did on Israel criticism under pressure from the Israel lobby. To bring attention to Warnock’s collapse would undermine the fallacy that the Israel lobby maintains in the Democratic Party, you can be progressive except on Palestine.
Israel has become a big issue in Georgia Senate runoff race. Democratic candidate Raphael Warnock runs away from previous Israel-critical statements. He has now “condemned” BDS and indicated he would never condition aid to Israel for human rights abuses. The AIPAC-linked group DMFI has now endorsed Warnock for Senate.
US election showed that American Jews and Israeli Jews could not be more different, American Jews dislike Netanyahu two-to-one, and so the Israel lobby is divided forever, because the Jewish community is divided on the Israel question, with many young Jews supporting boycott. And that divide will continue to spur political debate.
Don’t blame the Cubans! Trump’s 43 percent of Florida Jews shows influence of orthodox in Miami and turned the state for him, Israel lobbyist Mark Mellman says. Oh and Joe Biden will use “pressure” and “sanctions” to get a “stronger, better, longer” deal from Iran than President Obama got, Mellman says.
Israeli leaders believe that Donald Trump has set the new normal for US-Israel relations: total acceptance of Israeli expansion. And if Joe Biden is elected president today, Israelis will expect compliance from him; and Biden will likely do little to take Netanyahu on. That’s the view of Israel lobbyists as the pageant of democracy unfolds in the U.S.
“The president stands with our friend, Israel, more than any other president before,” Melania Trump brags in Florida. While Democrat Rep. Ted Deutch says, “Joe Biden will be a great president for the US Israel relationship…He… will make Israel a stronger country.”
Eric Edelman and Eliot Cohen, two Republican neoconservatives, endorse Joe Biden saying he will foster bipartisan support for Israel. And don’t worry about the Iran deal. Biden can’t easily return to the deal, Edelman assures a “Jews for Biden” event, because Trump has now set the terms and Dem leaders including Schumer and Menendez don’t like the deal.
One of Joe Biden’s political achievements this year is that he has taken what seemed to be a big issue for Trump– Israel — out of the campaign. The Israel lobby trusts Biden because he promises to use American force overseas and try to end the politicization of the Israel issue here. Biden and Harris have actually run against their own Democratic base on Palestinian rights.
U.S. Jewish support for Biden (70 percent) is similar to Palestinian support for Biden in Israel (78 percent). But Israeli Jews? They love Trump. Dems don’t want you to know these numbers because they show that our close ally is a rightwing ethnically-discriminatory state.
Michael Arria is on vacation this week, and Phil Weiss is filling in on trendspotting.…