J Street — the new “pro-peace, pro-Israel” advocacy group touted as an alternative to AIPAC — is currently hosting its first conference. The run-up to the conference included much fanfare, some good and some bad. One Palestinian poet who was invited to speak at the conference was asked not to participate after it was learned he compared Guantanamo to Auschwitz. Charming.
I’ve always thought I resisted J Street’s mission, until I came to a big realization: They don’t know what their mission is. Take this Jeffrey Goldberg interview with J Street executive director Jeremy Ben-Ami. In it we learn that Ben-Ami:
- Is a Zionist. He believes in a Jewish state of Israel.
- Believes that the Mearsheimer and Walt screed The Israel Lobby is dishonest and possibly anti-Semitic.
- Says U.S. military aid to Israel is vital to American security interests.
Ben-Ami. Courtesy of Haaretz
- Also says that this aid should not be tied to Israel’s settlement policy.
- Credits AIPAC and other pro-Israel elements with important political victories for the pro-Israel community.
- Supports Israel’s Law of Return, by which any Jew can immigrate to Israel and earn instant citizenship.
- Doesn’t think the U.S. government or the American Jewish community should push Israel to talk to Hamas against the wishes of the Israeli government.
- Denounces the “one-state solution” as both a moral and practical non-starter.
Ben-Ami also stated in another interview that “AIPAC nominally supports the notion of a two-state solution, but . . . advocating for aggressive American leadership to achieve it is not high on its priority list. For us at J Street, it’s the centerpiece of our agenda.” In other words, the difference is not in views but in priorities and strategy. Fine.
The problem is that other times J Street sounds like it attempts to be an alternative, rather than a supplement, to AIPAC. Take these comments from co-founder Alan Solomont: “We have heard the voices of neocons, and right-of-center Jewish leaders and Christian evangelicals, and the mainstream views of the American Jewish community have not been heard.”
So does J Street offer the same policy positions as AIPAC, or different ones? I think many Jewish Americans — myself included — would love an advocacy group that pushed for sensible steps toward peace — but not at the expense of successful, non-partisan groups like AIPAC. J Street needs to decide what it really wants to be: a fringe group or a complement to existing groups.
P.S. Interesting that Stephen Walt endorsed J Street. Part of his expansive and nefarious “Israel lobby” includes such J Street partners as the Israel Policy Forum.
I’d say that the driving force behind the creation of the J-Street organization is exactly as the director puts it: “to advocate for agressive American leadership” toward the two state solution and to voice the “mainstream views of the American Jewish community” regarding support of Israel. Both reflect the aims of a group whose supporters know exactly what their mission is: indeed, it IS to provide an “alternative” to AIPEC and other established Israel-lobbying organizations. The need for an alternative is fueled by the perception among increasing numbers of American Jews (who trend strongly to the left) and left-leaning non-Jews alike that established Israel lobbying organizations like AIPEC have in recent years become mouthpieces for otherwise unpopular right wing/right leaning actors on the political scene, those “neocons and christian evangelicals” who talk about invading Iraq, immediately bombing Iran, torturing prisoners in US custody and steadfast support for Israel in the same breath. I suspect for the most of the “mainstream American Jewish community” (over 70% of whom voted for Obama in the last election) that the last point does fit with the other three. It’s not that the J-street inclined are somhow less devoted Zionists or more tolerant of unfair criticism of Israel, its just that they deeply distrust the MOTIVES of those whom AIPEC appears to accept. In a sense then, AIPEC’s image problem is due to it being, as you say, “nonpartisan”; its standard is strong support for Israel, whether that support is based on genuine secular-democratic solidarity or the divine fullfillment of biblical prophecies or the opprtunity to perpetuate an “us versus them” version of the Middle East that is at best simplistic and at worst racism couched in political sloganeering. I suspect for the majority of J street supporters, (including myself), only the first reason is truly legitimate grounds for supporting the Jewish State to the extent that American has. Until AIPEC makes that distinction, there will be many more J Streets popping up.
1. Tying AIPAC to “invading Iraq, immediately bombing Iran, torturing prisoners in US custody” is manifestly unfair. That’s why this supposed perception among liberal Jews (which I don’t think exists) is ridiculous.
2. I disagree that J Street supporters are less tolerant of unfair criticism of Israel. Eric Yoffie, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism, was booed today at the J Street Conference for denouncing the Goldstone Report.
3. Israel is and always has been a secular-democratic country.
4. J Street IS out of touch with mainstream American Jewish opinion. 78% of Americans support sanctions and a clear majority of American Jews support either the United States or Israel attacking Iran’s nuclear sites if sanctions don’t work. J Street opposes both.
5. J Street and AIPAC differ in one other important regard. J Street followers live in some fantasy land where only massive American pressure on Israel will actually bring peace to the region. It’s an absurd proposition and a wrong one. AIPAC supporters understand that there is no partner for peace right now and that strengthening both Israel and Mahmoud Abbas is the best strategy right now, rather than rushing them into pointless talks.
Point #1: Agree with you; but the point I was making is that the perception exists, or at least enough people with that leaning think there are enough other people with that leaning to start a lobbying group. It may well be an overblown peception or exaggerated by the media (J street has gotten plenty of media coverage) but even then, rumors gotta start somewhere.
Point #3: That’s undoubtedly true, but not really the point I was making. I was talking about motivations. It’s certainly possible to support a good thing like the secular-democratic character of Israel for bad reasons that have nothing to do with secular-democratic ideals. The belief in evangelical circles that America has a divine mission to protect Israel, to preserve it for the second coming of Christ (at which point all the Jews there will be anihillated as unbelievers) is a good example of this. A more general example: You can support freedom of speech because you believe in human rights and the essential role it plays in maintaining democracy, or you can support free speech because you’re in the Klan and want to spew racism without legal muzzling. Good reasons, Bad reasons.
Point #5: Perfect. NOW here is where a stereotypical AIPAC supporter and a stereotypical J Street supporter might differ: the latter would be more open to direct American pressure on Israel (say, the Obama administration’s insistence on halting settlement construction) while the former would be less inclined. For my part, I think that massive American pressure is the ONLY thing that can bring peace to the region because only America has the kind of leverage to compel actions toward peace from both sides. If Netanyahu refuses to stop settlements and Abbas refuses to take a stronger stand against the obvious hate-spewers and extremists within his own ranks, Obama should start running down the Israeli/Palestinian foreign aid list with a big red pen, and wave it around for the whole region to see. But that’s just my view….guess that would make me more of a J-Street supporter, if I didn’t think that lobbying and special interests in general are a huge corruption of the whole poltical process.
If American pressure was the only thing that was keeping the two sides from reaching an agreement, we would have had one in 2000. How much more pressure can you get?
Assume Israel halts settlement construction and removes its entire military presence from the West Bank, including roadblocks. Assume it takes down the separation barrier. Assume they end the isolation of Gaza. Assume they use these as preconditions to negotiations. Assume they don’t ask Palestinians for anything in return at that stage.
Would the two sides be able to reach an agreement, with or without American pressure? No. The problem is that large portions of Palestinian society will not accept any agreement with Israel and will fight as a result. It’s got nothing to do with American pressure.