J Street: In the Wrong Corner

Finally, there is a new Jewish lobby, said to be dedicated to the security of Israel, called J-Street. Sadly, from day one it defined Israel’s number one enemy as —another pro Israel lobby, another group of American Jews, namely, AIPAC. Jews have excelled in many areas, but in none have they done nearly as well as in hating each other and in generating factions and sub factions that fight one another, even when the enemy is at the gate. (There are already fights within J-Street).

The number one concern of the new political action group, organized by a small band of lobbyists, is to raise money. The easiest way to raise money is to engage in negative advertising. To mobilize people to dig into their pockets, lobbyists know, you must be against someone, define someone as the enemy. For J-Street that enemy is not Iran, nor Hezbollah, nor Hamas, but the strongest pro-Israel lobby in Washington.

One wishes the new J-Street lobby would follow its declared aim and look for peaceful, diplomatic solutions to the tragic conflicts that bedevil the Middle East, and that their opening shot would be some new way to make peace or a revival of an effective old way. Unfortunately, this is not what you will find in their PR onslaught or any other place.
Professor Shibley Telhami (a Palestinian-American) and I (an Israeli-American) have called upon on both the Israelis and the Palestinians to stop blaming each other, stop trying to show that the other side is at fault and hence must be the one to yield if peace is to have a prayer. We suggested that for now the focus should be on where we go from here, which clearly requires both sides to make concessions. Later there will be room for a truth commission to sort out who was at fault, although most likely there is plenty of blame to go around. [Read the full text here.]

I outlined in a previous post [here]  an approach to peace which would be based a two state solution, a return to the green line (following minor adjustments in both directions), two capitals in Jerusalem, and a right to return (after the number of Arabs who left Israel and seek to return is calculated to be reduced by the number of Jews who left Arab countries). There surely is room for many other quests for a peaceful solution.

J-Street, however, does not embrace any of the various formulas for peace. Sadly, it was launched with a vicious attack on fellow Jews who support Israel, accusing them of being right wingers who are allied with religious Christians, and for having “hijacked” Washington.

The timing could not be much more inauspicious. The threat to Israel’s very existence is greater than it has been since it was established 60 years ago. Iran does not need a nuclear weapon to finish off Israel. No one is denying or questioning that Hezbollah has accumulated a very large number of long range missiles. When Hezbollah used its short range missiles following the very ill advised Israeli incursion into southern Lebanon in 2006, the northern half Israel had to be evacuated. The Israeli military found no effective counter measures against these attacks. After 38 days of fighting, Hezbollah was firing more missiles at the Israel than on the first day. Long range missiles would easily reach Tel Aviv, and there just is no way the city can be evacuated. In addition, Syria is reported to be standing by, more than ready to join the fray.

All this argues for greater efforts for peace.  Surely no one group has a monopoly on promoting peace. And surely there is considerable room for questioning the tactics employed by AIPAC. But sadly J-Street shows no sign that it has found a realistic way to promote peace in this tragic part of the world. Hold on to your check until they mend their ways.

Comments

[Jerry Haber]

Amitai,

As a fellow blogger, I know the pressure of reacting in a hurry to news. But as one who admires your scholarly work on communitarianism, and as a fellow-academic, I am puzzled by the sheer illogic and mean-spiritedness of your post, which I attribute to your unfortunate habit of blogging from the gut and not from the head

Did you really expect a new Jewish lobbyist group, one that positions itself as a liberal alternative to AIPAC, to float its own peace plan? Is that what you think lobbyists do? Is that what AIPAC does?

Well, I have a challenge for you... I will gladly donate $1000 to AIPAC if you can find me any passage in the J-Street statement below, from its website, which defines AIPAC as the number one enemy of Israel. That will be difficult since AIPAC is not mentioned.

And before you use my esteemed University of Maryland colleague Shibley Telhami's name, perhaps you would like to ask him what he thinks of the new lobby?

The truth is that I don't think you really understand what AIPAC or J-Street do. Because your article doesn't speak to the issue of lobbying at all.

Take a deep breath, and don't go negative, Amitai...leave that to Mort Klein. Give the group a chance, be a little generous. AIPAC need not be the only game in town (remember when Rabin told it to shut up about Oslo...)

J-Street is the political arm of the pro-Israel, pro-peace movement.

J Street was founded to promote meaningful American leadership to end the Arab-Israeli and Palestinian-Israel conflicts peacefully and diplomatically. We support a new direction for American policy in the Middle East and a broad public and policy debate about the U.S. role in the region.

J Street represents Americans, primarily but not exclusively Jewish, who support Israel and its desire for security as the Jewish homeland, as well as the right of the Palestinians to a sovereign state of their own - two states living side-by-side in peace and security. We believe ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is in the best interests of Israel, the United States, the Palestinians, and the region as a whole.

J Street supports diplomatic solutions over military ones, including in Iran; multilateral over unilateral approaches to conflict resolution; and dialogue over confrontation with a wide range of countries and actors when conflicts do arise. For more on our policy positions, click here.

J Street will advocate forcefully in the policy process, in Congress, in the media, and in the Jewish community to make sure public officials and community leaders clearly see the depth and breadth of support for our views on Middle East policy among voters and supporters in their states and districts. We seek to complement the work of existing organizations and individuals that share our agenda. In our lobbying and advocacy efforts, we will enlist individual supporters of other efforts as partners.

J Street is itself a 501(c)(4) organization and is part of the J Street family of organizations, which includes an independent, legally unconnected Political Action Committee