WASHINGTON (JTA) – Fraught record on issues of race and anti-Semitism? Check. Much-hyped meeting to get Benjamin Netanyahu’s hechsher? Check. Stirring speech at AIPAC to quiet the naysayers? Check. Jewish validators galore? Check. Administration top-loaded with Jewish staffers? Check. Welcome to Inauguration Day 2009. President-elect Barack Obama walked into… Read more »
Tagged AIPAC
In Congress, a new battle emerges: two states or not two states
WASHINGTON (JTA) – There’s a striking difference between competing bids in Congress addressing last month’s U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements. It’s not that they differ on the United Nations – the two nonbinding congressional resolutions under consideration condemn the Security Council, as well as the outgoing Obama… Read more »
Jewish groups fret as Republicans retreat from two-state solution
WASHINGTON (JTA) — In recent months, the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee have each emphasized what in recent years hardly needed emphasizing: mainstream Jewish support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The reiterations of support signify a concern… Read more »
In battle for the Senate, the Iran nuclear deal is looming large
WASHINGTON (JTA) – While the Iran nuclear deal gets fleeting attention in the presidential race, it is shaping up as a key issue in at least nine states integral to Democrats’ hopes of regaining control of the U.S. Senate. Rival pro-Israel factions are pouring money into many of those races, and candidates are… Read more »
Pro-Israel heavyweights press hard for 2 states
WASHINGTON (JTA) — In a rare and sharp split with Israeli government policy, a group of Jewish community leaders want to get a proposal for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on the next president’s desk. Two complementary U.S. and Israeli working papers to be launched next week propose… Read more »
How the 2016 election is upending pro-Israel orthodoxies
WASHINGTON (JTA) – When it comes to Israel, Democrats and Republicans simply do not see eye to eye, and for all their love of Zion, evangelicals will turn out for a candidate who is less than 100 percent on the issue. Welcome to the 2016 presidential election, when the… Read more »
How groups plan to protest Trump at AIPAC: Walk out, stay away, study Torah
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Walk in wearing stickers. Stay out bearing placards. Get up and walk out when Trump walks in. Just don’t go. Go but don’t clap. Blame AIPAC. Don’t blame AIPAC. And whatever you do, hit the Jewish texts. Donald Trump’s scheduled appearance on Monday at the American Israel Public… Read more »
Iowa federation chief, among youngest in country, navigates politics of battleground state
DES MOINES, Iowa (JTA) – Ten minutes into her speech at the Jewish Federation of Des Moines on Monday, Hillary Rodham Clinton had a coughing fit. She popped a lozenge, but that didn’t help. After a few long seconds and still gasping for air, Clinton turned to federation president… Read more »
How Jewish groups got spied on by Obama
WASHINGTON (JTA) — At first blush, it appears like a bombshell: The United States listened in on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s phone calls. But on closer examination, the revelations reported Dec. 29 by The Wall Street Journal might not be so far reaching. Spying on allies is both routine and… Read more »
Iran deal will pass (or so says the math)
(JTA) – Does the Iran deal have the votes or not? Though President Barack Obama is vacationing on Martha’s Vineyard and Congress is in recess through Labor Day, there’s plenty of action on the agreement as lawmakers debate whether to vote with their colleagues, constituents, aides or consciences — or… Read more »
Iran debate devolves with charges of ‘dual loyalty’ and ‘dog whistles’
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The dredging up of the dual loyalty charge — that lawmakers who reject the Iran nuclear agreement and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which is lobbying against it, are more closely aligned with Israel than the United States — illustrates just how tense the debate over the… Read more »
Blog: White House briefing of AIPAC activists ends in communication breakdown
(JTA) — Got questions about the Iran nuclear deal? Too bad, if you were an AIPAC activist at a briefing this week with top Obama administration officials. At the briefing Wednesday, Howard Kohr, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s director, stopped the proceedings before his activists could ask questions. The… Read more »
Obama rallies supporters against ‘billionaire’ opponents of Iran deal
WASHINGTON (JTA) — In a phone call with supporters on Thursday, President Barack Obama characterized opponents of the Iran deal as being backed by “billionaires” and urged those listening in to win over “squishy” lawmakers considering opposing the deal. Opponents “would be opposed to any deal with Iran,” Obama told… Read more »
McSally to join lawmakers meeting Netanyahu in Israel
Rep. Martha McSally (R.-Ariz.) will be one of more than 40 U.S. lawmakers traveling to Israel next month to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prior to a Congressional vote on the nuclear deal with Iran. Congress has until Sept. 17 to vote on the agreement the United States and five other countries (known… Read more »
Et tu AIPAC? Delegitimizing American Jews in the Name of Supporting Israel
I recently wrote an article outlining how and why the new well-funded Adelson/Netanyahu/Republican/Evangelical coalition has emerged as the new pro-Israel voice in the U.S. — supplanting the traditional majority of American Jews who are increasingly demonized for expressing honest and heartfelt concerns about the policies and statements of the… Read more »
AIPAC to fight White House head to head in battle over Iran deal
WASHINGTON (JTA) – Cancel your summer vacations. That was the order AIPAC’s executive director, Howard Kohr, gave his employees in a staff meeting convened this week at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee after the United States announced the Iran nuclear deal. With the influential pro-Israel lobby group pushing for Congress… Read more »
As Iran deadline approaches, skeptics draw dueling red lines
WASHINGTON (JTA) — In nuclear talks between Iran and the major powers, it’s deadline time, and skeptics on both sides are laying out red lines in a bid to shape a final deal. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader who had been wary of the talks, last week outlined his… Read more »
For this U.N. report on Gaza War, Israel came prepared
(JTA) – This time, Israel and its supporters came prepared. Anticipating what they believed would be an unfair U.N. report on last summer’s Gaza War, the Israeli government and friendly groups in the United States were ready with at least three reports they say better reflects the reality of… Read more »
With White House set to approve Iran deal, options to shape outcome remote
WASHINGTON (JTA) – The Iran deal may not be done, but bids by its opponents to shape it are all but buried. Skeptics of the nuclear negotiations have all but given up on a congressional role before the June 30 deadline for an agreement between Iran and the major… Read more »
Competing views of Iran deal highlight challenges ahead
WASHINGTON (JTA) – Now that the outline for an Iran nuclear agreement has been released — or, more precisely, two outlines, one by Iran, the other by the Obama administration — major gaps have emerged that will need to be resolved ahead of a June 30 deadline for a… Read more »