J Street conference: Some successes and some awkward moments
If this new lobby wants to become a serious player in Mideast politics, it will have to work much harder.
By Natasha Mozgovaya and Haaretz U.S. Tags: AIPAC Israel news Middle East peaceWASHINGTON, D.C. - On Wednesday, the "pro-peace, pro-Israel" J Street organization was set to wrap up its first national conference here with a political extravaganza on Capitol Hill. Three days in, there have been some successes and some awkward moments.
The conference has brought together some 1,500 participants for discussions on politics, media, faith and culture; they have praised and criticized Barack Obama, applauded a lot (such as for Congressman Charles Boustany for being the only Republican who dared to attend one of the panels) and also booed a little (Rabbi Eric Yoffie, President of the Union for Reform Judaism, for castigating Richard Goldstone).
Too many times panelists have sounded too apologetic for the movement that claims to represent "the majority of the U.S. Jews." The applause for Representative Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), when she said that she never considered dropping out despite some good souls' warnings, was too enthusiastic. On the whole, for a major conference aimed at tackling important issues, too much time is being spent on trying to establish the organization's legitimacy.
The conference may have gained some publicity over Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren's refusal to attend, but the open letter it sent in response was unnecessary. In the future, the lobby will have to deal with Israeli officials, not only former and opposition lawmakers.
The event has not so far made for many headlines, but Obama's National Security Adviser, General James Jones, gave J Street a lot of credit in his keynote speech on Tuesday by saying that he was "honored" to be there, that he was representing the Obama administration, and that the administration would be represented at future J Street conferences. If the J Street PAC which fundraises for Congressmen is successful, then there is a good chance that Oren will not be able to ignore the next conference.
The letter to Oren was a poor start to the relationship. Behind the scenes, Israeli diplomats bitterly expressed the opinion that J Street used Oren to score free publicity. Despite the obvious gap between the position of the U.S. administration and that of the Israeli Government, there is still an open phone line between the Israeli embassy in Washington and Obama's people. Furthermore, press releases and open letters often complicate real diplomacy.
There is a good chance that J Street will persist in trying to boost its standing and influence, in part because of the Obama administration's somewhat hesitant pace of progress on a range of intricate issues. The tensions between AIPAC, the older and stronger pro-Israel lobby, and J Street are likely to continue. Although no one can be certain what truly is good for Israel in the long run, it is safe to say that the bitter under-the-table rivalry between the two lobby groups will harm the state.
We are unlikely to see any camaraderie between the two lobbies, but a more civilized rivalry may yet be established. The current situation, in which both groups officially ignore each other while privately denigrating one another, is untenable. There is no reason for the peace camp to demonize AIPAC, and little too can be gained from dismissing J Street as amateurs that will soon disappear.
Capitol Hill is too small and the problems too pressing for such petty mind games; besides, the recent electoral smear campaign was troubling enough for many.
But inclusiveness has its own limitations. There is an obvious problem at the J Street conference over establishing a clear vision and agenda considering the plurality of voices represented and the clear generation gap. The attempts to define important parts of the agenda as alternatives to AIPAC won't take J Street too far beyond heated discussions in nice hotel rooms.
Over the past 18 months, J Street has made its name recognizable, and controversial. This week alone, I received many letters from angry readers who wrote, among other things, that "J Street is 10 percent Arab money, and George Soros is out to weaken AIPAC and get Israel to go back to the 1967 borders; J Street is not pro-Israel. They are pro-Obama."
Over the next few months, if this new lobby wants to remove the second label and become a serious player, it will have to work much harder. Now that controversy has been exhausted, it is time for the real test. The people of the Middle East are happy to sustain numerous organizations with endless conflict, but they would be even happier if one of those organizations would help solve it.
At any rate, J Street has already succeeded in one aspect where AIPAC has failed. This week, the Arab American Institute tabbed its Fall Arab Leadership Summit as "historic" because of meetings "with J Street and other pro-peace American Jewish leaders to support what so many believed could never be achieved - a collaboration between organizations representing Arab Americans and Jewish Americans, a collaboration dedicated to peace, justice, and prosperity in the autonomous states of Israel and Palestine."
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I'm a 60 yo Christian and I don't get it. Why attack each other? With silly name calling? Many posters who don't agree with JStreet approach wants to condemned those Jewish Americans. It's not very democratic approach to problem solving.
No one "represents American Jews" in any way whatsoever in the US. Six millions of them are Americans living pure American lives, and nothing else, and just some tens of thousands, or even one hundred thousand of them "belong" to one organization or another, representing itself. Once for all, please stop this "representing" non-sense!
J street is the hope of America to return back to its roots and Israel to exist. Peace is the only long-term guarantee of Israel survival along with its strength and these people know exactly this fact. Godspeed and may reason prevail.
The article stated that Congressman Charles Boustany was "the only Republican who dared to attend one of the [J Street] panels." Boustany's paternal grandparents were immigrants from Lebanon. But on January 9, 2009, Boustany voted in favor of Speaker Pelosi's resolution endorsing Israel's right to use military force in self defense against Hamas rocket attacks. J Street, in contrast, opposed Israel's Operation Cast Lead right from the start. And J Street raised campaign funds to reward Congresswoman Donna Edwards for voting "present" rather than "yes" on Pelosi's resolution. Interesting that an Arab-American politician is more supportive of Israel's right to self defense than J Street is.
J Street's and Obama's New Language Each American administration is inventing its own "Adminglish." Their linguistic "heroic" efforts are endless material for the late night comedians. Obamistas are far ahead of other administrations in this respect. It is almost always a good prediction of trouble of the hero of the day. Obama's Islamic shtick is turning into a complete failure of his pro-Islamic foreign policy on all fronts, Middle East included. I admonish the J Street leftists to return to their true beliefs and language: they hate Israel, Jewish people and consider Islamic terrorism the fault of the West. The J-conference demonstrated a collection of leftists of all kinds and colors. You'll fail in attempts to mislead Jewish people 100%. Isaac Tarasulo, Yale Ph. D.
J Street is a bunch of Jews on their way out. They are superficially informed on the conflict and swayed by the skillful deceptions of pro-Arab propaganda. Israel's existential struggle deeply embarrasses them within their pacifist left-liberal social/professional environment or college campuses. As a solution, in their hearts they wish the burdens of the Jewish nation-state would rather fade away from their lives. This is the true meaning of their self-described "pro-Peace" stand. In a choice dictated by Arab obstinacy, between "Israel without Peace" and "Peace without Israel", they appear to opt for the latter.
that Judenrein Street took the words "pro-Israel" off all literature being distributed on campuses for "fear of offending future donors and members!"
When young Mr Ben Ami attends the Arab American Institute conference, he will mightily received. He is going there not to defend Israel but to genuflect before the Arab American Institute members. Mr. Ban Ami will predictably accept all the policy prescriptions of the Arab League, blame Israel for the impasse and refuse to condemn Hamas, Hezbollah or Assad. In essence, Mr. Ami will be saying to his hosts: "Please devour me in your luxuriouis lair".
AIPAC is national extremist, and a counter-weight is needed.
Idealism aside there can be no future for J-Street other than as a co-opting force to sabotage, divide and weaken an already weakening and declining voice in America. While Jews invented and once dominated the film industry and while Jews once dominated intellectual circles and education (from an American perspective "thanks" to the expulsion of some of the best minds from Europe) they don't any more. Hollywood Jews-- if they were not persecuted-- they, like Samuel Goldwyn, married gentiles and died effectively as gentiles. Like in the Hollywood film "The Jazz Singer" from Jewish culture to pop to an Irish catholic wife. Herzl too once thought this was the solution to persecution. Before he came to the logical conclusion of Zionism he first suggested, like Jakob Frank, the mass conversion of Jews to Christianity. He, however, realized that if Jews convert not only are they no longer Jews but they still probably won't be spared persecution-- a truth witnessed by Schoenburg, Arndt,...
"They may be Jews in blood - but that`s where it ends. They will disappear in under 2 years" -henry. Mhhhh.. looks like pinpoint description for an average Israeli. Doesn't look like they are disappearing very fast does it?
"They may be Jews in blood - but that`s where it ends. They will disappear in under 2 years" -henry. Mhhhh.. looks like pinpoint description for an average Israeli. Doesn't look like they are very fast does it?
This would be a more interesting site without the name callers. What ever happen to civil discourse.
J street and its foolsih followers, like #2 are just being used by everybody who doesn't like Israel's policy of being tough. Instead they want to appease the arabs andmake nice. so where did that get anyone? these fools need to sie up, Arab rejectionism is the root of theporblems in themiddle east not Israel. the more morons like #2 and J Street try to pressure Israel theharm they will do. the terrorists and muslim fanatics in Iran only understand strength. Once you blink you are gone. these liberals jerks are destructive to our long term stability and need to wake up and get their brains fixed. J Street is Joke Street
Arab money, George Soros, the left, the Jewish left. None of them were elected to anything. They are a tiny perhaps vocal minority among American Jews/Israelis-and hopefully they stay that way.
So the Arabs are happy a group of self-defeating Jews agree with them. Whoopi.
Boos to an anti-Goldstone comment? Ha! Nitwit attempts to rally people who are merely born Jewish to represent Jewish values is pathetic. Did they even stop to pray once at the conference? Jews pray - these people just represent hatred of Judaism. Prayer is anathema. They may be Jews in blood - but that's where it ends. They will disappear in under 2 years. And so will the connection to Judaism of their next generation kin. Unlike Islam, Jews aren't about quantity, just quality. We don't preach conversion.
And booing a rabbin critical of Goldstone. Sounds like a real "pro-Israel" organization to me!
The only time an applause was heard, is when Gen James Jones was critical of Israel. Their conference was a sham, and a waste of time.
Sooner or later the damage AIPAC, created for Israel and the American jewish population will surface. And there will be a price to pay. This parade of so called Jewish Middle Eastern experts ( neocons), American TV likes to bring on almost continuously , or the TV talk show hosts, who throw a little propaganda for Israel Is starting to get silly. The general American population is starting to get very suspicious of Israel. Yelling or mumbling anti-semetism, is being heard as just another hollow phrase, to cover up Israeli wrong doing. Jews should make it very clear that AIPAC, does not speak for them or represent them.
How is it possible to claim any success with your neighbor when they have been consistently dehumanizing and deligitimizing your existance for over 60 years? Any A-Street success (which J-Street wants to take credit for) is harmful to the very existance of Israel and Jews. Currently they are over 1.5 millions Arab Israelis who have better life then that of all the other 350 million Arabs are so yearning for. Their leaders in the Israeli government opneny debate the best ways for the destruction of Israel! I think I will give J-Street some credit when the jewish population in the arab world is a fraction of what was 50 years ago with free, safe and equal paricipation in all norms of society. Meanwhile the views of A-Street about Jews and Israel are the same to that of Hamas, Hizballah and of course Ahmadenajad. They are stating it daily, teaching it to their chlidren and spending a lot of money, perhaps also on J-Street,to sway the UN and others of their desire to destroy Israel.
you are right, this article is a bit of both, and a little analysis too. then again many of haaretz's articles are like this. Except her analysis is a bit better than most presented here.[and i do not lean to the right...] always good to have dieverse opinions represented, for israel's sake no need for any sacari anymore....
If ever there was a need for an alternative voice to the droning one of Aipac, it is now. Three cheers for J Street and its effort to bring reasonable discourse to bear on US foreign policy in the middle east. The problems there are enormous and the heretofore uncritical US support for the State of Israel may well be the prime cause.
Does anyone else get the feeling that this is an opinion piece masqueraded as a news article? I respect everyone's opinion and Natasha is certainly entitled to a view... but I believe her job right now is to be a reporter, right?