What does it mean to be pro-Israel? It depends on who you ask.
As the 2012 primary season heats up, Republican presidential hopefuls are competing for the most staunchly pro-Israel image among primary voters. But here’s the rub: the policies touted by primary candidates run counter to the majority opinions of the American Jewish community regarding the United States’ role in ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
While sustaining Israel’s qualitative military edge and deepening the US-Israel alliance have broad bipartisan consensus, opposition to the two-state solution is a radical departure from decades of bipartisan US-Israel policy. It also contradicts the aspirations and official policies of Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The best way to understand this corrosive dissonance is through the lens of domestic American politics.
Jim Gerstein of the firm GBA Strategies lays out the data:
“When presented with a comprehensive peace agreement that follows the parameters reported from talks during the Barak and Olmert Administrations, Jews support the agreement by a 57 to 43 percent margin. The result is noteworthy given the specific mention of language that recently raised an uproar among many Jewish organizational leaders – that is, establishing borders based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed upon land swaps – and other controversial elements such as Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees.”
67 Percent of American Jews want the United States to play an active role in helping the parties resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict, even if that means the U.S. publicly disagreeing with both Israelis and Palestinians.
If two thirds of American Jews want active American leadership to resolve the conflict, why are Republicans fighting this effort so hard? Because their playbook is drastically out of date; and as a result, their talking points are increasingly disconnected from the facts on the ground and the will of American Jews. They are disconnected from the will of Israeli Jews and, most importantly, Israel’s long-term strategic interests.
A generation ago, Israel was David in a neighborhood of Goliaths, and American Israel advocacy rightly reacted to the existential threats to the Jewish state. Thanks to the critical work of traditional Israel advocates, Israel today is stronger than ever before and its bond with the US is indeed unshakable.
Today Israel’s existential concerns are territorial and demographic. A Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza is the only way to ensure Israel’s future as the Jewish, democratic state.
To guarantee our future as a free people in our own land, more forceful American diplomatic leadership is required. In 2011, a politician is sufficiently pro-Israel to the degree that they advocate for aggressive diplomatic leadership to resolve the conflict.
J Street is rewriting the chapter of the political playbook on Israel advocacy. By representing the majority view of American Jews, J Street has grown rapidly as the home for Jews and other Americans who love Israel but feel betrayed by a pro-Israel establishment that silences dissent and vilifies moderates.
In the past, absolute and uncritical support of the Israeli government was the American litmus test for a politician to be “pro-Israel.” Precisely because of our love and support for Israel, J Street and millions of Americans are compelled to advocate for a two-state solution, which is the only way to protect both Israel’s Jewish and democratic future. Understanding and acknowledging the urgent necessity of a two-state solution is today’s test of whether a politician is truly pro-Israel.
Politicians of all stripes would do well to wake up and listen to the moderate majority and adopt the right policy for Israel, a genuine representation of American Jewish opinion.
Is it just me, or does this read like nothing other than a non-paid ad for J-Street?
Susan,
It is not just you….
And, BTW, there are reasonable republicans.
And, perhaps, the focus should be shifted from a two-state solution. Personally, I do not particularly care whether palestinian arabs get a state of their own, or get absorbed by another arab state. That is, as long as Israel remains a Jewish state, with jewish majority, and manages to rid itself of this “gaza-west-bank” hump.
Whether arabs get yet another state of their own or not is not that important — they will not be able to make heads or tails out of it anyway. What is important is that they are physically and completely disengaged from Israel.
Hate to comment on my own post, but I do not know how to edit the existing one…
Anyway, to preempt any comments on my “reasonable republicans” statement, I’d like to say that I feel rather dismayed that none of what I consider “reasonable” republicans are even close to participating in the primaries.
Evan Stern’s TC Jewfolk commentary “Pro Israel? According To Whom?” (above) is a well-meaning, but misleading, look at Jewish sentiment on America’s policy toward Israel. Stern claims that survey data shows American Jews overwhelmingly desire U.S. engagement to achieve an Israeli/Arab peace deal “even if that means the U.S. publicly disagreeing” with Israel. Let’s look at the facts that Stern, a member of J Street’s Minnesota steering committee, has twisted like a rugelach.
Stern’s article cites a July 2011 survey by “the firm GBA Strategies” for his argument that U.S. Jews support a two-state solution, even if at the cost of the Obama Administration criticizing Israel. But Stern leaves out of his article that GBA Strategies’ survey was commissioned by J Street (oops!), the controversial “pro-Israel, pro-Peace” group. More interesting, J Street’s own data appears to contradict its claim that American Jews’ views match up with J Street’s political positions in regards to Israel’s survival.
For example, J Street says its survey shows 57% of American Jews support a two-state solution that would include withdrawing to borders based on the 1967 lines — although the take-it-or-leave-it wording of the survey’s Question #40 doesn’t enable the respondents to choose an alternative to J Street’s concept of a two-state solution (which, by the way, includes “financial compensation for Palestinian refugees,” a vaguely-limited right of return for thousands of Palestinians and a return to “the borders that existed in 1967”).
Yet only 13% of those surveyed said they “strongly support” the two-state peace deal described by J Street, with a whopping 43% opposing such a dicey deal for Israel and 44% only “somewhat” supportive. Hardly a ringing endorsement of J Street’s positions. Yet J Street’s survey researchers claim in a July 20 memo that “a broad majority of Jews” support J Street’s position for a peace deal. According to whom, indeed!
Easily the most striking finding of J Street’s survey is its claim that 81% of Jews support the US playing a role in the conflict even if it meant the US “publicly stating its disagreements” with both Israel and the Arabs. The methodology to get to this statistic is intriguing: J Street first asked American Jews if they believe the US should play an active role in resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict – not surprisingly, 83% supported that. Then J Street asked two other questions with similar but significantly changed wording. One follow-up Question, #32 (you can find it online at: http://2011poll.s3.amazonaws.com/J_Street_Survey_July%202011_Final_Results.pdf) requires a respondent who opposed the US publicly stating its criticism of Israel to jointly respond that they oppose both “the US publicly stating its disagreements” and “the United States playing an active role” in resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict, which is even more confusing than it sounds.
When J Street restated the question (#33), asking if Jews would support the US playing a role in helping resolve the conflict if it meant the US publicly stated its disagreements with just Israel (removing the idea of airing disagreements with the Arabs as well), a rousing 47% of Jews responding to that question opposed the U.S. involvement if it involved publicly criticizing Israel. Not surprisingly, that last statistic is neither included in J Street’s press release nor in Mr. Stern’s TC Jewfolk post – because disagreeing with Israel is central to J Street’s gestalt. A more accurate survey question would have been: “Do you believe it’s appropriate for the United States government to publicly criticize Israel for its policies and actions?” I don’t believe J Street would have been pleased with the response of American Jews to that simple question.
What kind of sampling of Jews did J Street rely upon for its Web-based panel survey? 800 respondents. To be sure, in the world of public affairs, a random sample of 800 is considered statistically valid. But I am uncomfortable basing the future direction of US involvement in Israeli-Arab negotiations on a J Street-funded survey of 800 of America’s more than 6 million Jews.
Ironically, the Jews surveyed by J Street don’t appear to be as gullible as some might hope. In the context of asking Jews about whether they support or oppose Israel’s stopping the flotillas that have been designed to break the blockade of Hamas weapons being smuggled into Gaza, J Street’s survey quotes “flotilla supporters” as comparing the flotillas to “the modern-day equivalent of the Freedom Rides in the South in the 1960s, exposing the injustice and suffering imposed by Israel on Palestinians.” To their credit, fully 78% of those surveyed said Israel should prevent these flotillas from reaching Gaza – but the very wording of that half of the question speaks volumes about J Street’s view of Israel’s attempts to survive against terror attacks.
“There are three kinds of lies,” said Benjamin Disraeli, “lies, damned lies and statistics.” If J Street is to credibly serve as an alternative to the respected American Israel Public Affairs Committee/AIPAC, it will be vital that it refrain from ‘spinning’ polling data to shore up its controversial stance on what’s best for Israel.
Mr. Maccabee’s attempts to delegitimize J Street and the findings of the widely respected firm GBA Strategies are both a shock and a disgrace to our community. Why does Maccabee pour such energy and enthusiasm into debunking the findings of J Street’s 2011 Jewish Community Public Opinion Poll? Because he too is reading from an anachronistic playbook.
The old chapter on American Israel advocacy compels hard-line Israel supporters to employ every trick, no matter how dirty, to ensure their monopoly as recognized representatives of the Jewish community as a whole.
If a member of Congress rejects dangerously reductive, zero-sum Israel policies, they are decried as “anti-Israel.” When non-Jews question the wisdom of expanded settlement entrenchment beyond the green line, they are considered anti-Semites. When leaders in the Jewish community raise the same question, no matter how internationally respected, they are labeled as “self-hating Jews.” I myself have been threatened by hard-line Israel advocates, warned that there will be personal and professional consequences for publicly pushing the two-state solution.
If Maccabee had taken the opportunity to question the merit of American policy toward Israel in which a two-state solution is a central goal, I would welcome his thoughtful feedback. But he hasn’t. Instead of engaging a substantive discussion about the policy itself, Maccabee has chosen to attack the credibility and character of J Street and myself. He questions the appropriateness of public criticism of the State, but I question how appropriate it is to publicly attack individuals and organizations in our community who fight for Israel’s future as the Jewish, democratic homeland of our people.
Attempts to silence dissent and portray moderates as controversial don’t just damage the prospects for meaningful American leadership in resolving the conflict. They reflect terribly on us as a people and have the collateral damage of diaspora Jews disconnecting from Israel and the mainstream community itself.
I consider this type of intra-tribal attack to be outside the realm of acceptable behavior, and I am tempted simply to delete Maccabee’s comments. However, because he is a widely respected PR professional who has taken the time to contribute to this discussion, I will now explain why his critique is erroneous and marred by anti-moderate bias.
Maccabee challenges question #40, but fails to acknowledge that the terms listed in the question are the exact parameters of a peace deal most recently reached by negotiators for both parties. When Israel supporters are aware of the real terms, they are overwhelmingly supportive of sealing the deal. Maccabee ignores the critical detail that returning to pre-1967 borders will be offset by land swaps to accommodate so many Israelis currently living in the West Bank.
Maccabee’s misreading of survey questions 31-33 is not just wrong, it’s shocking given his extensive PR experience. Maccabee should be familiar with survey logic, a technique which prompts those who respond one way to answer follow-up questions, and skips to the next set of questions for those who do not. Questions 32 and 33 followed up question 31 by asking only those who support an active US role in resolving the conflict whether they specifically support publicly disagreeing with both parties (Q. 32) and publicly disagreeing with Israel (Q. 33).
Ignoring the methodology of the survey, Maccabee attempts to discredit questions 31-33 as confusing and designed to generate a false response. The reality couldn’t be further from the truth. Maccabee then shows his bias, claiming (erroneously) that criticizing Israel is “central to J Street’s gestalt.” A cursory reading of J Street’s history and a few minutes on J Street’s website obliterate this smear, as J Street has consistently held the position that public pressure on both sides is critical to achieving real progress towards a two-state solution.
Maccabee also misreads the language of Gaza Floatilla supporters, accrediting it to J Street itself. Never mind that the question regarding the floatilla also quotes the Israeli government, and that these clearly attributed quotes are included to fully contextualize the question. He then insults J Street and the survey respondents by suggesting a desire for gullible survey respondents. Precisely because American Jews are educated, critical thinkers, J Street asks high-level questions with considerable detail. Smearing moderates to make them appear to be radical is an ugly move from an outdated playbook, and Maccabee should not repeat it.
I want to clarify for Maccabee–and everyone else–that J Street is not an alternative to AIPAC. the American Israel Public Affairs Committee is largely responsible for the position Israel enjoys today: A qualitative military advantage head and shoulders above its neighbors, and an unshakable bond with its closest ally, the United States. J Street needs AIPAC to ensure that Israel is secure and strong enough to take the risks and make the compromises necessary to achieve peace. And AIPAC needs J Street to advocate forcefully for a two-state solution. The work of the two organizations compliment each other, as evidenced by the numerous members of AIPAC who are also J Street supporters. Again, this is not a zero-sum game.
Lastly, Maccabee says that he is “uncomfortable basing the future direction of US involvement in Israeli-Arab negotiations on a J Street-funded survey of 800 of America’s more than 6 million Jews.” This survey is just the tip of the iceberg. If Maccabee is still dismissive of the findings despite my clarifications, let him instead listen to leaders like Admiral Ami Ayalon, the former head of the Israeli Navy and Shin-Bet and former Minister and Member of Knesset, who shares J Street’s vision.
Let him listen to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and every President since Clinton, who all agree that ending the conflict is a national security interest of the United States and Israel.
Let him listen to his conscience, which says that it is unacceptable for Jews to occupy another people, denying their human rights to the extent that it threatens Israel’s Jewish, democratic future.
Let him listen to MK Yoel Hasson, the current Chairman of the State Control Committee and former President of the World Zionist Congress, who will speak about the imperative of a two-state solution at Adath Jeshurun on February 8.
Hasson is a rising star in Israeli politics, the second-youngest member of the Knesset, and a warmly welcomed speaker at AIPAC and J Street conferences alike. Stay tuned to TC Jewfolk for more information about the event in the days to come.