Obama and American Jews
- 01.29.2008 - 10:10 AMThroughout his presidential campaign, Barack Obama has faced a series of disturbingly slanderous e-mails. Obama has been falsely accused of being secretly Muslim; studying in an Indonesian madrassa; and refusing to say the pledge of allegiance, among other charges. Sensing that these e-mails were particularly prevalent within Jewish circles, Obama held a conference call with Jewish journalists yesterday afternoon.
During the call, Obama sought to reassure the Jewish community by addressing Jewish identity issues. He thus declared his support for Israel “as a Jewish state”; expressed concern for continued rocket attacks from Gaza; stated that the Palestinian right of return could not be interpreted “in any literal way”; and opposed negotiations with Hamas so long as it denies Israel’s right to exist. He further denied that he had ever practiced Islam, and said that his church leader had made a “mistake of judgment” in honoring Louis Farrakhan. “My church has never issued anti-Semitic statements, nor have I heard my pastor utter anything anti-Semitic,” he said. “If I have, I would have left the church.”
The implication that Obama—by virtue of his church leader’s connections with Farrakhan—is anti-Semitic is hard to swallow. After all, Obama remains one solid degree removed from Farrakhan—highly significant in a political environment in which Joseph Lieberman declared his “respect” for Farrakhan during his 2000 vice-presidential candidacy. Moreover, it is saddening that Obama continually feels the need to address his non-Islamic faith, particularly when doing so insultingly implies that Islam is undesirable.
Yet one question remains legitimate: how can voters who care about the U.S.-Israel relationship be reassured that Obama’s staunchly pro-Israel declarations are not mere pandering? After all, Obama is on record as having called for an “even-handed approach” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in 2000, just as the Palestinians commenced the Second Intifada following Camp David. According to Electronic Intifada founder Ali Abunimah, Obama’s pro-Israel epiphany occurred shortly before his 2004 U.S. Senate campaign—an about-face for which Obama apologized to Abunimah. “Hey, I’m sorry I haven’t said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race. I’m hoping when things calm down I can be more up front,” Obama said at the time.
Obama’s apology to Abunimah—a major proponent of the one-state “solution”— indicates an unsophisticated view of American politics, in which success requires whispering sweet Zionist nothings to satisfy the almighty, one-issue Jewish electorate. Obama’s foreign policy advisers have similarly promoted this inflated vision of Jewish power. As my contentions colleague Noah Pollak has assiduously noted, Obama adviser Samantha Power has declared that sound Middle East policy might require “alienating a domestic constituency”—guess which one. His staff further features Zbigniew Brzezinski, who has defended the Walt-Mearsheimer “Israel Lobby” thesis that the U.S.-Israel relationship is the product of Jewish power politics, rather than strategic interest.
This mixture of prior statements and advisory influences suggests little regarding how Obama might act towards Israel if elected. Obama has repudiated Brzezinski’s call for dialogue with Hamas, while Power’s support for ending U.S. foreign military aid to Israel probably represents too radical a departure from historic U.S. policy to be taken seriously.
Rather, Jewish concerns regarding Obama’s candidacy should focus on whether Obama and his posse view American Jewry as a stumbling block in the way of promoting U.S. interests in the Middle East. This is the insidious crux of the “Israel Lobby” thesis, and Obama’s prior statements to Abunimah—as well as the writings of Power and Brzezinski—are hardly reassuring.
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January 29th, 2008 at 10:31 AM
I have consistently argued since early 2004 that probably a minimum of 33% of those belonging to the Democratic Party are somewhat hostile to Israel. Unfortunately, I have no polling data to back up my suspicions. When will such a poll occur? Could it be that the pollsters, who are often Democratic Party partisans, afraid of what they might find—and how it could impact the elections of 2008?
January 29th, 2008 at 11:03 AM
The assumption that American Jews vote based on Israel policy is overstated. American Jews tend to be anti-war, perhaps naïvely so, and many are filled with UNICEF greeting card dreams of internationalism. Only a minority are actively involved with Middle East matters.
There is a fairly well organized minority, some quite well-to-do and willing to donate to candidates, and some in the punditocracy, who embrace and give great weight to a combative version of Zionism. There are also Christian dispensationalists who are pro-Israel for different reasons. All viable Democratic candiddates for two generations have made their obeisances to this view, even if not fully embracing it. Sen. Obama is no different in this regard.
Since the demise of the Soviet Union, the close alliance with Israel has made very little strategic sense, but the domestic political cost of soft-pedaling it has outweighed any immediate foreign policy advantage to be gained by doing so. As long as these political realities exist, whether or not a President feels warm and fuzzy about Jews in general, the policy won’t change.
January 29th, 2008 at 11:17 AM
The real Obama is the one who surrounds himself with god-awful leftwing academics and policy advisors who are extremely hostile to Israel. If Jews or anyone else interested in securing Israel are fooled by campaign rhetoric, they have only themselves to blame for not paying attention.
David: there was a poll done by the LA Times in August 2006 in the midst of the Israel-Hezbollah war. You won’t be surprised to learn the following:
When asked if Israel was justified in making war on Hezbollah and if Israel’s response was not excessively harsh, a total of 43% said yes. Of those saying yes, 29% were Democrats and 64% were Republicans. When asked if Israel was justified in making war on Hezbollah but if they also thought Israel’s response was excessively harsh, a total of 16% said yes. Of those saying yes to this question, 20% were Democrats and 11% were Republicans.
It gets worse: when asked should the US continue to align with Israel, only 50% said yes; of this 50%, 39% were Democrats and 64% Republicans. Adopt a more neutral posture? 44% said yes, of which 54% were Dems and 29% were Repubs. My guess is Obama and his creepy advisors are aware of this polling data, showing Democrats to be far less supportive of Israel than Republicans.
For the poll itself, go here: http://latimes.image2.trb.com/lanews/media/acrobat/2006-08/24694273.pdf. Daniel Pipes has information on this poll and others as well, here: http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/579.
January 29th, 2008 at 12:52 PM
For every policy, there must be some constituency. One question not often asked (certainly not by “The Israel Lobby” crowd) is what constituency is there that actively opposes a given policy, in this case, the US support for Israel?
I would argue that Democratic elites break down into three broad categories, all of which for somewhat reasons, oppose current policy with varying degrees of intensity:
1. Transnationalists. (S. Huntington’s term) This class represents those whose commercial interests are now multinational, and thus, have weakened national loyalties. (Think Wall Street, Davos attendees, etc.) In many respects, this is the new face of the Democratic elite, having replaced the antique, once-Republican paradigm of “Big Business.” This group has no inherent policy leanings, certainly few moral ones, other than a preference for the kind of “stability” that fosters commercial activity. Add to that the natural bias that comes from representing various sovereign entities (i.e., petrodollars) that do have a dog in the fight, and lo and behold, the US-Israel relationship suddenly becomes “counterproductive.”
2. Academicians. For regular posters here, this should require little comment other than the observation that US academics have taken their cues from their European counterparts at least since the 1820s, and the fads of “over there” eventually show up here. The fad that Bat Yeor finds “over there” is what she calls the “Palestinianization” of the European academy. Coming soon to a university near you.
3. African-American Leadership. Of course, the “black-Jewish rift” has been discussed since the 1960s. Less often mentioned is the hallucinatory and deeply entrenched anti-Semitism of the black community. Polls bear this out, and I’ve never seen a good study as to why this is–perhaps another poster can help. But putting aside their prejudices, it should be noted that every group (especially the Jews) suffers from a tendency to project its past onto somebody else’s present and future. Thus, Arial Sharon became Bull Connors, Yassir Arafat became MLK, and so forth.
The point of the foregoing is that other than for their fundraising potential, the Democrats have less and less need for Jews. In short, they will become much like the medieval princes who found Jews useful for helping to budget wars, but had little problem turning on them when the mobs howled for Jewish blood.
January 29th, 2008 at 1:08 PM
I’m willing to accept Obama’s claim that he is a Christian now and that he has been for some time (accepting without argument for a moment that the pan-African black power church he belongs to is truly ‘Christian’), but why is he completely disingenuous about his past? The fact is that he was born a Muslim, and when he was enrolled in school in Indonesia he was identified by his parent’s on his enrollment papers as Muslim. Yet, he claims that he has never been a Muslim. The issue here is not that he is still secretly Muslim, acting stealthily to steal the Preisidency for Muslims as soom looonies may claim. The issue is honesty. If he can’t tell the simple straight-forward truth about his heritage, why does anyone expect him to tell the truth about anything else? Yet, the mainstream media won’t touch the question for fear of being labelled “anti-Muslim”.
For more detail on Obama’s Muslim background, see the excellent articles on the subject at Daniel Pipe’s website.
January 29th, 2008 at 2:37 PM
Eric Trager writes:
There is absolutely no doubt that American Likudniks are a stumbling block in the way of promoting U.S. and Jewish interests in the Middle East. Obama is running for the Presidency of the United States - not Israel - and there is no reason for him, or any other Presidential candidate, to listen to the weasel voices of treason voiced in the Contentions blog and Commentary magazine.
January 29th, 2008 at 3:26 PM
At the very least, Obama comes off as someone who has not thought through his stance(s) on Israel and the Palestinian Arabs, and determined which principles he considers crucial, and/or will not be budged from. In that context, we have every right to be concerned about the trend of ideas from his policy advisers.
January 29th, 2008 at 4:38 PM
Dennis, if his father enrolled him the school may have chosen Muslim for him. Going to Mosque with dad because he says so doesn’t make someone a real Muslim any more than being dragged to Sunday School makes someone a Christian. A certain belief and faith is required.
There is also the issue of Muslims killing those that leave the religion. To admit he was a Muslim but is now a Christian creates a lot of issues he probably doesn’t want to deal with. So is it honesty or logic, belief, and self-preservation?
January 29th, 2008 at 5:17 PM
Indonesian law requires all citizens to choose one of six recognized religions: Islam, Protestantism, Catholicism, Buddhism, Hinduism and Confucianism. (Confucianism is a recent addition, so Obama would have had only five choices.)
As a Muslim student in a government school Obama would also have had to take lessons in Islam for a couple of hours a week. Had his parents registered him as a Protestant, a Catholic or a Buddhist, then these lessons would have been devoted to one of those faiths instead.
There’s absolutely no evidence to suggest that Obama has ever been a believing Muslim, much less a practicing one. (Not that there’s anything wrong with either.) There is evidence to suggest that his mother and stepfather–neither of whom were particularly religious–chose to register their son as a Muslim when other options were available. But these were attenuated options; they could not have registered Obama as an atheist, agnostic, humanist or theist.
Why this should be an issue at all beats me.
January 30th, 2008 at 9:04 AM
As of right now there is a unique chance in Palestine to achieve a peace deal. Israel has 2 factions- moderate Fatah and militant Hamas- each now distinct palestinian groups with different approaches to Israel. Israel should be siezing this opportunity to sign into a deal with Abbas for some form of pre-1967 borders and should be working to bring up the economic status of the West Bank to discredit Hamas and all militant activity against Israel. Instead, Israel has continued to build settlements in East Jerusalem and has refused to forecefully stop settlers from constructing more settlements in the West Bank, instead, it just tells them they dont have permission.
Israel, however, has done none of that. Israel has continued to treat the first Palestinians- who havent been violent- like dirt, and have walked all over them throughout the Peace Conference. With Islamic Extremism at an all time high, one would think a show of respect and progressive thinking towards the Arabs would be in order, especially considering the sensitivity of the Arab-Israeli issue. Instead, we have no progress, and we now risk losing our opportunity to convince Palestinians that Israel indeed even wants peace that isnt based entirely on their terms.
So what is it going to be? Are the Jews going to crucify a man who actually shows an intent to get things accomplished? Or is he going to be crucified by a lobby that cares so much about itself that its putting the United States at risk? Israel is a strong ally of the US, and should certainly remain so. But enough is enough. This is the United States, not Israel. With our soldiers dying across the world to battle this extremism, our country’s interests come first, not those of 3000 jewish settlers and AIPAC.