The Hypocrisy of Jeremy Ben-Ami

In a CBS report on this week's Christian Media Summit in Jerusalem, I found this quote:

"We really truly stand with Israel, and we really truly want to be dear friends," he [Gordon Robertson, chief executive of the Christian Broadcasting Network] said.

Not everyone agrees. Jeremy Ben Ami, president of J Street, a liberal pro-Israel group in Washington that is often critical of the Israeli government, said the evangelicals do not necessarily have Israel's best interests in mind. "Israel should be wary of embracing extreme Christian Zionist groups that may be more concerned with their own theological agendas than with Israel's long-term survival as a secure, democratic homeland for the Jewish people," he said.

I'm still laughing.

If anyone is concerned over his own agenda and does not have Israel's vital interests in mind or heart, if there is anyone who is more committed to a foreign ideology rather than Jewish nationalism, if there is anyone that is serving a tenet (progressivism) and a person (Barack Obama) more than Israel and Zionism, it is Jeremy Ben-Ami.

J Street has taken many wrong turns.  Most of them not pro-Israel.

His observation in this matter is purely hypocritical and in error.

^

J St. Description Contest

I have already noted that I do not use Holocaust nor Nazi terminology when dealing with other Jews.

It is not nice. It is unnecessary. It is not proper and there is no possible comparison of circumstances that could justify such linguistic usage.

Would the Senators at David Friedman's confirmation hearing like it if I termed their questioning as an "inquisition"?

Friedman's "worse than kapos" has its own inner logic - that whereas these people were forced, J Streeters seem actually to delight in their destructive work, underrmining Israel's security and diplomatic support while pretending to be "pro-Israel, pro-peace" - but that still does not justify employing the term "kapos".

Jeremy Ben-Ami, who works to the detriment of his father's legacy*, has now, I read, declared that his organization's 

"challenges are not limited to the Middle East"

Well, I guess we're in for some possible pro-Islamist reorienting.

In any case, without resort to Holocaust/Nazi language terms and certainly no profanity, what would you call J Street?

Traitors has already been taken, in a sense.  As has “Juedische Selbsthass”.

Can someone come up with a new longuistic form?


______________

*

Who wrote the following:

Western political leaders have acquired a concern for 'Arab-Palestinian homelessness', which is selfishly economic rather than humanitarian.  At the same time they ignore that three quarters of the original Palestine Mandate area is now under Palestinian-Arab rule.  The sooner disaspora Jews and the Hebrew nation recognize these new realities, the stronger they will be.

The Hebrew renaissance offers a painful choice to Jews.  They can live in the diaspora, often  facing isolation, persecution and ambivalent identities, or they can return to their ancient land and face perils, but with a chance for honorable self-fulfillment and an end to wandering...

It was Yitzhaq Ben-Ami, father of Jeremy Ben-Ami, on page 544 of his book. 
Years of Wrath, Days of Glory.

Think about that.


^

Jeremy (J Street) Ben-Ami Coming to the West Bank

Really.  He'll be on the West Bank:

Jeremy Ben-Ami, president and founder of J Street, will speak on “Prospects for Arab-Israeli Peace in the Wake of the Israeli Elections” 5 p.m. Tuesday, April 14
 in the Humphrey Forum
 at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs, 
301 19th Ave. S., on the U of M West Bank campus, in Minneapolis.  Ben-Ami will be joined by Humphrey School Professor Brian Atwood, chair of Global Policy and former dean.

I presume the construction and residency there on that West Bank is legal?


(kippa tip: JW) 

-----------------------------

A response:

__________________

Seems that George Washington University also has a problem with J Street.

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Jeremy J Street and Israeli Democracy

Naftali Bennet is upsetting Jeremy Ben-Ami:

The real story of the Israeli election scheduled for Jan. 22 is the meteoric rise of the right-wing HaBayit HaYehudi (Jewish Home) Party and its new leader, Naftali Bennett. Likely to head the second- or third-largest party in the next Knesset, Bennett advocates immediate annexation of 60 percent of the West Bank.

Gone from Israel’s next government will be any semblance of a moderate voice favoring a two-state solution. Instead, the ruling coalition will feature leaders such as Moshe Feiglin, a firebrand who wants to rebuild a Jewish temple on the Temple Mount, denigrates Muslims and democracy and suggests paying Palestinian families to emigrate.

And Jeremy J Street then extends sympathy for the Pals:-

Also awaiting Obama’s new team will be a clear message from the Palestinian leaders who still believe in two states: President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. [do they, really?] Without immediate, meaningful diplomatic action to bring about two states, they will say, talking about a two-state solution while Israel settles the land where Palestinians look to build their state is no longer a viable option.

He notes:-

The Obama team’s understanding of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and what needs to be done to solve it, has to catch up with these new realities.

But, of course, he doesn't like or supports a democratic decision by Israel's electorate:

Sadly, many in the nation’s capital remain convinced that Israel is simply building on land that “everyone knows” it will ultimately keep. In their view, the present settlement-building frenzy should not be a problem for Palestinians.

Even Shiloh stars:

Construction and planning are taking place in areas far outside the “consensus” blocs that President Bill Clinton envisioned remaining with Israel in 2000. From construction in Shiloh and Beit El, to accrediting a national university in the outlying settlement of Ariel, to planning to develop the E-1 area east of Jerusalem, the government of Israel is unrelentingly establishing that it has no interest in the creation of a viable Palestinian state.

Jeremy J Street should know that even Ehud Olmert knew E1 would be Israeli in the end.

If Jeremy does mention the term "settlement", it's not a Jewish residential community but

No, [Obama] cannot impose a settlement...Obama must go to the region early in his second term and, backed by the entire international community, lay out the parameters for resolving the conflict, a credible timeline and a process for mediated discussions that assures both sides their concerns will be heard.  He and the world need to exert meaningful pressure on both sides to decide whether they will accept the well-known terms of a viable two-state solution.

Nodding to democracy, he ends:

Israelis will have to decide between leaders such as Feiglin and Bennett, who say no to compromise and peace, and those who — like all six of Israel’s living internal security chiefs — are willing to lead the way to a two-state solution. Palestinians will have to decide between leaders such as Abbas and Fayyad, who believe in nonviolence and diplomacy, and Hamas, which refuses to recognize Israel’s existence. 

Forget his anathema to "right-wing Zionism".  The problem with Jeremy J Street is his empathy for the Pals.

Of course, he will explain that the only way Israel can exist, in his opinion, is if the Pals. accept the concept of peace - which they will never do, well, not in the way we understand it, - and, in order for that to happen, Israel must take steps which I think, and, it seems, a great many Israelis agree, endanger its current security  and future existence.

But Jeremy J Street expresses himself in the Washington Post and I express myself here.

^

An Offer Beinart Will Refuse?

Or will he?

It's from my friend Ronnn Torossian

I am prepared to make a 6 figure donation to J Street and/or Peter Beinart. My $100,000 gift comes with a simple condition – they have to speak to Arabs as they do to the Jewish community. Among my objections to these misguided peace-seekers is that they preach almost exclusively to the Jewish community and Western audiences about peace in the Middle East – and are ignoring the need to address Arab communities in their countries, whose participation is of course necessary to achieve the peace that they so clamor for. I was inspired to make this offer after reading Peter Beinart’s ‘Open Zion’ blog introduction that speaks of “official Jewish discourse” but says nothing of “official Arab discourse.”


For the challenge, they must pick three Middle Eastern Arab countries as well as Gaza, and speak in open advertised forums including Mosques and Universities. They must also travel without security as they do in Israel and Jewish communities. Upon completion of this tour I will sign the check, which I am prepared to place in escrow today with attorneys. J Street President Mr. Jeremy Ben Ami and Mr. Peter Beinart simply need to preach their message of co-existence in the Arab world.

Is that an offer they can't or can refuse?

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Slowing Down On J Street

From the interview of Jeremy Ben-Ami by Jeffrey Goldberg:

JG: But you publicly disagreed with his op-ed in which he called for a boycott of products made in settlements. Why do you disagree with it?

JB: Because I don't think that it makes any sense to put negative pressure on people whose behavior you hope to change. I think that the way that Israelis will feel comfortable making the compromises and the sacrifices--and Israel as a whole, not just the settlers --is when they really feel that not only American Jews, but the United States, is going to be there for them...

...The biggest obstacle I see in the Israeli psyche at the moment is this sense that two states is never going to happen, that there's just no way peace is ever going to come. While 70% of Israelis want a two-state solution, 80% of them think it's never going to happen in their lifetime.

JG: How do you dislodge the settlers?

JB: The way that you overcome the mindset, which I think is the first step, is you actually present an agreement that, lo and behold, the world supports, and Palestinians would support, and you realize that, hey, we actually can get it. And that positive pressure to make that decision by creating a path to hope, a path to the future, gives you then the national political will and the national political consensus to make that very difficult move: to say to the settlers, it's time to come home.

...The problem with Oslo was it laid out a process without ever telling you what the end result is going to be. What does that Palestinian state look like? What does the border look like? What are the security arrangements? Let's actually skip over the three to five years of process and talks, because we don't need them--because we already know what the end result looks like. Let's put that deal on the table and force the political decision on both sides--both the Palestinians and the Israeli political world--to decide if they are really ready to say yes to a realistic resolution to this conflict.

...JG: We expect J Street to condemn settler violence, or provocative settlement building, or the power of the religious right parties in Israel. But another thing that we don't seem to hear from J Street enough is where the left side of the framework is. I understand where you go on the right, but it's always this concern--look, some of it is manufactured by people who don't like your general outlook, but some of it is real. What is "too left" for J Street? What sort of expression of criticism is too far to the left, from your perspective?

JB: We established at the beginning of the interview some of the tactical things that are too far. We don't support, obviously, BDS but also Peter's conception of "Zionist BDS," that that is either advisable, doable, or workable.

JG: Do you think that this would put you on a slippery slope toward full BDS?

JB: I think it's very hard to make a clear line between what is "settlement business" and what is not. So many businesses do business on both sides of the Green Line. Very few things are simply, purely done on the other side of the Green Line.

JG: And isn't it, of course, the Israeli government that subsidizes factory-building in settlements that then create products that are sold?

JB: Right.

JG: So then why are you blaming the factory? Shouldn't you be blaming the guy who gave you the money to build the factory, which in this case is the Israeli government?

JB: The same issue comes up with divestment. Because if you divest from a company that produces a military product that is used in the occupation, that same company is probably producing a product that helps defend Israel from, let's say, rockets. So if you're saying you shouldn't be supporting a truck company or a boot manufacturer, is that the boots of the soldiers who are going to defend Israel itself? It is a slippery slope and very hard to draw that line.

JG: Do you think Beinart's idea is going to catch on?

JB: I think there are a lot of people in the progressive part of the pro-Israel community who are personally, deeply bothered by the notion that we would doing anything that helps to perpetuate this occupation. So I think on a personal level, people do, when they find out that a product or a wine or whatever it is comes from the West Bank, then personally I think people will consider this.

JG: I don't think this is going to gain traction in the American Jewish community. Tell me I'm wrong.

JB: No, I don't think so either...

^

Shots at J Street

From a crime report of Davis, CA:-

10:34 pm – Gunshots were reported heard at J Street Apartments. The caller heard one shot coming from the complex. Nothing else was seen or heard.

By the way, Davis, a city in Yolo County, California, part of the Sacramento–Arden-Arcade–Roseville Metropolitan Area, is home to USC Davis and

is known for its liberal politics

And by the way,

Jeremy Ben-Ami of J Street clarifies ‘Israel-Firster’ comment

I guess he was a bit too liberal the first time:

Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of J Street, released a statement where he sought to clarify his comments in a Washington Post article reporting on accusations that staffers from the Center for American Progress used anti-Semitic and anti-Israel language to attack pro-Israel activists.

In The Washington Post article, Ben-Ami was quoted saying that he had "no problem" with the term "Israel-Firster" and emphasized that it is "a legitimate question"...

In his new statement, Ben-Ami said that "the use of the term 'Israel Firster' is a bad choice of words. The conspiracy theory that American Jews have dual loyalty is just that, a conspiracy theory and must be refuted in the strongest possible way."

^

Even Jeremy J Street Admits

...most Republican candidates express unqualified support for Israeli government policy and unprecedented backing for Israeli settlement beyond the pre-1967 Green Line.

Source

He claims that what is happening is that

Settlements beyond the Green Line continue to expand, and doubts regarding the existence of a true partner for peace are used to justify continued procrastination in taking meaningful steps toward a two-state solution.


All too quickly on this path it will become clear that there no longer is a Green Line. Rather, there will be one state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean left to grapple with how to remain a democratic, Jewish nation when a majority of the people living there are not Jewish.

Of course, this developing situation will force "pro-Israel" forces like Jeremy to come to terms with facts:

a) is there truly a demographic threat?  will there be a non-Jewish majority?

b) is there a threat to democracy if there is a demographic threat?

c)  are there other political resolutions other than a "one-state/no more Green Line"?

d) is the assumption that there is a "true peace partner" actually correct?

e) does Jeremy really know what he talks about?

(k/t=BT)

^

Have A Laugh At J Street's Expense

Here's the J Street Statement on Newt Gingrich which begins

J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami released the following statement in response to Republican Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich’s recent remarks about the Palestinians.

“Newt Gingrich’s comments about the Palestinian people and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are ill-informed, irresponsible and frightening.

The former Speaker’s assertion that the Palestinians are an ‘invented’ people shows an appalling lack of understanding of the history of the Middle East in the last century following the break-up of the Ottoman Empire.

So, the glorious history and heritage of the ancient "Palestinian people", whose supposed ancestors predated Jews in the country, who descended from Jebusites, etc., etc., etc., - but who actually refered to themselves as "Southern Syrians" in the early 1920s, demanding that the League of Nations Mandate be dissolved and the country reunited with Syria * - needs to be defended by Jeremy Ben-Ami who can go back no further than "the last century"?

Oh, woe!

And who is ill-informed?

See below.

________

*

Arab opposition to the Mandate idea of a Jewish National Home began in early 1919:


The first Palestinian Arab congress (al-Muʾtamar al-Arabi al-Filastini) met in Jerusalem from 27 January to 9 February 1919. Organized by local Muslim and Christian associations, its thirty participants framed a national charter that demanded independence for Palestine, denounced the Balfour Declaration (and its promise of a Jewish national home), and rejected British rule over Palestine. A majority sought the incorporation of Palestine into an independent Syrian state, and the delegates strongly denounced French claims to a mandate over Syria. The congress expressed its request for independence in the language of U.S. president Woodrow Wilson's principles supporting the right of self-determination of subject peoples.

This, of course, highlights the major problem with the so called "Palestinian nationalism" in that in the early 1920s, it sought not an "independent Palestine" but a "Greater Syria".

The text of two of the relevant decisions:

"1. We consider Palestine as part of Arab Syria as it has never been separated from it at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, natural, economic and geographic bonds.

2. The Declaration made by M. Pichon, Minister for Foreig Affairs for France, that France had rights in our country based on the desires and aspirations of the inhabitants has no foundation and we reject all the declarations made in his speech of 29th December 1918, as our wishes and aspirations are only in Arab unity and complete independence.

3. In view of the above we desire that one district Southern Syria or Palestine should not be separated from the Independent Arab Syrian Government and to be free from all foreign influence and protection."

^

Jeremy J Street Makes A Joke

In a reviewof Jeremy Ben-Ami's book on J Street, we are informed that

Ben-Ami starts with a historical analogy that is sure to drive many of his critics bonkers: He compares J Street to the Bergson Group, the band of right-wing loyalists to Ze’ev Jabotinsky. The group was ostracized by the U.S. Jewish establishment in the 1930s and ‘40s for waging an aggressive campaign to finance illegal Jewish immigration to Palestine and publicly pressuring the Roosevelt administration to do more to help European Jewry. What gives the comparison extra punch is that Ben-Ami—a former Bill Clinton and Howard Dean staffer—is the son of the late Bergson Group member Yitshaq Ben-Ami.

“My organization, J Street, is attacked … from the right for being left-wing, while the attacks in the 1930s against the Bergson Group came from the left and called them ‘fascist,’ ” the younger Ben-Ami writes. “If the experience of the Bergson Groups teaches us anything, it is that the appropriate way to deal with those new voices is not to reflexively shut them down but to engage them on the merits and see what value there may be in what they are trying to say.”

True.

And J Street has no merits.

It is a pro-American liberal progressive group of assimilated Jews that can find enough solace in its Israel-directed activity to feel still Jewish, but barely, and not be condemned by antisemites.

It is subversive, it undermines Israel's security and unabashedly identifies with the enemies of the Jewish people.

Bergson Group?

Is that the sounds of "Mike" Ben-Ami, a proud scion of Chabad and the Irgun, I hear banging?

Remember, he wrote the following:

Western political leaders have acquired a concern for 'Arab-Palestinian homelessness', which is selfishly economic rather than humanitarian. At the same time they ignore that three quarters of the original Palestine Mandate area is now under Palestinian-Arab rule. The sooner disaspora Jews and the Hebrew nation recognize these new realities, the stronger they will be.

The Hebrew renaissance offers a painful choice to Jews. They can live in the diaspora, often facing isolation, persecution and ambivalent identities, or they can return to their ancient land and face perils, but with a chance for honorable self-fulfillment and an end to wandering...

on page 544 of his book, Years of Wrath, Days of Glory.

Jeremy, you're joking, right?

^

President's Conference - Part Three

Carl has done a very good job of detailing what went on at the session devoted to Israel-Diaspora Relations this morning.  So, read him and I will add some other details and observations.

But first, the dramatis personea:

(left to right: Moderator Shmuel Rosen, Jeremy Ben-Ami, Dani Dayan, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, Prof. Fania Oz-Salzberger and Prof. Dina Pinto.  Photo credit: YMedad)

As expected, Dani, who I knew was well prepared, did an excellent opening salvo.  He described acts that he thought were beyond criticism and dialogue and exchange of views and then declared that they were anti-Israel.  I will have to do some more research but Jeremy's line of defense was to prevaricate and deny and then to declare that J Street wasn't attacking Israel (in the instance of the UN Security resolution on Jewish communities in Yesha: "...we cannot support a U.S. veto of a Resolution that closely tracks long-standing American policy and that appropriately condemns Israeli settlement policy") but, acting as Americans, they were supporting an American policy.  Did you get that?  That was "dual loyalty" at its worse - backhanding Israel and then denying they did it as Jews.  Dani also noted that all this talk of the "tent" is problematic because what J Street is doing is sneaking in to this community tent and subverting from within.

Amos Oz's daughter, Fania Oz-Salzburger, actually said two things memorable: the first, that Israel's need to learn the new global language and get nuances correct (Carl has on this "She says brush up your English and don't play into anti-Israel hands" which is true but I think that, at this point, she really did express concern about Israelis, even well-meaning ones, who adopt terms that indicate to Israel's enemies that the enemies are right in that they lose the semantic under-layers - and I was thinking them so much about her father).  The second was her attempt to portray pre-1967 kibbutzim as the legitimate expression of "the Zionist settlement enterprise" whereas the post-1967 Yesha communities are not.  That attempt at distinguishing, of course, makes no difference to Arabs, local or others, and so Fania, professorship and all, was simply, to quote her, 'playing into the hands of Israel's enemies'.  She also said at the end that the Yesha communities were a real danger to Israel's existence and therefore it is quite legitimate a target for criticism.

Poor Dina Pinto.  She had to deal with the panel, explain why ethnicity and God are not in the lingo of Europe and then saw fit to attack Chief Rabbi Sacks for daring to declare that "human rights" is the new mutation of anti-semitism which always rides on the central motif of discourse (in the Middle Ages - religion; in the 19th-20th century - science and now human rights).

The alliance between Dani and Rabbi Yoffie, - who, I must note, not only remembered when we met long ago but is aware that I blog (see, there are advantage to blogging) and I must have said something very negative about him for him to recall my activity, - was played almost perfectly by Dani, even when he noted that Reform Judaism realized the era of its ways when it was anti-Zionist and decided to come back into the tent in 1937.  I am sure, though, that few youngsters there were aware of that prehistoric event (and ARZA only joined to Zionist Organization in 1978).

The episode with Judge Goldstone and the South African Zionist Federation (Carl writes: "South African Zionist Federation delegate raises Goldstone...Adds quick anecdote. They asked Goldstone whether he believed the Israeli government was responsible for war crimes and Goldstone said no") is inadequate a retelling.

The man actually said that he asked Goldstone if he truly believed that Israel purposefully committed 'war crimes' and he said that Goldstone admitted he had a problem with "this [Israeli] government" but he pointed out to the judge that the government that led Operation Cast Lead was a Kadima government, not Likud.  I think that is an important addition.

One other matter.  Dani Dayan revealed that he had met the members of a Congressional delegation led by J Street.  I know someone who was invited to meet with a J Street group earlier and was heavily pressured to withdraw due to the firm opposition to any contacts with J Street and the need to ostracize them.  I do not think it fair to say one thing and to do another. [Dani adds: "I never pressed anyone not to meet J Street.

Additionally, I don't consider it as meeting J street but as meeting 5 members of Congress.]

One last thing, with thanks to David Bedein who reminded me.

Who wrote the following:

Western political leaders have acquired a concern for 'Arab-Palestinian homelessness', which is selfishly economic rather than humanitarian.  At the same time they ignore that three quarters of the original Palestine Mandate area is now under Palestinian-Arab rule.  The sooner disaspora Jews and the Hebrew nation recognize these new realities, the stronger they will be.

The Hebrew renaissance offers a painful choice to Jews.  They can live in the diaspora, often  facing isolation, persecution and ambivalent identities, or they can return to their ancient land and face perils, but with a chance for honorable self-fulfillment and an end to wandering...

It was Yitzhaq Ben-Ami, father of Jeremy Ben-Ami, on page 544 of his book.
Years of Wrath, Days of Glory.

Think about that.


P.S.

Arutz 7 has a video up, in Hebrew, of course and here is their interview in English with Dany.

Jewlicious.

P.P.S.  Youtube.
^

J Street Had An Accident

From EOZ:-

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J Street's Values or Its Hypocrisy?

Reported:

[Jeremy] Ben-Ami said that J Street itself strongly opposes the BDS movement, but that “we engage with people we disagree with. We don’t shut them out. Those who are involved in the BDS movement in the Jewish community should be argued with and shown that they’re wrong, but to just shut them out is wrong.”
At the same time, Ben-Ami, as well as Saperstein, distinguished between campaigns to boycott Israel entirely versus those targeting products and institutions in the West Bank.

So, I don't get invited to discuss, discourse or debate?  Not even engaged?

I'm shut out, I guess.

Is that a value or plain hypocrisy?

^

J Street's Jeremy on "Settlements"

Charley Levine, who I well know, interviewed J Street's Jeremy Ben-Ami for Hadassah Magazine.

One issue is: was that giving a very invidious person who lies and acts subversively an unfair platfrom in a major Jewish organization's house-organ? Were the questions the best that could have been asked?

Another issue are the answers Jeremy provides.

I picked the one on Jewish civilian residential communities wherein live revenants, in portions of their historic patrimony sanctioned by international law to become their reconstituted national home:

Q. What is J Street’s position on settlements?

A. We have felt, J Street and me personally, that the focus on just the settlements and just the freeze is looking at a symptom rather than the underlying disease. J Street is all about assuring Israel’s long-term survival and security as a Jewish, democratic state. I don’t see how that is possible if Israelis and Jews continue to live over the Green Line with expanding numbers and jurisdiction over a majority of people who are not Jewish. Unless we figure out a way to separate from the Palestinian people and to draw a border that the world recognizes, the whole Zionist enterprise is finished. This is the more important question. Whether the bulldozers start working again over the Green Line is a tactical question, but the bigger one is: Will the government of Israel, the country as a whole, recognize that it is on a vehicle that is heading off a cliff? This may not happen today or next year, but at some point Israelis are going to wake up and see they are a minority in the geographic area they control, that they haven’t given rights to the majority, the country itself has become isolated from the rest of the world….

All of this will gradually happen. And one day everyone will ask, How did we get into this position? It is still not too late to make decisions to change course. I’d rather the discussion in Israel be what Tzipi Livni and even Ehud Barak are trying to get the focus to be—not yes or no to extending the settlement chill…for a few more months, but how to actually resolve the underlying conflict. Let’s get a border, let’s agree what settlements are staying with us, what land we are giving back, and let’s end this conflict. What do I think will actually happen? I think the focus will be on the freeze, that under pressure, the Israeli government will concede and will extend the freeze for another number of months so that the peace process might continue.

Besides that cute "settlement chill" turn-of-phrase, Jeremy makes unsubstantiated claims about political, military and demographic developments that are divorced from reality. He expresses his own wishful thinking and then, from those frameworks of conception, revisits the situation, applies them and draws his own pre-determined conclusions.

a. J Street has been quite focused on the issue of Jewish communities across the former Green Line armistice boundary, incouding running a campaign to investigate the matter of tax-exmpt status of charity funds directed our way.

b. J Streets actions, pronouncements and hype is all about decreasing Israel's ability to survive.

c. One can ask, if it can be proven that within X number of years, at current prognistications, that northern Israel or the nortern Negev could become 'minority-Jewish', would Jeremy demand its surrender to local Arabs or Beduin?

d. alternatively, if Israel can exist with 20% non-Jewish minority, why cannot "Palestine" exist with a 15% Jewish minority? Are there different understandings of democracy? Different standards, one for Jews, one for Arabs? And does that apply, as well, to the solutions suggested, including mass expulsion and destrcution of property?

e. Jeremy is BSing. It is not a question of whether the world will recognize some new border but whther the Arabs will.

f. On giving back land, since the principle Jeremy is enamored with is "giving back land", that is, territorial compromise, and since Israel is in possession of Judea and Samaria as a result of a defensive war (and we won't argue now whether the Gaza Disengagement proved this unworkable and illogical), why not demand an Arab yielding of territory? Why is the onus on Israel?

g. and as for "isolation", since Jeremy is aligned with forces who seek that goal specifically, his hypocrisy is only less than his hubris.

^

Another Lost for Posterity Letter to the NYT Editor

I guess this, too, is not going to get published:-

Jeremy Ben-Ami misleads when he writes in his letter that "Unlike elements of Israel’s government, most Jewish Americans favor a two-state solution, restricting settlement growth and active American leadership to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict",("Politics and the Mideast", Dec. 1). In the first instance, "elements" or not, Israel's current government policy is to assist in the establishment of a two-state solution, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pronounced over a year ago in his Bar-Ilan speech. In addition, Israel's government severely restricted, indeed froze, construction in the Jewish communities across the former Green Line armistice line - a move that did not move the Arabs to negotiate - and has been working closely with American leaders for decades to achieve a peace settlement.

However, in the second instance, as regards Jewish American opinion, J Street polls have been shown to be highly suspect, misleading, unreliable and, being in-house managed, a product of narrow progressive political ideology, a system totally rejected by American Jewry. Ben-Ami is simply on the wrong corner.

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J Street Chametz

Lenny Ben-David has pointed out J Street's Jeremy Ben Ami’s false Pesach message, writing:

In his Passover missive, Ben Ami divides the Jewish world in two, describing it as a “struggle developing between two camps with radically different visions of Jewish expression in the 21st century.” According to Ben-Ami, it’s “us” or “them.” There are no shades of grey? How Jewish is that?

“On one side of this struggle,” Ben Ami continues,” are those committed to our vision of time-honored Jewish and democratic values - grounded in respect for ‘the other,’ a tolerance for dissent, and a willingness to sacrifice territory for peace.”

Notice Ben-Ami has no respect for “the other” when she/he is a Jew. It's all "we" and "they." And since when is surrender a "time-honored Jewish value?" Look how divisive Ben-Ami is in the next section:

“On the other side,” says Ben-Ami, “are those who seem willing to muffle dissent, view all conflict as zero-sum, and place retaining captured land and territory at the center of its value system.”

What intolerance! Anyone who opposes J Street as well as the Israelis who democratically vote for what they perceive as best for Israel are depicted as fascist. Don’t forget that territory was given up by right-wingers Menachem Begin and Binyamin Netanyahu when they negotiated directly with real partners for peace. Barak and Sharon surrendered territory to terrorists and got rockets in return from Lebanon and Gaza.

“As a people,” Ben-Ami concludes, “do we line up with those who seek to hang on to all of "Greater Israel" and watch our Jewish and democratic values erode in Israel and in our community, or do we stand up urgently for territorial compromise and for behavior in Israel and in our community that reflects our cherished and long-held values? … We're in a larger and more significant battle over who we are as a people in this new century and how our people are defined collectively for ourselves and for others by the behavior of the country that serves as our national expression.”

What an anti-democratic diatribe by Ben-Ami. His “we” should decide Israel’s values and behavior! He's upset because Israel's behavior will define him, a Newest Testament Jew, living in Washington.

That "Torah" of Ben-Ami is, of course, chametz-torah.

Chametz is forbidden on Pesach and we are prohibited even from benefiting from its usage or ownership. It should be either burnt, hidden away and/or sold depending on its status.

I leave it to you to decide what you want to do with his ideology.

J Street's Jeremy Ben-Ami Threatens A "Throttled" Peace

Jeremy Ben-Ami, son of my friend and former employer as a reseacher on his autobiography, the late Yitshaq Ben-Ami, "Mike", heads that way far-off progressive semi-anti-Israel J Street organization that serves as the fawning "Jewish" support for the Obama Administration's Israel policies (although some presume they actually aid in fashioning them).

Anyway, seems he wants to throttle either peace or Israel.

He wrote to Abe Foxman, a former member of Betar, who heads ADL:

A full-throttle effort to reach an end to the conflict that resolves all disputes has overwhelming support from Jewish Americans and from the majority of all Americans.

I, for one, and I would guess many other Israelis, would not react pleasantly to a throttling.

Can I suggest he get a better hand on his mouth - and get his foot out?

J Street Backstabbing Begins

J Street backs alternative House letter on Mideast

J Street is backing a bipartisan congressional letter to the president...an alternative to House and Senate letters backed by AIPAC that also are being circulated on the Hill.

...The Cohen-Boustany-Carnahan letter states that "America best serves our historic friendship with Israel when it is actively working to de-escalate conflict and advance peace, and that our relationships throughout the Arab and Muslim world will be strengthened through a negotiated agreement that ends the conflict."

It adds that "Israelis and Palestinians have not been able to achieve peace on their own, and we therefore share your belief that American leadership is essential to achieving meaningful progress. Left to themselves, the parties have been unable to make the necessary progress toward ending the conflict, and an American helping hand is now needed to bridge those gaps."

The AIPAC-backed House letter urges the president to make "every effort" to achieve peace in the Middle East, but emphasizes that "the parties themselves must negotiate the details of any agreement" and that the United States must insist on an "absolute Palestinian commitment" to end violence and terror.

It also states that the United States needs to "work closely and privately together" with Israel "both on areas of agreement and especially on areas of disagreement."

E tu, Jeremy?

Words of Wisdom

...the self-loathing masked as communal angst exemplified by J Street.

James Kirchik

Jeremy, J Street Jew

J Street's Jeremy Ben-Ami has an op-ed in The Forward: For Israel's Sake, Moderate American Jews Must Find Their Voice (and a similar one in the ‘International Herald Tribune’ of April 10, under the headline: “Tel-Aviv, Then and Now”.

Its essence:

For the sake of Israel, the United States and the world, it is time for American political discourse to re-engage with reality. Voices of reason need to reclaim what it means to be pro-Israel and to establish in American political discourse that Israel’s core security interest is to achieve a negotiated two-state solution and to define once and for all permanent, internationally recognized borders...In early 21st-century America, the rules of politics are being rewritten, and conventional political orthodoxy is clearly open to once-inconceivable challenges.

It is time for the broad, sensible mainstream of pro-Israel American Jews and their allies to challenge those on the extreme right who claim to speak for all American Jews in the national debate about Israel and the Middle East — and who, through the use of fear and intimidation, have cut off reasonable debate on the topic.

Why should this silly approach be adopted?

Well, Jeremy asserts:

By and large, we are a progressive community, among the most liberal in the United States.

and what really bothers him is:

In the name of protecting Israel, some of our community’s leaders became linked with neoconservatives...Some of our leaders have struck up fast friendships with far-right Christian Zionists...many of these are people with whom we disagree profoundly on values and beliefs that our community holds dear...

In Washington today, these voices are seen to speak for the entire American Jewish community. But they don’t speak for me. And I don’t believe they speak for the majority of the American Jews with whom I have lived and worked.

So, Jeremy's personal beliefs andwhat he perceives personally to be the majority of American Jewish beliefs is what counts. And if the majority of Jew werre arch-conservatives, would Jeremy be quiet? By the by, if that is true that Jews are progressive, how come for over 60 years the vast majority of America's Jews support what Jeremy would consider "extreme right views"? Well, simple, really. Because in the Middle East, there is no balance nor logic nor rationality on the Arab side and you can't compare to the political atmosphere in democratic America. To apply "Washington rules" of the Constitution and Bill of Rights to the Arab-Israel conflict is not only wrong but stupid. Jeremy, though, would blame the "Jewish establishment", as if he were an antisemite, which he isn't.

The J Street poll was destroyed by Rosner (and see my comments below) and the J Street interference on that Iran rally, getting Sarah Palin dis-invited gto please Hillary Clinton to the detriment of Israel is a matter of anti-Israel record.

At that Forward op-ed, some commented that they presumed to know what Jeremy's grandparents and parents would be doing in their graves - rolling over. I don't know for sure but since Jeremy does invoke his ancestry ("I support Israel. My family history ingrains in me the belief that the Jewish people need and deserve a home. I know that that nation must be strong and secure and that a deep bond between Israel and America is essential to its survival."), I am going to take a guess that with his current policies, if Jeremy had been his grandfather, Tel Aviv would not have been purchased and established. It would have been considered Arab land, Jewish expansion and needlessly causing friction with the neighbors. Sometimes, chronology does work - Jeremy is not his grandfather, although I am sure his proud display of genealogy is as empty as his political aptitude.

On April 17, next week, the descendants of the founders will gather in Tel Aviv at the ‘old’ Manshia Train Station (border Neve-Tsedek/Yafa) on April 17th, at 10:30 to reenact the famous photograph,



together with descendants of the city builders and prominent figures alongside thousands of residents.

Jeremy Ben-Ami will be there.

I wonder, will anyone be there holding up a placard reading:

Jeremy J Street Jew:
If this was 1909,
You'd Be Opposing The Purchase

====================================


In that poll, I searched for the section on revenant Jewish communities and found this:

American Jews Oppose Settlement Expansion: By a 60 to 40 percent margin, American Jews oppose the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank based on “what they know” and after receiving short statements by supporters and opponents of settlement expansion. Simply put, attitudes toward settlements are highly negative and firmly held. Not surprisingly, opposition to settlements is higher among Reform (64 percent oppose) and unaffiliated Jews (69 percent oppose), in contrast to Orthodox Jews who strongly support settlements (80 percent support). But one very interesting demographic finding is the strong opposition (72 percent oppose) among Jews who give money to political campaigns.

And here is the raw material:-

Q.60 From what you know about Israeli settlements in the West Bank, do you support or oppose expanding these settlements?

Total:

Strongly support..... 14

Somewhat support..... 25

Somewhat oppose..... 28

Strongly oppose..... 32

which sums up as Total Support..... 40 vs. Total Oppose..... 60.

Support - Oppose..... -21


Q.61 Supporters of expanding Israeli settlements in the West Bank say this is the biblical Land of Israel, Jews have the right to live there, and settlement expansion is necessary to accommodate natural growth.

Opponents of expanding Israeli settlements in the West Bank say the settlements break agreements with the United States, violate international law, and prevent Arab-Israeli peace because they establish Israeli population centers in the middle of a future Palestinian state.

After hearing these statements, do you support or oppose expanding these settlements?

Total

Strongly support..... 16

Somewhat support..... 24

Somewhat oppose..... 29

Strongly oppose..... 30



Total Support..... 40

Total Oppose..... 60

Support - Oppose..... -19

And remember:

Gerstein | Agne Strategic Communications designed the questionnaire for this survey of 800 self-identified adult American Jews, conducted February 28-March 8, 2009. The survey has a margin of error of +/- 3.5 percent; the margin of error in the split samples is +/- 4.9 percent.

Now, my comments:

1. Question #60 is phrased as "From what you know about Israeli settlements in the West Bank, do you support or oppose expanding these settlements?" What would have happened result-wise if I had composed the question so:

From what you know about Jewish communities established in Judea and Samaria, what is also referred to as the "West Bank", do you support or oppose these communities, towns and villages?

2. I would then add:

From what you know about Jewish communities established in Judea and Samaria, what is also referred to as the "West Bank", do you support or oppose the expanding of these communities, towns and villages within their official zoned areas, what is called "organic growth"?

3. As regards Question #61, I would have composed it so:-

Supporters of expanding the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, what is also referred to as the West Bank, say this is the biblical Land of Israel, Jews have the natural right to live there just as Arabs can live in Israel, that the international community assigned all this territory to have it become the Jewish national home before being partitioned and expansion is necessary to accommodate natural growth as well as contribute to Israel's security.

Opponents of expanding Israeli settlements in there claim the communities break agreements with the United States, violate international law, harm Israel's security and moral fibre and prevent Arab-Israeli peace because they establish Israeli population centers in the middle of a future Palestinian state.

After hearing these statements, do you support or oppose expanding these communities?

4. And notice, that while overall this is no change in negative responses from #60 to #61, actually the strongly opposed to #61 is reduced. In other words, the explanation within the question contributed to a doubt which reduced opposition from 32 to 30!