Friday 19 March 2010
God's Own Country
Sam Tanenhaus has an important article, which won't be online for about a week, in this week's Spectator. American Jews continue to approve of Obama more than any other ethnic group except blacks. And, like Americans in general, they see America as the Promised Land, looking to no Old Country or transnational religious hierarchy as the Irish, Italians or Poles do, and feeling no WASP or Scots-Irish (or, one should add, basically German wannabe-WASP) requirement to be loyal to every failing of America simply on account of having been there so long. Consequently, even they, who did not care about Israel at all until the aftermath of the 1967 War, still do not really care all that much about Israel.
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I can tell you for a fact that your information is mistaken, all around. Jewish support for Obama is in free fall. I know this because I know a lot of Jewish Democrats. I have not heard anyone say anything positive about him and, on top of that, the comments are downright hostile towards his administration and, primarily, regarding his dealings with Israel.
ReplyDeleteHere are comments I have heard from left liberal Democrats of Jewish confession: "I would not vote for Obama even if the alternative were Sarah Palin." "Obama is an idiot." "Obama is no friend of the Jews." "He is our enemy."
Further, widespread Jewish opinion in favor of Israel did not begin in 1967. It began in 1948.
I do not know where people in Britain get their facts about Americans much less American Jews. On this one, you have no idea what you are talking about.
It is true that Jews voted for Obama. The rest of what you write is not so.
Keep telling yourself that, dear.
ReplyDeleteSam Tanenhaus is an American Jew.
Sam Tanenhaus speaks for himself. By contrast, most American Jews who care about Israel - and that means most American Jews in Florida and New York and Massachusetts and California - are furious. And, the groups which represent Jews across the political spectrum are speaking out against the president's approach, albeit without insulting the office of the presidency. To get an idea of the anger, note this report:
ReplyDeleteBut once the Obama team kept up the criticisms after Biden's departure, then Jewish groups began striking back at the administration. So, this attempt to calm things down with a relatively light rebuke of the administration, should probably be taken as a sign of just how alarmed many Jewish organizations are about the escalating tensions.
The Jerusalem Post, which is, as you know, an Israeli paper, reports:
The Jewish leader speaking anonymously agreed that Obama’s falling popularity, especially among a pro-Israel community already skeptical of his moves on Israel, contributes to the willingness of groups to speak out.
In contrast, he noted, “To a large degree for the first year of the administration, the pro-Israel organizations were silent, giving the benefit of the doubt to someone who was then a very popular president.”
Bloomfield compared the current flap to the last major run-in between the two countries. He came up with the tempers that flared between former president Bill Clinton and, as it happens, Netanyahu, when the latter resisted signing the Wye Accords during his first term.
On that occasion, Bloomfield can’t recall American Jewry piling on in criticism against the president, in part because Clinton was a very popular president.
In contrast, he asserted that Obama “might have gotten 78 percent of the Jewish vote, but he does not have a real strong base of support in the Jewish community and there’s a feeling that he hasn’t handled the account well,” adding that “the fact the he doesn’t have a really strong base in the Jewish community makes him vulnerable to attack by his critics and it nurtures those attacks of his critics – does he really love us?”
Biden’s trip, of course, was supposed to answer that question firmly in the affirmative. A White House official told The New York Times that the housing approval “undermined Biden’s entire trip.” But a lot of leaders of the American Jewish community would say that it was instead the Obama administration’s reaction after Biden’s return that put the nail in the coffin.
That is consistent with the view of Jews I know, and, as I said, they are all Democrats and they are all disgusted with Obama, for whom they voted.
And, I should add, the President's mail has been deluged with criticism, although that has been from Christian friends of Israel. I understand that 20% of all mail received has been about the dispute - as much as 20,000 letters a day - and in opposition to his policy.
"the groups which represent Jews across the political spectrum"
ReplyDeleteIf you mean the likes AIPAC and the ADL, then they are entirely self-appointed and unaccountable, and they constitute the largest spy network maintained by any state on the soil of any other.
The Jerusalem Post would say that, wouldn't it?
And the Christian Zionists would never have voted for him anyway, so he isn't losing anything there.
First, David,
ReplyDeleteThe JTA article I cited states:
The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations has issued its statement on U.S.-Israel tensions.
In order to understand the significance, it's important to keep in mind what the conference is and what it aspires to do: It is an umbrella organization bringing together more than 50 organizations from across the political and religious spectrum in an attempt to present a consensus position on Israel and other Middle East-related issues.
For the record ... The Jerusalem Post is a newspaper which reports rather carefully on matters that matter to Israelis. And, they do care about what American Jews think. So, the chances that the article I cited is wrong is, to be frank, nil. Unlike in the UK, where newspapers are more like party organs, Israeli papers tend to report news that disagrees with their own perspective. The same is true in the US. Can you say that about UK papers like The Guardian? Surely, not if you are being honest. And UK coverage of the dispute has been, to say the least, inaccurate. Where American papers are reporting that the Obama administration screwed up vis a vis Israel, your papers are repeating Mrs. Clinton's propaganda that she got important things from the Israelis. The US papers are saying that Israel did not offer anything about Jerusalem at all, other than than the "don't ask, don't tell" policy, meaning that the effort to welche on the agreement with Israel to allow building in Jerusalem, something promised by the Obama administration in the Fall, blew up in the administration's face. And, now, leaders of the Senate have told the President to bug off on the issue. And, as has been reported, the primary donors to the Democrats - who are mostly Jewish, by the way - have made their displeasure be known in a promise not to give those who side with Obama any money.
So, I think it is you who needs to look at a wide spectrum of American sources. They tend to know a lot more about the US and about Israel than do British sources.
There is no such "spectrum" on this issue. All they know is what they are allowed or inclined to write. It is that which is the difference with Britain.
ReplyDeleteI think we all know who "The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations" really are. The Administration clearly does. And the Administration also clearly knows who they are not, namely people who speak on behalf of most American Jews.
David,
ReplyDeleteSo, you think that an organization consisting of most major Jewish groups, including liberals, conservatives and religious Jews does not know what Jews think. Arrogance is not a sufficient word to describe your view.
In any event, the President is not doing well with the public on all of this, as is evident from the fact that congressional leaders of both parties have now told the President to back down, which he has evidently done.
Let's see what happens at AIPAC.
ReplyDeletePatience has clearly been exhausted by Israel's petulance, ingratitude, and presumed entitlement. Even Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton have had enough, and more than enough.
As for the GOP, is it going to go out into the heartland calling for unconditional and uncritical economic and military support for any foreign state, never mind for a foreign state which, as much as anything else, has never sent a single troop to a single American war?
David,
ReplyDeleteThe problem with your view is that Israel is a remarkably popular country in the US. The newspapers of record are mostly extremely supportive. They cover both sides, not just, as in your country, the Arab version of the dispute. So, unlike in The Guardian, there was major coverage of the Thai worker killed in a rocket attack from Gaza. The Guardian mentioned it in a note in an article, but only after Israel retaliated.
So, people here have a much broader amount of information presented. And, there are people on all sides of the issue. Notwithstanding, as of February, Israel was more popular in the US than it has been in recent memory. And, standing up to the increasingly hated US president - and, on that point, ask people from Massachusetts, which is where I live, what they think of him and you will hear a mouthful of vile comments (and, Massachusetts is a rather liberal by US standards) - is unlikely to change that.
Joe Biden was not very angry at Israel, by the way. However, the Clinton family hates Netanyahu, going way back. And, Obama, while supportive of Israel generally speaking, holds views that, to most American Jews, are unacceptable. So, you will see, come the next election, that Obama will lose 30 - 35% of the Jewish support he once had.
Again, only arrogance could let you think you know Jewish opinion better than the major Jewish organizations, of which there are quite a number, not just AIPAC and the ADL. Did you think when you said that?
You need to read more British newspapers than the Guardian. The extremely pro-Israeli ones account for eighty per cent or more of papers bought in this country.
ReplyDeleteIf Biden was not being all that anti-Israeli, then perhaps someone should have told Abe Foxman? But Obama could lose every Jewish vote and probably still win. Most of them live in safely blue states, anyway. And it is not as if that is going to happen.
Number of Israeli troops in Korea? Nil. Number of Israeli troops in Vietnam? Nil. Number of Israeli troops in the Gulf? Nil. Number of Israeli troops in Afghanistan? Nil. Number of Israeli troops in Iraq? Nil.
But Israeli expectations of the American taxpayer and of the American fighting man... Not, of course, that the slightest gratitude is ever expressed. Quite the reverse, in fact.
Bush the Elder's Administation, exemplified by Jim Baker, had very little time for Israel, in the Republican tradition going all the way back to Eisenhower. And in view of the above, how could that be anything other than the gut instinct of the heartland, to which the GOP is returning after its disastrous flirtation with neoconservatism?
The largely Jewish intelligentsia and the negligibly Jewish heartland are now as one on this, wishing no active ill on Israel but damned if they are going to pay, or send their boys to die, to protect any foreign state, never mind one so ungrateful and so unwilling to pull its own weight.
The exceptions - neoconservatism, and Christian Zionism - are noisy, but they are not really very large, as political forces they are thoroughly discredited, and they are therefore in visible decline. So there is no electoral need to pay any attention to them, and indeed a considerable electoral need to be as distant as possible from them.
You know it makes sense.
David,
ReplyDeleteI have yet to see a truly pro-Israel paper in the UK. In the US, The New York Times is considered relatively neutral and, at times, hostile to Israel. Historically, the paper was hostile to Israel, opposing the creation of the country and rarely siding fully with it. The Washington Post is considered mostly friendly to Israel. The Boston Globe is considered somewhat less friendly than The New York Times. No British newspaper I know of (i.e.Times, Telegraph and Independent) is anywhere near as friendly to Israel as relatively unfriendly Globe.
Foxman did not complain about Biden. He complained about what happened after that, when Obama decided to pick a fight, one which he now appear to have lost. Moreover, the Obama position is, to be frank, nuts, if the goal is to resolve the dispute. Now, the Palestinian Arab side refuses to have direct negotiations. In other words, the Obami have moved progress on resolving the dispute to the way it was before the time of Sadat's visit to Jerusalem.
Query: what difference does it make that Israel's troops are mostly - but not all, by the way - in Israel. Israel provides other services to the US: spying; supporting, on behalf of the US, actions which the US government wants kept quiet and non-traceable to the US; high technology; banking (the Israeli banking and economic system, unlike that of the US and the UK, has not suffered from the current great recession, with Israel's top bank keeping its country's banks out of the types of investments and real estate disasters that have plagued the rest of the world); etc., etc. I might add: the money that the US gives Israel is spent in the US, nearly entirely, on purchase of military equipment so, in fact, the US gives the money in order, primarily, to support military hardware suppliers.
If, as you claim, Israel shows no gratitude to the US, why is Israel among the most popular countries, according to polling, in the view of Americans? In fact, your understanding is wrong.
Bush the Elder's picked a minor fight with Israel, which cost him. Recall: he was a one termer and, according to people associated with him, the fight was a major reason, albeit not the only reason, he lost.
Republicans have long been friendly to Israel. I recall Richard Nixon helped Israel a great deal during the Yom Kippur War. Eisenhower, less so, but Israel was a non-power at the time.
Christian Zionists are important in both political parties. And, Jews are the main financial backers of the Democratic party. Without Jews, the Democrats could not run an effective campaign for dog catcher. So, if you do not think that the Obami have made a political mistake, you are in dreamland. I might add: most Democrats are pro-Israel although, at the moment, there are some Democrats who take the view that Obama has, for now, taken.
Queries. How do any of your points address the fact that Jewish Democrats are furious with the Obama administration? What possible basis could lead you to think that Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations does not act on the wishes of the bulk of the Jewish community in the US? This latter point of yours is, to be frank, not even rational or, if you do not know what the organization is, completely ignorant. Again, that organization does speak for the vast majority - say, 95+% - of all American Jews. That is true whether you want to believe it or not.
"I have yet to see a truly pro-Israel paper in the UK"
ReplyDeleteI stopped reading at that point.