The Obama administration's National Security Adviser General James Jones told the "pro-Israel and pro-peace" Israel lobby J Street this week that America believes "Israeli security and peace are inseparable." The comment received a wild cheer, although similar comments were made during the Bush years.
The over 1500 delegates to the first J Street national conference in Washington DC -- a broad collection of Zionists, peace activists, students, anti-Zionists, pensioners and the curious -- came from around the world to engage on issues related to the Israel/Palestine conflict.
Although the organization's establishment spreads a conservative agenda -- the two state solution and pressure on Iran's suspected nuclear program -- the hard-line Zionist community attacked the group for not being sufficiently close to the government of Benjamin Netanyahu.
J Street was smeared for being disloyal, anti-Israel, pro-terrorist and pro-Palestinian. The Israeli Ambassador to America Michael Oren expressed "concerns" about unspecified "policies" of the 18-month old institution. J Street was framed as an upstart daring to challenge Israeli policies, including opposition to the December/January Gaza onslaught.
The conference had a schizophrenic, identity crisis. On the one hand, Executive Director Jeremy Ben-Ami clearly outlined before the event the lines his group would not cross -- a one-state solution was out of the question and withdrawing US military aid. Yet any number of sessions I attended featured concerned and dedicated Jews (with a handful of Palestinians and Arabs) challenging the tenets and morality of a Jewish state itself, the occupation of Palestinian land and the likelihood of Obama being able or willing to bring the warring parties together.
Post-Zionism was in the air, desperate to find a place in the acceptable boundaries of mainstream American Jewry. J Street may not be the space for this multi-cultural and multi-racial future to emerge. The concept of a "Jewish, democratic" state, with little discussion about the roughly 20 percent of Arabs citizens in Israel proper, permeated the official sessions across the three day event, but I heard nobody question how that outcome could satisfy non-Jews. Are they not welcome in this J Street vision and why would they want to live in a Zionist state when they are already profoundly discriminated against?
I sensed that many participants were keen to feel included in the debate, used to years of isolation in a Jewish establishment that only tolerates Zionist obedience. Stories of Gaza emerged (albeit on the sidelines), the occupation of Palestinian lands was acknowledged and the trauma of the ongoing settlement project in the West Bank was dissected. Details emerged here and there about placing faith in the Democratic Party but there seemed to be an almost unreal expectation that the Obama administration would be able to end the never-ending colonies growing like cancer across the Palestinian territories.
Virtually nothing has changed since Obama's inauguration and Palestinian lives remain tortured by checkpoints and humiliation. I saw it with my own eyes in July. Many J Street Jews were able to acknowledge the presence of an occupation -- an important step in the evolutionary process -- but with little understanding of the practical ramifications of this oppression being committed in their name and with billions of tax dollars in annual aid.
I was told by a number of sources that J Street was keen to avoid substantive discussion about Gaza and the effect of America's shunning of the democratically elected Hamas government. Democracy, claimed J Street officials, would emerge only when both Israelis and Palestinians felt comfortable trusting the other side. Such motherhood statements emerged in the 1990s during the Oslo peace process when both parties were placed on an equal playing field when, in fact, the Palestinians were under occupation.
The situation has only worsened since then. The occupation -- and its effect on young American Jewry -- is clear. Subjugating another people comes with a price but ending it requires more than tough speeches by Obama.
J Street is attempting to play the Washington game, a dangerous position to take when facts on the ground in Palestine don't gel with the concept of a "Jewish, democratic state." An unofficial bloggers' event at this week's conference, featuring writer Max Blumenthal and Mondoweiss founder Philip Weiss, allowed freer talk over the hot, Jewish issues. The small, crowded room buzzed with the opportunity to dissect the UN Goldstone report -- the only time I heard the Jewish, South African judge praised for daring to investigate gross human rights abuses in Gaza -- settlement activity on the West Bank and challenging conservative critics who only accept blind support of the Jewish state; insecurity masquerading as strength.
The J Street event was undoubtedly a watershed in the American, Jewish community. Political influence is the aim and Obama is the leader. If he fails, founder Ben-Ami couldn't tell me what would happen. "Israelis will have to decide", he said, implying that apartheid is the only alternative, a reality that exists today for millions in the West Bank and Gaza.
I arrived a cynic and left a skeptic. Social progress occurred this week and countless Jews met to respectfully engage the major issues of their lives. Even the growing boycott, divestment and boycott campaign against Israel was mentioned and analyzed. J Street must decide what it wants to be -- a wide tent that allows virtually every Jewish opinion on Israel or an orthodoxy that pushes only conventional platitudes -- but the Palestinians don't have time to wait.
Jewish angst is ultimately not enough to bring peace with justice to both Israelis and Palestinians.
In the 1990s, when we came together, we only did it at the behest of the White House, and Israeli and Palestinian leaders on the White House lawn validated the effort. This time is different.
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Max Blumenthal: Elie Wiesel Appears With End Times Pastor John Hagee, Hagee Trashes Obama
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Now matter how wrong J-Street might be in the current and final analyses, they are still at least trying to move things off top dead center. Remember that inertia is the friend of the expansionists and ethnic cleanser elements. This was the Bush posture- stasis knowing full well the rightists are grabbing more land every day.
At least J-Street seems to give a damn and wants to discuss all this foolishness which is holding world peace hostage.
What is most frightening is that the most rabid supporters of Zionism in this country are praying for Armageddon,. This is the clearest reason not to vote for right wingers in either US or Israel. The nut cases get their fingers closer to those little red buttons with a Netanyahu or Bush in power.
Then, yesterday JB announced that while it does not agree with the wording of Congress's Resolution to smear and damage Dr. Goldstone, it does however, urge the Obama Admin. to "make clear that it will use its veto to prevent any referral of this matter to the International Criminal Court."
Sadly, it seems that J Street's writing is on the wall and in its essays Gaza is under the proverbial bus.
if an Arab is responsible for crimes against his brethren then there is always room to debate the merits of the argument.
Hizbollah and Hamas were partly responsible for hundreds of innocent deaths in 2006 and 2008 respective
Typically, talking about a crime by an Arab leader in the Middle East, one will almost always end up talking about other concerned parties. It seems to be a special built-in ability to auto-dodge accountability. No one ever admits responsibility in the Arab states and no one is ever held accountable (unless he is toppled, that is)."
Sultan Sooud Al-Qassemi
http://www
ROBERT L. BERNSTEIN, founder of Human Rights Watch
Ignore any Human Rights group which says that Israel is causing unnecessary hardship to a civilian population (committing a war crime).
The free press is 1 point I may give you, but it is similar to the free press in the US where opinions are given as facts. A case in point is the refusal of too many in the Israeli press to acknowledge the war crimes of the Israeli government.
A democratically elected government which is so fractured that it seems no group can sustain a government for a full term.
A judiciary which rules against the government, but whose decisions are ignored by the government. A judiciary which will release a person who is video taped shooting someone, with no provocation, but allow that person to walk free because the victim is an Arab.
Fact: Palestinains are not Israeli citizens.
Fact: Israel and Palestinains are in conflict over disputed lands.
Neither of these facts are related.
Britain was a democracy when involved fighting Norther Irish.
United States was a democratic republic despite various Native American lands.
Turkey is democracy regardless of the the fact that they're occupying Northern Cyprus.
try political science.
do you see how the fairytale is so old no one is buying it anymore...
West Bank could unite with Jordan as an autonomous region. Jordan is a majority Palestinian, Arab, Muslim state. They'll get along fine. West bank Palestinains were already Jordain citizens decades from 1950. They never protested and got along famously. Voila!
Gaza can join in when they get rid of Hamas.
obviously Palestinains disagree.
Proof1:When Arafat came back from Camp David without an agreement for Palestinain state, he was met with flowers and candy by jubilant crowds
Proof2: Instead of continuing negotiations Palestinian rejected all offers by Clinton and Barak and chose to fight..
Proof3: Abbas and PA recently issued 14 pre-conditions just to be begin talking.
Proof4: PA and Hamas are unable to achieve a unity government
Conclusion: These are NOT people who are in a hurry.
Among serious people it is an axiomatic fact that Israel is a democratic state, the conflict with Palestinains notwithstanding. No more than Britain was a democracy when dealing with Northern Ireland conflict. Any person who claims otherwise is either unfamiliar with the concept of Parliamentary democracy and/or selling something.
nice article, obama admin should make sure not to play in hands of aipac like its predecessors otherwise there will be no change but pretty much business as usual, this is not why public voted for him...