Israel's Best Interest is a Morally Strong America
I am supporting Obama for president for two reasons: one is my disdain for the McCain-Palin ticket, and the other my respect and admiration for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
Among Jewish voters, some feel the basic question is which candidate will act in the best interest of Israel. The answer is Barack Obama. As an American Jew who loves Israel, I cannot support John McCain. He cannot provide what Israel needs most--a respected, credible, morally strong America. To have the United States and Israel both regarded by the rest of the world as unreliable and in isolation is no way to solve the problems that plague both countries. This has been the effect of the Bush policies, and these are the policies that John McCain has promised to continue. Barack Obama is the candidate who can restore America's moral authority in the world and position our government to help negotiate peace.
The most vexing problem Israel faces is its relations with its neighbors. From the inception of the state until today, Israelis have felt besieged, surrounded by enemies who want to make them disappear. The constant security threat has made it very difficult for Israel to address the long list of problems that for the most part have been swept under the rug while awaiting peace. These include a disastrous educational system, a widening gap between rich and poor, and bitter division between secular and religious Jews. Israel desperately needs peace if it is to come anywhere close to being the "light unto nations" of Jewish dreams.
I quarrel with the oft-heard assumption that "George W. Bush is good for Israel." He gleaned many Jewish votes on that slogan, but I take a contrarian's position. Israel is further from peace than it was at the end of the Clinton administration. The smoldering hatred between Iraq's Sunni and Shi'a has burst into flames as a result of the American occupation. An emboldened Iran, with its Shi'a majority, has strengthened and armed Israel's enemies Hamas and Hezbollah. But Israel's most immediate danger comes from a nuclear Iran. Under the Bush administration, conversations with the Iranians began only at the end of May 2007 and have been badly mishandled. The result of the Bush doctrine in the Middle East has been an America and an Israel that are regarded with hatred and fear.
The region requires an honest broker that will push both sides towards a workable solution and a two state outcome. I remember the scene at the White House when President Clinton helped Prime Minister Rabin to shake Arafat's hand. Whether an American president is prepared to preside over another handshake--one that could build lasting peace--should not be measured by his professed love for one side or the other, but by his judgment.
John McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as running mate is the towering example of his poor judgment. Palin's ignorance of public affairs is monumental. Especially disturbing to the Jewish voter should be her willing acceptance of the campaign assignment of demagogy, which has stirred up racism and hate. The prospect of our having a 72-year-old president in poor health raises the real possibility that Palin could be our president, a thoroughly frightening thought. (I am well aware, in my eightieth year, of the flagging energy of any 72-year-old.) McCain's choice of Palin was a bid to the extremists in the Republican party, not the considered choice of a man who puts his country first.
Barack Obama is the leader who can begin to undo some of the damage done by Bush's policies. His background as an American who has lived among diverse cultures makes him sensitive to the cultural and religious motives that shape conflicts. He is cerebral, measured, calm, and pragmatic. By his character, he will engage these issues with more than stonewalling and weapons. He is brilliant in his choices of advisors. He is a tough idealist who has the courage to imagine an America that may inspire hope, not fear, in the Middle East and around the world.
Voters who care about Israel's welfare should ask which candidate will help sustain the ties between Israel and American Jews. Those of us who were alive at the creation of Israel have a love for Israel that is tied to the Holocaust, to the displaced persons camps and to the early struggles for a Jewish homeland. We were all as generous as we could be in support of Israel, as donors and as advocates. Now there is a generation growing up that is more distant from Israel than I should like. Young Jews do not automatically support Israel, and many are rightly troubled by what they learn about the ill treatment of the Palestinians under Israeli occupation. No longer motivated by fear of anti-Semitism, they seek to understand what Israel stands for, not to say "my Israel, right or wrong." Without strong support among the younger generation of American Jews, Israel may lose its vital relationship with the US government.
Obama can inspire much-needed support for Israel among this next generation of American Jews. He reflects their idealism and speaks in the language of hope they understand. His approach to international affairs shows a commitment to restoring America's reputation and to working with our allies to combat war, poverty, disease, and environmental destruction. He has articulated a vision for American society that does not ask us to ignore our differences--religious, racial, or economic--but to set aside divisive rhetoric and acknowledge that we all have a stake in building a more ethical society. Under his leadership a renewed America can help to foster a renewed Israel. Barack Obama is an inspiring American, willing and able to lead this nation and the world to new heights in very perilous times. I will vote for him with enthusiasm.
Edgar M. Bronfman is the former president of the World Jewish Congress. He is the author, with Beth Zasloff, of Hope, Not Fear: A Path to Jewish Renaissance (St. Martin's Press, 2008).
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I am an Israeli living in the US, and I wholeheartedly support Mr. Bronfman's sentiments expressed above. Many people believe that world conflicts are like sports matches, we go, we fight, we win and we are done. Mission Accomplished. In reality, conflicts keep transitioning and morphing and the challenge facing world leaders is not about winning, it is about reducing conflict and creating conditions that will eliminate it over time. Therefore, the biggest benefit to the US as well as to Israel, is a president that does not look at the world through the narrow perspective of winning and losing, but through long term goals and understanding of how to achieve them in collaboration with other players. I believe Obama has greater ability to achieve those for the US as well as for Israel.
If Israel wants peace then they need an american president that looks at both sides of the issue and not just support Israel in whatever they do. That's the problem. The one sided view of the conflict by all the american presidents.
If.
At last, some clear thinking and realistic, pragmatic expectations. Life, and its processes, are, always have been, and always will be "tests" (if you will), or challenges to our abilities on all levels to move forward, to grow and evolve. I agree that a "win" vs. "lose" mentality will not help us in our 21st century world.
"But Israel's most immediate danger comes from a nuclear Iran." Oh, really, Edgar? And why isn't ALREADY-NUCLEAR ISRAEL an immediate danger to Iran?
Partly because Israel never threatened to erase Iran off the map?
neither did iran. Read the quote again with an open mind. Don't just spit out what the MSM wants you to hear.
And BTW Israel didn't threaten to erase a country from a map. They actually almost did it last year in lebanon with the US blessing.
And unfortunately, Iran never threatened to erase Israel off the map either. Republicans and pro-Israeli interests are, frankly, lying about what Achmedinajad said. And even if they weren't, he's not as I understand it, in charge of the military -- the President of Iran couldn't instigate any sort of military engagment with Israel. So besides being an outright lie, this is a paper tiger as well.
you meant to say "the most powerful military force in the middle east constantly supplied with more arms and more money from the us" (as opposed to "an already-nuclear israel")
"And why isn't ALREADY-NUCLEAR ISRAEL an immediate danger to Iran?"
Maybe because Israel is a peace-loving country that hasn't invaded a neighbor since 2006.
While Iranians are warmongers whose last invasion of a foreign country (Afghanistan) was as recent as 1856.
add this to your voter guide ou.org
All well and good, but the reality is that the "jewish" vote only amounts to 2% of the entire vote in the US.
Actually, it's 1%. Doesn't sound like a big difference but you just doubled their population.
Not all jews are Isarelis, nor prothe current Israeli gvoernment.
By the way, Bronfman is Canadian.
Thank God, and I mean that literally, for Bronfman and all the wonderful American Jews who understand what a disaster Bush and the neocons have been for Israel, as well as America itself. The fool neocons destroyed the Bush Administration and the Republican Party with the debacle in Iraq, which weakened Israel by strengthening Iran into the bargain. Now, for poisonous dessert, the same neocon fools, and their sponsors in Israel (as opposed to the wise Israelis who know that Olmert was right about peace with the Palestinians), want to elect McCain to bomb, bomb, bomb Iran for Israel, to take their backers in Israel off the hook, since such bombing would cause unprecedented worldwide rage because of the obliteration of world stock markets that the resulting $300 oil would cause overnight, after Iran retaliated by sinking plenty of oil tankers in the Persian Gulf. The neocons have been the stupidest and most irresponsible fanatics I've ever seen in American politics. Thank God for the strong majority of wise American Jews (75%) who are working with other Americans to drive these fools into the political oblivion they so richly deserve.
I as an American think that "our" government has no right to dictate to the world that only countries that we like are "permitted" to obtain and keep "NUKES" . It was beyond our capasity to prevent Pakistan, a muslim country from having "nukes" and they are no threat to Isreal, and believe me they see Zionism as wrong and the last evil thing done by England, in its waining cololonial days to a non-white world.
Iran is no threat to Isreal but it is not in the interest of policy makers to admit iot.
Obama will be a very strong backer for Israel.
Israel's best interest? The new Jimmy Carter?
Is this what Biden was warning about?
IRAN TESTS NUCLEAR WEAPONS Israelis fear attack
"The report quotes an Iranian nuclear scientist who claims to be working in uranium enrichment for the project, and who said that the 'quake' was actually an underground nuclear bomb test. The Israel Insider source reports that two nuclear rockets are currently ready - and are intended for use against Israel in the coming months."
http://all
http://www
U.S. concerned about EMP attack
http://www
Additional:
http://www
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http://win
Jimmy Carter was partly responsible for the first peace agreement between Israel and Egypt. It is a strategic asset to both Israel and Egypt an allowed prosperity on both sides. It is one of the greatest diplomatic achievements in the Middle East and a testament to the possibilities open when people take their eyes away from the gun sights and adopt a broader perspective.
I am by no means a Jimmy Carter fan but you can't deny him this exceptional achievement.
Oh good lord. That rat, Jimmy Carter! Been a while since Egypt attacked Isreal, eh? Fear fear fear. kthxbai.
tonight i watched a PBS documentary on the torture regimen in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib and realised that the Bush administration had done what no Muslim has ever been able to accomplish: render Islam sympathetic. The negation of the Geneva Convention and the legislative sidestepping of the Supreme Court's rulings on this subject is the stuff which makes the World whisper: "We're all Muslims now."
You made a very relevant point.
I'm whispering this, delir. I'm not a muslim. I'm not an anti-Jewish bogot.
okay, edit 'bogot' to read 'bigot' ! I'm making my coffee, NOW!
The first thing one does when reading anything is consider the source, if you don't you're lost. PBS isn't regarded as an alltogether unbiased source of information. You do know that, right?
But I'm guessing you want to hear what you want to hear.
Yes, PBS is totally biased.
Toward THE TRUTH.
I hate to break it to you, but PBS is the most unbiased source of information on American TV. Somehow I get the idea you probably don't look any further than TV or the drudge report for your information.
PBS is for your benefit; the rest of the world has had this information for some time.
Osama bin Laden understood that a long time ago. That's why he attacked the United States when reactionary, reptilian nut-jobs were occupying the White House. He understood that the way to attack the United States was through its pocketbook, and he knew that the neocon cowards who had conned the brain-dead slobs in this country into voting for them would immediately toss every penny in the U.S. Treasury (or, more accurately, every fiat penny that the U.S. Mint could produce) into the two gigantic Asian holes that he dug for them.
While I agree that Guantanomo should be condemned in the starkest of terms, I regret your suggestion that no Muslim has ever been able to make "Islam sympatheti
Perhaps you should read some of the beautiful poetry of Rumi, the great Muslim mystic, and see another side of Islam than what its detractors and their extremist allies want to depict. An Islam of love for humanity and generosity toward ones neighbor.
the mystical poetry of Rumi is not what Westerners have been seeing on the evening news for four decades. I suggest that the treatment of Muslim detainees has caused the West to reevaluate its relationship with the US and to consider that if Israel adheres to neo-Con alignment so strenuously, it jades the international viewer into dismissing the conflict as 'people who deserve one another'. Individual Muslims we have come to accept, but the collective 'Islam' has never engendered much sympathetic response from Westerners. But the enemy of my enemy may be my friend and the erotic overtones of the sexual humiliation of detainees coupled with the german shepherds and the leashes and the prediliction for false confessions extracted for propaganda purposes and the soiling of the Articles of the Geneva Convention are all hallmarks of the enemies of Western Civilisation.
It is refreshing and promising to hear different and objective perspectives on Israel from the jewish community, I bet similar opinions have been around for a long time but could never be heard in the last decades of fear and division promulgated by the hawks in the US and middle-east. Time for change, let's not blow it,times like these don't come often...
In Israel the debate is much broader and more nuanced, with both more realistic and tolerant voices on both sides and more radical, but yes you are right here in America it is typicaly just a black and white shout-fest.
I agree - I have relatives in Israel and not everyone is hawkish.
Agreed, POTUS.
Foreign voting by Americans in Israel shows a landslide victory for McCain. A vast, overwhelming victory for McCain. Clearly the Jews know who is good for the Jews. McCain.
Somebody pleae explain to me why Jews in this country tend to vote liberal when clearly the lib party favors everything muslim, everything Palestinian. Israel might once have been the poster child of the left but those days are long gone, people.
My Husband (who is an Israeli Jew) and myself (Jewish by Conversion) tend to Vote for Liberal and or Progressive Candidates and Policies that favor Solutions and Peace for ALL PEOPLE.. and I think that if People such as yourself truly knew what it was like to live in actual Fear instead of this Existential Political Facsimile of Fear you would understand that desire.
Perhaps you might also understand that many Jews, Secular and Religious as well as Muslims and Palestinians are not blind to the suffering of Each. . We realize that our fates are irrevocably intertwined now and The Entire Middle East is being held Hostage by US Policies that only seem to spread the Misery around and foster resentment between the Numerous Factions that are in play. I am not sure how Anyone of Sound Mind could believe that if the US were to "Bomb Bomb Bomb Iran"... Israel would benefit .. from what would undoubtedly be the precursor to the Complete Annihilation of Iran.. Israel and Everything Around and In Between.
In Obama, we see a willingness(among other stellar qualities) to confront the Disastrous Middle Eastern Reality that has been exacerbated by the Neo-Con Ideology..
If you know anything about Judaism you might see why there's a split in thought.
Some people stick close to the narratives about righteously smiting everything in your path, and some people feel like the things done to us justify anything we want.
And some people didn't forget what it's like to be the world's pariah and what it's like to be displaced and what it means when you displace and bulldoze human beings.
Whilst I am sure that you are right that a large number of Israelis support McCain, I find it hard to credit that therefore Jews support McCain. Surely in the more grown up political world that Obama will bring we must recognise that critisism of Isreali policy is not critisism of all Jews and that just because there is an opinion within Israeli society it might not be shared by the global Jewish community.
LOL...well
Thank god he is going to lose then
Thank you Mr Bronfman. This is exactly what I have been telling my Jewish friends who will not vote for Barack Obama. We have a very broken country and will be of no use to any of our allies unless we fix it. John McCain had his chance with a Republicans in a majority untill the last two years. Nothing good happened and now our deficit is insurmountable. I feel bad for the job that the next president will have but I know from his record that McCain will do what he has done the last 8 years.
Exposure to modern values has a great penetrating force---it opens the eyes of people that have been blinded by centuries of ignorance and has made the Middle East more dangerous than a hornets nest. Outsiders are wise to keep their distance because the Middle East hates foreigners interfering in their regional,religious, and political affairs. But there is nothing to worry about because even if religious radicals gain control there would never be an Islamic superpower. Only if they had a nuclear bomb would they be dangerous. That is why the United States must make sure that Islamic nations are nuclear free. Even Pakistan should not be allowed to posses nuclear arms. Fortunately they will remain weak and divided. Oil is all they have and it must be exported to buy food. Despite their dreams of financial independence they will always need industrialized nations as customers to survive.
Thank you Mr Bronfman,finally somebody said it,Israel is suffering the consequences of a bully administration who has been alienating almost the whole world,especially in the very fragile middle east where Isreal is surrounded by step by step more ex.treme government
I have to echo this sentiment. We need cohesiveness, not division to fix the mess that Bush has wrought on us that has rippled out to the Middle East.
Thank you, Edgar. It is profoundly relieving to see a Jewish leader of your stature articulate such a sane, intelligent, and thoughtful position. Indeed, with McCain/Palin at the helm, this country will no doubt continue its downward economic and moral spiral and will be in no position to support Israel and promote a viable, lasting peace.
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