{"id":51176,"date":"2015-08-23T12:58:12","date_gmt":"2015-08-23T17:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/persian-heritage.com\/?p=51176"},"modified":"2015-08-23T12:59:20","modified_gmt":"2015-08-23T17:59:20","slug":"iran-nuclear-debate-fracturing-american-jewish-community-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/2015\/08\/23\/iran-nuclear-debate-fracturing-american-jewish-community-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran Nuclear Debate Fracturing American Jewish Community"},"content":{"rendered":"
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VOA – Cecily Hilleary – Last updated on: August 22, 2015 9:36 AM – WASHINGTON DC\u2014 The debate over the nuclear deal with Iran is dividing American Jews, who have traditionally aligned with the Democratic Party<\/a> and supported Barack Obama in two elections\u00a0\u2014 but not always when it comes down to Iran. Four notable polls conducted since the deal was announced demonstrate that the American Jewish community is divided. Figures also show a significant number of Jewish Americans are still undecided, along with the general U.S. population. \u201cThe split is more between the grassroots American Jews in general and what is called the \u2018organizational\u2019 Jewish community\u00a0\u2014 Jewish organizations like The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Federations and some other organizations which have come out in opposition to the deal,\u201d said Ori Nir<\/a>, director of Communications for Americans for Peace Now.<\/div>\n
AIPAC and its spin-off, Citizens for a Nuclear Free Iran, are spending<\/a> between $20 million and $40 million against the bill; J-Street, the \u201cpro-Israel and pro-peace\u201d group that supports the deal, is planning on spending far less \u2014 about $5 million.<\/div>\n
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Thursday, more than two dozen prominent Jewish leaders<\/a> \u2014 including a former AIPAC director\u00a0\u2014 took out a full-page advertisement in the New York Times.\u00a0 While they expressed worry that Iran is \u201cunflinchingly anti-Semitic and an unapologetic state-sponsor of terrorism,\u201d they say endorse the nuclear deal and are calling on Congress to vote in its favor.<\/p>\n

How to account for this divide? <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cOne factor in the polarization among American Jews is how Prime Minister Netanyahu and his ambassador, Ron Dermer, have inserted themselves directly in the debate,\u201d said Ron Kampeas<\/a>, chief for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n

By his active campaigning against the nuclear deal, Kampeas believes Netanyahu has put himself into a position of opposing American Jewish voters\u2019 \u201cfavored president.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMore subtly, it’s also sidelined the organizations that once saw it as their duty to defend Israel,\u201d Kampeas said. \u201cBy directly supplanting these organizations, Netanyahu and Dermer have lowered their motivation to identify with Israel’s cause.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem really is beyond venture politics,\u201d said Israeli political insider Josef Olmert. \u201cIt\u2019s about the Jewish community and its attitude towards Israel, and also about its role in the United States altogether.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government of Mr. Netanyahu pulled no punches in the debate with the Administration, and the speech in Congress was a mistake\u2026 definitely with regard to the Jewish Community which is by and large more supportive of the Democratic Party than the Republican Party.\u201d<\/p>\n

Until recently, Olmert said, the Jewish community was the most supportive of all American ethnic groups of its \u201cown country, of its historic homeland.\u201d<\/p>\n

And because the younger generation tends to be more liberal, he said, \u201cthey find it very difficult to support what they consider to be a right-wing conservative government in Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n

He believes that American Jewish voters\u00a0\u2014 indeed, the U.S. public in general\u00a0\u2014 has been caught up in an unfair public relations battle between Washington and the Netanyahu government.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe public relations policies of the White House are extremely effective in hitting home on the heads of the Jews a point that many Jews don\u2019t like to hear from their neighbors, let alone from the President,\u201d Olmert said, \u201cthat is, the question of the presumed or alleged double loyalty, that is to say that if Jews support Israel at a time when Israel seems to be at odds with America, they show that their loyalty to Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rabbi Steven Bob is one of 340 U.S. rabbis<\/a> who sent a letter to Congress Monday, urging lawmakers to approve the deal.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a question of conflicting loyalties.\u00a0 I would identify myself with the President of the United States.\u00a0 I\u2019m a strong supporter of him.\u00a0 I worked hard for his election and I voted for him.\u00a0 And I would identify myself with those people in Israel who also support the agreement,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u2018Fratricidal civil war\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nir said the deal \u201cis pulling at the very soul, the very essence of the American Jewish community and causing a great deal of pain, almost torture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Olmert referred to the rift as \u201ca fratricidal civil war.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the<\/em> big discussion in meetings, over the dinner table on Friday nights, in synagogues and in the pages of Jewish newspapers,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

This week, the Reform Jewish Movement<\/a>, which represents more than a third of American Jews<\/a>, announced it will neither support nor oppose the Iran deal but focus, instead, on the future.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VOA – Cecily Hilleary – Last updated on: August 22, 2015 9:36 AM – WASHINGTON DC\u2014 The debate over the nuclear deal with Iran is dividing American Jews, who have traditionally aligned with the Democratic Party and supported Barack Obama in two elections\u00a0\u2014 but not always when it comes down to Iran. Four notable polls […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"en","enabled_languages":["fa","en"],"languages":{"fa":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":false,"content":false,"excerpt":false}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51176"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51176\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}