Friday, November 20, 2009
Following a brief hiccup, we are happy to be four-square behind the ADL once again. Michael Goldfarb has a pair of must-reads here, starting with a report on J Street's going after Sarah Palin for, y'know, being too pro-Israel for their taste, and then getting a righteous smack-down from Abe Foxman as a result: ADL Blasts J Street: "Question Mark" About Pro-Israel Bona Fides
When Sarah Palin offered her unqualified support for the Israeli government's policy of settlement expansion in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, the self-described "pro-Israel, pro-peace" J Street blasted her for "pandering to her right-wing base comes at the expense of the security of the State of Israel." The group added that "the majority of Israelis and pro-Israel Americans who view the growing settlement enterprise as a threat to Israel's very future as a Jewish democracy." So according to J Street, Palin's support for the official policy of the Israeli government raised questions about Palin's pro-Israel bona fides.
Anti-Defamation League chief Abe Foxman sees things differently...
He goes on to quote Foxman per JTA. Goldfarb goes on:
...J Street has explicitly worked to change the definition of what it means to be pro-Israel by pushing people like Palin out of the tent and letting self-described anti-Zionists in -- so is Ben-Ami the only one who gets to decide who is and who is not pro-Israel based on whether they agree with his views? Palin is without a doubt pro-Israel, and yet Ben-Ami blasted her -- why? Because she doesn't agree with his views, and because J Street is not a pro-Israel group but a partisan political organization that, in Ben-Ami's own words, seeks only to be Obama's "blocking back" in Congress...
Do read it all. Of course J Street, as a highly partisan group, will always be a marginal and controversial outfit, punching above its weight for no other reason than a hefty budget. When the real pro-Israel people I know get together and we hear that there are Jewish college students who have no interest in Israel, maybe aren't comfortable with a Jewish State at all, we think, "What can we do to change that?" When J Street hears it, they think, "There's our market!"
Goldfarb's other must-read concerns J Street's behind the scenes collaboration with the now besieged NIAC (the National Iranian American Council) to basically undermine the position of every other truly 'pro-Israel' group on the planet: J Street: Not Really So Concerned About Israel's Security
Palin said something to the effect:
More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And I don't think that the Obama administration has any right to tell Israel that the Jewish settlements cannot expand."
Maybe she gets it because she is aware of what the Jews face with the ever increasing antisemitism world wide.
The latest incitement against Jews in Britain which Channel 4's "Dispatch" about the Lobby will accomplish, is not comforting.
Maybe the next thing Israelis will be told is "do not procreate" so as not to need more housing.
Alas, I think Palin's comment has more to do with her beliefs in the "rapture":
http://jeffreygoldberg.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/11/sarah_palin_and_the_rapture.php
You mean she may possibly have a love of Jews and Israel based on some irrational (or extra-rational) basis? Horror. I expect her to read 3000 or so pages of academic peer-reviewed material before coming to such conclusions!
No Solomon, the problem with rapture-based love of Israel is that the destruction of Israel and the conversion of the Jews to Christianity is the endgame.
It isn't love for Jews or for Israel as we are but rather as to how we fit into a very biased religious schema with a violent ending. That makes me nervous.
It's the end-game only after Christ comes back to earth. Worried? Goldberg's piece actually confuses pre and post millennial dispensationalism (whether intentionally or due to clumsy writing). The pre-millennialists (like Sarah Palin)believe Christ will return and usher in the millennium, no intervention by man necessary or wanted.
As the old joke goes, when the Messiah comes, we can all ask whether this was his first or second visit.
Yours is a typical Jewish reaction: "You say you love me, but do you really love me? Do you LOVE me, or just love me? For me, or for some other reason? On a scale of 1-10 how would you rate...if Jesus and I were both trapped under an avalanche, and you had only enough time to rescue one of us..." Stop it!
It doesn't matter to Nappy that a small proportion of Christian Zionists have a wacky theology and a kooky eschatological script for the End Times. What counts is what they do in the here and now; their support for Israel and their respect and love for the Jewish people are genuine.
There are Jews with no love for the Jewish people, Jewish religious teachings or the Jewish national homeland, Jews who claim to be "pro-Israel, pro-Peace" whose program is supported by enemies of the Jews, of Israel and of peace and whose biased religious schema -- belief in the Obamessiah, belief in the religion of Oslo -- will bring about a violent ending if allowed to run its course.
If you're skittish about our Christian Zionist friends, Nappy suggests that, instead of relying on the bad press they get from the left who try to marginalize them, you actually make an effort to get to know them. Zev Chafetz (A Match Made in Heaven: American Jews, Christian Zionists, and One Man's Exploration of the Weird and Wonderful Judeo-Evangelical Alliance ) and David Brog (Standing With Israel: Why Christians Support the Jewish State) have both written good books. If you're local (Boston area), come to a CJUI event.
It's foolish to fret over Sarah's deepest beliefs when in both word and deed she is a true friend of Israel. Assembly of God churches and CUFI put their money where their mouth is and demonstrate their love of Israel; Israel is truly blessed* by them. When it comes to the larger geopolitical struggle of our time, of which the battle for Israel is just a part, Sarah gets it -- which is a lot more than you say for J Street.
Nappy gladly chooses Sarah Palin and Pastor John Hagee over George Soros and Jeremy Ben Ami.
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*That's Christian-talk. It means Israel feels their love, which they show in tangible ways.
Sophia,
You need to worry more about those people who believe in Replacement theology than Palin's possible beliefs. We are are not father confessors who have had her open her soul to us.
As Nappy said, it is the here and now that matters and not what might, according to some religious prophecy, coincidentally come to pass.
What she says in support of Israel right now is more important than what she may or may not be in light of the absolute rubbish your President spewed about Gilo, which is a suburb in the South-West of Jerusalem, being a settlement.
Dare the Jews live anywhere?
"Settlement" (n): A place where Jews live, but you wish they didn't.
But there may be a little bit of hypocrisy. While looking at Google I found a disturbing little paper titled "Pretrib Hypocrisy." Laurie