Wednesday, March 28, 2012

J Street Does Not Go Zion Way

Found at this report where Daniel Treiman quotes Chemi Shalev on the J Street Conference
:
...when Olmert spoke of the deep Jewish connection to Jerusalem, a staple crowd pleaser at AIPAC, the J Street audience yawned, but when he referred to the inevitability of the capital’s division, his listeners howled with approval. Realizing where the crowd’s sentiments lay, Olmert had to beg his audience not to applaud when he recounted his painful agreement during his talks with Abbas to relinquish Jewish sovereignty on the Temple Mount.

and then adds his own observations:

I’d note that this applause disconnect isn’t entirely due to the (very real) policy differences between the two groups. For instance, AIPAC and J Street both support Iran sanctions, and both would certainly agree that there is a deep Jewish connection to Jerusalem. But talking about the Iranian nuclear threat or the Jewish connection to Jerusalem evidently doesn’t put the fire in the bellies of J Streeters in the same way as it does for AIPACers.
This is, to a certain extent, reflected in the two groups’ position statements on Jerusalem. AIPAC’s issues page on Jerusalem hits the emotional notes. It states that Jerusalem “has served as the Jewish people’s spiritual and religious capital for 3,000 years.”

By contrast, J Street’s policy statement on Jerusalem offers (in some detail) its prescriptions for the city’s future under an eventual peace accord, but the language is clinical and devoid of emotion. It makes no mention of the Jewish historical connection to the city even as it devotes one of its four paragraphs to criticizing Israeli policies in eastern Jerusalem.

Even in affirming Jerusalem’s status as Israel’s capital, the J Street statement sounds more defensive than emphatic: “J Street does believe that Israel’s capital is in Jerusalem and will be internationally recognized as such in the context of an agreed two-state solution.” (Why the use of words like “does believe” with reference to the notion that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital?)
"By the waters of the Hudson and Potomac...". ^

1 comment:

NormanF said...

A crook and a liar serving up lines about redividing Jerusalem!

I guess he can freely say it in a front of a foreign audience. Ehud Olmert doesn't have to worry about offending Israeli voters there.

But the fact J-Street cheered it shows again its neither pro-peace nor pro-Israel.