The American Jewish Committee (AJC) released its annual poll of Jewish-American public opinion yesterday, which, as with all demographics, showed a dip in Jewish support for President Obama over various issues including his handling of Israel-related matters. All the usual neocon partisans, who would [...]]]> Reposted by arrangement with Think Progress

The American Jewish Committee (AJC) released its annual poll of Jewish-American public opinion yesterday, which, as with all demographics, showed a dip in Jewish support for President Obama over various issues including his handling of Israel-related matters. All the usual neocon partisans, who would love to see Obama wounded because of the importance of Jewish Americans to the Democrats, seized on the some version of the news. But the Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin, in an article accurately headlined “Obama disappoints, but we’ll vote for him,” hit on a point of the survey the others missed:

On Iran, Jewish voters are much more hawkish than the president. If sanctions fail to halt Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons, 56 percent favor the U.S. taking military action, and 88 percent favor Israel doing so.

Rubin initially got one of the numbers wrong (the post has since been corrected): In reality, only 68 percent of respondents said they would support Israeli military action. (Both figures are down slightly, within the margin of error, from last fall’s AJC poll.) But the questions themselves, which are typical of this issue, are tricky. Here are the relevant questions and (actual) numbers from the AJC poll:

While the survey asks about strikes “to prevent [Iran] developing nuclear weapons,” military analysts and non-proliferation experts from both the U.S. and Israel agree that attacking Iran’s nuclear installations would only delay — not stop — Iran’s nuclear progress.

At an event hosted by the Arms Control Association in Washington last week, senior fellow Greg Thielmann said, “[E]ven U.S. airstrikes would only delay, not prevent, an Iranian nuclear weapons capacity.”

That judgment corresponds with that of Jeffrey White, a military analyst at the pro-Israel Washington Institute, who said this summer:

You can’t destroy knowledge and you can’t destroy the basic technology. The setback to the program would be measured in years I think — two years maybe three years.

White thought an Israeli strike, because of Israel’s lesser military capabilities, would cause an even smaller delay of probably only a year.

Another skeptic of the efficacy of Israeli airstrikes against Iran is the former commander of the Israel Navy, retired Rear Admiral Avraham Botzer. In June, Botzer told Haaretz:

I’m afraid the air force has convinced the politicians that an attack on Iran is possible and will achieve results. If I’m right, then we’re dealing with a dangerous illusion.

Since an Israeli strike is less likely to significantly delay Iran’s nuclear progress, perhaps American Jews show greater support for that option because of the increased threat perception. The distinction might be moot anyway, since the U.S. could potentially be dragged into a very risky regional conflict because of an Israeli strike. Those kinds of consequences of an attack weren’t so much as hinted at in AJC’s poll.

Friedman takes on Harris’s attempt to debunk ‘linkage,’ the concept that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a burden on U.S. policy-making in the Middle East. [...]]]> Lara Friedman, of Americans for Peace Now, has a great post up on Huffington in which she debunks the many claims of American Jewish Committee Chief David Harris.

Friedman takes on Harris’s attempt to debunk ‘linkage,’ the concept that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a burden on U.S. policy-making in the Middle East. This has been a neoconservative effort of late, which has been mostly absurd, and sometimes from Israel itself, on the dime of a pretty far right-wing Israel lobby group.

Harris takes this tack, too. And Friedman takes him apart:

Harris argues that some people have said that “without progress on the Palestinian front, it would be impossible to mobilize Arab countries to face the Iranian nuclear threat,” but that the cables released by WikiLeaks, which reveal great concern among many Arab governments regarding Iran, have “blown [this argument] out of the water.”

What Harris is implying, more broadly, is that there is no linkage between the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the ability of the U.S. to mobilize support for its policies in the Middle East and beyond — an argument that simply does not stand up to logic or facts.

Like this fact: a full (rather than selective) reading of the WikiLeaks cables shows that Arab leaders are deeply concerned both about Iran and about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — something Middle East experts have long argued to be the case. And the reality is that while the U.S., Israel and many Arab countries share concerns about Iran, it is undeniable that the failure of the U.S. to put forth a successful policy on the Israeli-Palestinian track, and the absence of progress toward peace (and continued provocative Israeli actions in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem), complicate virtually every aspect of U.S. relations with these same Arab countries, including mobilizing support for America’s Iran policy.

ECI, the partisan “pro-Israel” group set up by Bill Kristol, Gary Bauer and Rachel Abrams (wife of Elliott), [...]]]> Where does the  Emergency Committee for Israel get off complaining that AIPAC shouldn’t support New START because it’s outside of the “pro-Israel” purview? Who knows. But that’s exactly what they did.

ECI, the partisan “pro-Israel” group set up by Bill Kristol, Gary Bauer and Rachel Abrams (wife of Elliott), sent a letter to Senators Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Carl Levin (D-MI), slapping them on the wrists for asking AIPAC to take a public stance on the New START treaty (for it).

Several Jewish groups recently came out in favor of New START because they think a rocky U.S.-Russia relationship is bad for putting pressure on Iran. According to Laura Rozen at Politico, AIPAC has even reportedly been pushing for the treaty behind closed doors (with Republicans, and maybe even successfully).

But ECI, which was birthed at Sarah Palin advisor Randy Scheunemann‘s shop, says that for Schumer and Levin to ask AIPAC to go public with their support of New START is “unSenator-like conduct” — “public bullying,” as the ECI directors put it in the letter.

Jennifer Rubin, the neoconservative blogger who just moved from Commentary — where she worked with now-ECI director Noah Pollak — to the Washington Post, wrote from her new perch that Kristol, Bauer and Abrams “would no doubt claim, the actions of these two senators…would set a dangerous precedent.”

First of all, I’m not exactly sure it’s even sure it’s “unSenator-like conduct.” Aren’t politicians supposed to play politics to make what they think is good public policy?

Secondly, don’t you wonder what a pro-Israel group is doing defending its turf against the evils of the New START if it’s “a matter far outside its expertise and area of concern,” as ECI put it?

Well, the letter has a hedge that says, “needless to say, the Emergency Committee for Israel takes no position” on New START. But, hey, why is the Emergency Committee for Israel weighing in on Senate ethics?

Furthermore, the notion that AIPAC — or other Jewish or Israel lobby groups — shouldn’t support Congressional action (in this case, Senate ratification of a treaty) is ridiculous. For years, groups like the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the American Jewish Committee (AJC)  worked against Congressional resolutions recognizing the Armenian genocide because Turkey was considered a strategic ally of Israel (the support ended when the relationship went icy over the Gaza War of Winter 2008/09).

It’s not as if the legitimacy of the Armenian genocide is exactly within the scope of “pro-Israel” activity. But, before the Israeli-Turkish alliance fell apart, a happy Turkey was good for Israel. Just like how the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) supports New START because a happy Russia makes it easier to confront the “Iranian nuclear threat.”

AIPAC and other Jewish groups also joined the Greek lobby to support a Congressional resolution about Cyprus (also to stick it to Turkey). So this really is business as usual for Israel lobby groups — they play geopolitics in ways they think will be good for Israel.

The mysterious part is why ECI felt compelled to jump into this at all. Was it to protect the purity of “pro-Israel” advocacy? A partisan shot against two powerful Democrats to pry AIPAC away from them? Or could it be because the faltering opposition to New START (which the, needless to say, don’t oppose)? Or was it just to weaken Obama to make room for anti-START Sarah Palin (who was pushed onto the national stage by Kristol)?

What’s funny — though predictable — is the charge of “public bullying” from a group that employs the likes of Kristol, Bauer, Abrams, Pollak and another Scheunemann employee, Michael Goldfarb.

We covered [...]]]> A recent American Jewish Committee poll of 800 self-identifying American Jews showed decreasing support for President Barack Obama and his Middle East policies. While his handling of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the economy were also concerns, the prominent trend of growing U.S. Jewish support for an attack on Iran was most striking.

We covered the poll, via the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, in our October 12 Daily Talking Points, but here is some further analysis from our colleague Jim Lobe where he calls upon Harvard political scientist Stephen Walt‘s take on the numbers:

Support for U.S. military action against Iran “to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons… if diplomacy and sanctions fail” rose from 53 percent to 59 percent since last March, while opposition to such a course fell from 42 percent to 35 percent over the same period.

As recently as its 2008 survey, the AJC found that 47 percent of respondents opposed an attack, while a 42-percent plurality supported one.

“I don’t think these results are surprising, especially given the drumbeat of Islamophobia in the American media, the constant pounding on the Iran threat by Israeli politicians and their supporters here, and the Obama administration’s repeated failure to explain what it thinks it is doing in the Middle East,” said Stephen Walt, a Harvard international relations expert and co-author of the controversial 2007 book, “The Israel Lobby”.

“They’ve let their critics define the narrative, while doing nothing to give anyone on either the left or the right any confidence in their leadership,” he added. “If I’d been asked, I’d have said my approval of the job he’s doing was pretty low, too, though I obviously don’t agree with the idea of attacking Iran.”

The survey suggested that the hawkish views of the right- wing leadership of major Jewish organisations, including the AJC itself, have been gaining traction with the more-liberal Jewish public over the last eight months.