by Jim Lobe

The latest issue of the New Yorker features a lengthy article by Connie Bruck on the recent travails of AIPAC, especially its unsuccessful efforts since last November to increase sanctions on Iran, and its steady Likudnik drift, which has increasingly alienated its more liberal and Democratic supporters in Congress.

The article, “Friends [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

The latest issue of the New Yorker features a lengthy article by Connie Bruck on the recent travails of AIPAC, especially its unsuccessful efforts since last November to increase sanctions on Iran, and its steady Likudnik drift, which has increasingly alienated its more liberal and Democratic supporters in Congress.

The article, “Friends of Israel,” makes clear (in case any additional evidence were required) that the  group’s intention all along was to sabotage the ongoing negotiations between Iran and world powers, which we at LobeLog chronicled pretty intensively during the key five-month period, and casts more insider light on the pressure exerted by AIPAC, related groups, and key donors on Democratic lawmakers. Consider this passage, for example:

[Majority Leader Eric] Cantor and [Minority Leader Steny] Hoyer have been steadfast supporters of AIPAC, and its members have held at least a dozen fund-raisers for them each year. But last December AIPAC’s efforts to implement sanctions against Iran were so intense that even this well-tempered partnership fractured. When Congress returned from its Thanksgiving recess, legislators in the House began discussing a sanctions bill. According to the former Congressional aide, Cantor told Hoyer that he wanted a bill that would kill the interim agreement with Iran. Hoyer refused, saying that he would collaborate only on a non-binding resolution.

Cantor sent Hoyer resolution that called for additional sanctions and sought to define in advance the contours of an agreement with Iran. “The pressure was tremendous—not just AIPAC leadership and legislative officials but various board members and other contributors, from all over the country,” the former congressional aide recalled. “What was striking was how strident the message was,” another aide said. “‘How could you not pass a resolution that tells the President what the outcome of the negotiations has to be?’” Advocates for the sanctions portrayed Obama as feckless. “They said, ‘Iranians have been doing this for millennia. They can smell weakness. Why is the President showing weakness?’” a Senate aide recalled.

AIPAC was betting that the Democrats, facing midterms with an unpopular President, would break ranks, and that Obama would be unable to stop them. Its confidence was not unfounded; every time Netanyahu and AIPAC had opposed Obama he had retreated. But Obama took up the fight with unusual vigor. …As the Cantor-Hoyer resolution gathered momentum, House Democrats began holding meetings at the White House to strategize about how to oppose it.

Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the head of the Democratic National Committee, attended the meetings, at some political risk. Wasserman Schultz represents a heavily Jewish district in South Florida, and has been a reliable signature on AIPAC’s letters and resolution; she has boasted of concurring with a hundred per cent of its positions. Now the lobby e-mailed out an “AIPAC Action Alert,” including the text of a story about the meetings in the conservative Washington Free Beacon, in which she was described as “siding with the Mullahs over the American people.” The alert asked AIPAC’s executive-council members to contact her office, ask if the story was true, and challenge her opposition to Cantor-Hoyer. Stephen Fiske, the chair of the pro-Israel Florida Congressional Committee PAC, sent a similar alert to Wasserman Schultz’s constituents, setting off a cascade of calls to her office. (Fiske told the Free Beacon that the callers included a team of young students: his son’s classmate at a Jewish day school in North Miami Beach.) Wasserman Schultz was furious. Soon afterward, she flew to Israel for the funeral of former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. On the trip, she remarked to a colleague, “They’re doing this to me?” [Emphasis added.]

Eventually, of course Hoyer disassociated himself from the initiative, and, as the months unfolded, AIPAC’s campaign to undermine the negotiations by enacting new sanctions legislation in both the House and Senate became increasingly partisan, jeopardizing the group’s carefully cultivated image of bipartisanship, until it finally essentially gave up the effort in March. The article offers many such anecdotes, but, of course, the sentence I bolded above helps to confirm the theory that AIPAC’s aim wasn’t to strengthen President Obama’s hand in the P5+1′s (US, UK, France China, Russia plus Germany) talks with Iran; on the contrary, the objective—entirely consistent with Netanyahu’s wishes, was to blow up the talks.

I particularly appreciated Bruck’s pretty extensive quotation of remarks by former Washington State Democratic Rep. Brian Baird whose on-the-record frankness about AIPAC was undoubtedly made possible by the fact that he left Congress in 2010 and apparently has no intention of running again. Baird, one of the very congressmen who traveled to Gaza after the 2009 war, explains the relationship between fund-raising and AIPAC:

“‘The difficult reality is this: in order to get elected to Congress, if you’re not independently wealthy, you have to raise a lot of money. And you learn pretty quickly that, if AIPAC is on your side, you can do that. They come to you and say, ‘We’d be happy to host ten-thousand-dollar fund-raisers for you, and let us help write your annual letter, and please come to this multi-thousand-person dinner.’” Baird continued. “Any member of Congress knows that AIPAC is associated indirectly with significant amounts of campaign spending if you’re with them, and significant amounts against you if you’re not with them.”

“…When key votes are cast, the question on the House floor, troublingly, is often not ‘What is the right thing to do for the United States of America?’ but ‘How is AIPAC going to score this?’” He added, “There’s such a conundrum here, of believing that you’re supporting Israel, when you’re actually backing policies that are antithetical to its highest values and, ultimately, destructive for the country.” In talks with Israeli officials, he found that his inquiries were not treated with much respect. In 2003, one of his constituents, Rachel Corrie, was killed by a bulldozer driven by an Israeli soldier, as she protested the demolition of Palestinians’ homes in Gaza. At first, he said, the officials told him, ‘There’s a simple explanation—here are the facts.” Or, “We will look into it.” But, when he continued to press, something else would emerge. “There is a disdain for the U.S., and a dismissal of any legitimacy of our right to question—because who are we to talk about moral values?” Baird told me. “Whether it’s that we didn’t help early enough in the Holocaust, or look at what we did to our African-Americans, or our Native Americans—whatever! And they see us, members of Congress, as basically for sale. So they want us to shut up and play the game.”

While it may seem somewhat unrelated, this last point recalled for me a couple of op-eds published in the New York Times during the most recent war in Gaza on the subject of liberal Zionists (who, not coincidentally, reside almost exclusively in the Democratic Party, and their reaction to the evermore-rightward and aggressive drift of Israeli politics and policy. Both were written by Israelis; the first by Shmuel Rosner, an Israeli writer and fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute, which is supposed to study and make recommendations about relations between Israel and the Jewish Diaspora; the second, by Antony Lerman, the former director of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research and author of “The Making and Unmaking of a Zionist.” In his column, “Israel’s Fair-Weather Fans,” Rosner essentially tells liberal Zionists who have warned Israel’s leadership that their right-wing policies are putting at risk the support of liberal US Jews to, in Baird’s words, “shut up and play the game.”

If all Jews are a family, it would be natural for Israelis to expect the unconditional love of their non-Israeli Jewish kin. If Jews aren’t a family, and their support can be withdrawn, then Israelis have no reason to pay special attention to the complaints of non-Israeli Jews.

…If they still want to root for a Jewish state, there’s no substitute for Israel. If they believe there is a need for Jewish sovereignty, Israel is the only option available to them. As the song says, there’s no other country even it it’s on fire.

For his part, Lerman more or less agrees that liberal Zionists in the US have become largely irrelevant, at least in terms of influencing Israeli policies and actions, and thus his title, “The End of Liberal Zionism.”

“Today, the dominant organizations, like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League, as well as a raft of self-appointed community leaders, have swung to the right. They have made unquestioning solidarity with Israel the touchstone of Jewish identity—even though majority Jewish opinion is by no means hawkish.

…In reality, the only Zionism of any consequence today is xenophobic and exclusionary, a Jewish ethno-nationalism inspired by religious messianism. It is carrying out an open-ended project of national self-realization to be achieved through colonization and purification of the tribe.

Noting that the collapse of the latest US efforts for peace talks, as well as Netanyahu’s de facto rejection last month of the possibility of an independent Palestinian state (despite his previous grudging commitments to a two-state solution), Lerman argues that liberal Zionists have reached a dead end.

Liberal Zionists must now face the reality that the dissenters have recognized for years: A de facto single state already exists, where rights for Jews are guaranteed while rights for Palestinians are curtailed. Since liberal Zionists can’t countenance anything but two states, this situation leaves them high and dry.

Of course, this reality also means that liberal Zionists—who undoubtedly constitute a majority of American Jews (who in turn constitute a major source of political campaign funding for Democrats)—face a choice between their Zionism, as defined by Netanyahu and AIPAC, on the one hand and their liberal values on the other. The two appear to have become mutually exclusive.

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by Jasmin Ramsey

The talks in Vienna over Iran’s nuclear program will likely continue past the July 20 deadline for reaching a final deal. President Barack Obama noted “real progress” but hinted at an extension yesterday after being briefed by Secretary of State John [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jasmin Ramsey

The talks in Vienna over Iran’s nuclear program will likely continue past the July 20 deadline for reaching a final deal. President Barack Obama noted “real progress” but hinted at an extension yesterday after being briefed by Secretary of State John Kerry, who held several meetings with the Iranians this week.

On Wednesday, an Iranian diplomat told the Japanese Kyodo News that the talks could be extended by two months, but there’s still no official word. The editorial boards of the New York Times and the Washington Post have meanwhile come out on the side of continued negotiations.

Presently there’s not a lot of buzz around the question of whether Congress will push for more sanctions on Iran. Indeed, senior Senate aides told the Wall Street Journal yesterday that they do not see the same level of tension over a possible extension compared with the beginning of the year.

Still, as Jim wrote earlier this week, key lawmakers here in Washington are trying to make sanctions relief to Iran conditional on Congressional approval.

While the prospects of reaching a comprehensive deal any time soon are far from certain, one thing is for sure: important actors, from all sides of the political spectrum inside Iran, support the diplomatic process. Indeed, just this week the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran (ICHRI) released a study showing leading Iranian activists’ support for the negotiations.

The report, Voices from Iran: Strong Support for the Nuclear Negotiations, shows that support for a successful deal are equally forthcoming not only among human rights victims and former political prisoners, but also among those who believe that the negotiations themselves would have no effect on the human rights situation in Iran.

“Opponents of the nuclear talks cannot use human rights concerns as a tool to undermine the negotiations,” said Hadi Ghaemi, Executive Director of the Campaign. “The very individuals who have suffered the most from the human rights crisis in Iran remain fully committed to the negotiations.”

More than two-thirds of the 22 key human and civil rights defenders interviewed said they felt an agreement resulting in the lifting of sanctions would improve the economic conditions of ordinary people, who would then be enabled to focus on improving civil liberties.

“Every single human rights advocate — along with journalists, editors, private business owners and so on — I have met in Iran hopes for the resolution of the nuclear conflict and eventual ending of sanctions for two basic reasons: one is economic and one is political,” said independent scholar and LobeLog contributor Farideh Farhi.

“As one prominent human rights advocate told me, the right to economic livelihood is also a human rights issue. Given the comprehensive nature of US-led sanctions, these folk see them as major violations of the Iranian peoples’ rights and want them removed,” said Farhi, who is currently in Tehran.

“Politically, while the lifting of sanctions is not presumed to automatically lead to better treatment of dissidents and critics by the state, there is hope that the reduced threat perception and reduced fear of regime change will eventually lead to the further loosening of the political environment,” she added.

“Conversely, there is fear that a breakdown in the nuclear negotiations may lead to the intensification of domestic factional and institutional conflicts, which have historically harmed the more vulnerable political and civil rights activists as well as members of the press,” she said.

This should be important news for US, Canadian (also see here) and EU politicians who appear worried that seriously engaging Iran on its nuclear program will lead to worsened human rights violations and/or believe further punitive measures at this time will improve the situation.

As Jim noted:

While [House Foreign Affairs Chairman Ed Royce, R-Calif and ranking member Eliot Engel, D-NY] were releasing their letter, on one side of the Capitol, Sen. Mark Kirk, by far the biggest Congressional recipient of AIPAC-related funding in his 2010 re-election campaign, teamed up with Marco Rubio, the keynoter at last year’s Republican Jewish Coalition convention, to introduce The Iran Human Rights Accountability Act on the other. Among other provisions, it would impose visa bans and asset freezes against Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Hassan Rouhani. It’s just the kind of thing that generates a lot of goodwill in Tehran. Indeed, one of the Act’s chapters could only be interpreted as “regime change:” it declares the “policy of the United States” to be laying “the foundation for the emergence of a freely elected, open and democratic political system in Iran that is not a threat to its neighbors or to the United States and to work with all citizens of Iran who seek to establish such a political system.” Another gift to the hard-liners in Tehran who are as eager to undermine their negotiators in Vienna as the hawks here are to blow up the negotiations.

“The study makes clear that anyone concerned about human rights in Iran should not use human rights to undermine a nuclear deal,” Mike Amitay, a senior policy analyst at the Open Society Policy Center, told LobeLog. “Human rights issues should be addressed in tandem with support for the negotiations and in a way that does not undermine the success of the negotiations.”

“In this regard, recently introduced rights legislation is counterproductive and offered now as an attempt to scuttle a deal,” he said.

By the way, here’s Josh Fattal, who spent 2 years as an American hostage in Iran’s notorious Evin prison, urging Congress to support the nuclear talks with Iran:

The most important point I’d like to impress on our negotiators and members of Congress is that this is a historic opportunity. Additionally, the human toll from decades of confrontation is immeasurable. My suffering as a political hostage in Evin Prison from 2009 to 2011 was a result of decades of mutual hostility between the U.S. and Iran. But, taken in context, I got off relatively easy with only 26 months behind bars. A resolution to the standoff over Iran’s nuclear capacity will finally lead us down a different path that no longer punishes the Iranian people for the actions of their leaders.

Photo Credit: The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran

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by Mitchell Plitnick

When the history of pro-Israel lobbying in Washington is fully written, it may well be that the push for conflict with Iran will be seen as a major turning point. On Monday, a consistently hawkish, pro-Israel Democrat, Robert Menendez (D-NJ), withdrew the U.S.-Israel Strategic Partnership Act from the [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Mitchell Plitnick

When the history of pro-Israel lobbying in Washington is fully written, it may well be that the push for conflict with Iran will be seen as a major turning point. On Monday, a consistently hawkish, pro-Israel Democrat, Robert Menendez (D-NJ), withdrew the U.S.-Israel Strategic Partnership Act from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s docket. Menendez made the surprise move because a Republican member of the committee, Bob Corker (R-TN), was going to add an amendment intended to undermine the Obama administration’s efforts to reach an agreement with Iran on its nuclear program.

Judging from news reports in mainstream and far-right outlets, it seems the amendment was Corker’s idea. It would have required the U.S. president, upon reaching a deal with Iran, to submit a report to Congress within three days. Congress would then have a non-binding “vote of disapproval.” But AIPAC, the powerful pro-Israel lobbying group, stood by the amendment, and one has to think that Corker would not have introduced it if he knew AIPAC would oppose it. AIPAC eased up on its pressure against negotiations with Iran earlier this year, but it has remained steadfast in its distrust of the diplomatic process, as has, of course, the right-wing Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu. AIPAC’s decision to support the Corker amendment, coupled with a ratcheting up of the rhetoric coming from Netanyahu against the negotiations in recent days, suggests a renewed campaign to derail Obama’s efforts to resolve the dispute with Iran diplomatically.

Perhaps even more notably, this episode marks another step in the increasing polarization of Israel as a domestic U.S. political issue. The Republicans have been working hard ever since Barack Obama got elected to “own” the issue of Israel. In this case, however, they and AIPAC may have overplayed their hand, just as it did at the beginning of the year with S. 1881, when it lined up with Republicans to try to strangle the Joint Plan of Action (JPOA) between world powers and Iran in its crib.

The U.S.-Israel Strategic Partnership Act had already generated some controversy, especially over a provision that would have allowed Israel to participate in the U.S.’ visa waiver program, which would make it easier for Israeli citizens to obtain American visas. The House of Representatives ended up amending the bill to address the initial objections to admitting Israel into that program program. The objection centered on Israel’s unwillingness to reciprocate in granting visas to U.S. citizens, a standard expectation of the program. The bill now addresses this with language that requires Israel to treat U.S. citizens (including Arab Americans) as it wishes the U.S. to treat Israelis and satisfy all other requirements of the visa waiver program. Many believe that other objections, specifically revolving around Israel’s espionage activities in the U.S. (which Israel vehemently denies but are well known in the U.S. intelligence community), are the reason for a recent spate of leaks to Newsweek magazine on the subject.

But aside from that piece, the legislation is a pretty standard piece of pro-Israel fluff, which would provide only a modest, small boost to existing cooperation between the United States and Israel in military, security and scientific arenas. Yet it appears quite possible that AIPAC helped Corker kill it, however unintentionally. Why did that happen?

This seems to have been a miscalculation on AIPAC’s part. If this amendment originated with Corker and not AIPAC, as seems likely, then it was clearly an attempt by the Tennessee Republican to drive a wedge between the “pro-Israel community” and the president. AIPAC backs the idea, but they surely treasure bi-partisan support for their initiatives in Congress much more, as indicated by their decision to back down on S. 1881 in February, especially after it ran up against a solid wall of Democratic opposition. Yet AIPAC has been remarkably passive in the face of Republican efforts to make Israel a partisan issue. Of course, Republicans have gotten a lot of help from Netanyahu (and now his new ambassador, Ron Dermer) on that score in recent years. But the alienation of liberal Democrats from pro-Israel sentiment is growing as a result. This amendment and its result constitute one more step in that direction.

AIPAC, and probably Corker as well, did not expect Menendez to pull a popular pro-Israel bill from the Senate docket. But Menendez appears to have recognized the difficult position this amendment would put Senate Democrats in. They cannot credibly oppose Obama on negotiations with Iran because their constituents support the talks and are deeply opposed to military action against Iran. Once Obama, in his State of the Union Address no less, declared that he was standing firm on negotiating seriously with Iran and then prevailed in the fight over S. 1881, it was clear that most Congressional Democrats would not challenge the president so long as the talks continued. So, if the Corker amendment was brought, Senate Democrats would either have to vote against their president or against AIPAC. Neither prospect held any appeal to Menendez. So he pulled the bill.

In many ways, Menendez and other Senate Democrats who are particularly close to AIPAC just want to keep their heads down for the next two years. If Obama can work out a viable deal with Iran, that’s great. If not, they are probably hoping that a more hawkish leader, like Hillary Clinton, who will be more in line with AIPAC on Middle East policy, will win in 2016. Until then, they are going to have to walk a tightrope.

Republicans, meanwhile, are likely to continue their efforts to “own” the issue. Corker will probably back down on his amendment eventually so that the rest of the bill can go through. But that will mean that the Republicans can claim that Menendez, well-known as among the most pro-Israel Democrats in Congress, thwarted AIPAC’s plans.

If, as AIPAC surely hopes, the next president, from either party, is more in tune with the Netanyahu government than Obama, then a rightward move of the Israel issue serves it well in the long-term. Indeed, in such a case, AIPAC would probably prefer a Democrat again in the White House, reinforcing the group’s bipartisan image and influence, while Israel gets framed in Washington in a more comfortable way than it is now.

Still, this could backfire. Aggressive Republican efforts to make Israel a partisan issue — and AIPAC’s acquiescence in that strategy — are alienating a lot of Jews and a lot of Democrats. Most of those groups want a secure Israel, to be sure. But they also want to avoid war with Iran and an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land. AIPAC is working against both of the latter goals.

AIPAC will have no problem keeping Republicans in their camp, unless more radical groups, such as Bill Kristol’s Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI), the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), and, of course, the Republican Jewish Coalition, that criticized its capitulation on S. 1881 persuade its wealthiest donors to desert it. But Democrats might find it increasingly difficult to toe the AIPAC line, even with a more hawkish figure like Clinton in the White House. AIPAC has come a long way by justifiably touting its bipartisanship. Should “pro-Israel” become a Republican label, however, they stand to lose a great deal in the long run. And maybe that’s not a bad thing.

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by Kelsey Davenport

In two months Iran could produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb, according to Secretary of State John Kerry’s testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 8. In isolation, this number sounds alarming, but in context, Iran is years, not months, away from a deliverable nuclear [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Kelsey Davenport

In two months Iran could produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb, according to Secretary of State John Kerry’s testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 8. In isolation, this number sounds alarming, but in context, Iran is years, not months, away from a deliverable nuclear weapon and the United States is negotiating to extend that timeline even further.

Highly enriched uranium alone does not give Tehran a practical weapon. Iran would need to be able to build the explosive package and fit the bomb onto a missile. The US intelligence community has consistently testified since 2007 that Iran abandoned its nuclear weapons program years ago and that there is no hard evidence that Iran has restarted these activities.

Compared to the alternative, two months demonstrates a rollback in Iran’s capabilities. If Iran, the United States and its negotiating partners had not reached the interim Joint Plan of Action (JPA) in November 2013, that time window would be weeks, not months. That two-month window will also grow longer as Iran continues to follow through on its commitment under the JPA to eliminate its stockpile of uranium that could be more easily enriched to weapons-grade.

While Washington negotiates with Iran on a comprehensive deal that will put even more time back on the clock, it is important to consider how long it would take Iran to “break out” from its commitments and produce enough highly-enriched uranium for weapon. But this is only one factor of the final deal, which should be considered in its entirety.

Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) said in the April 8 hearing that limiting Iran’s nuclear program to a 6-12 month breakout timeline under the final deal is not enough and that a deal must “dismantle Iran’s nuclear weapons program.” However, Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program. It is also naïve to regard these conditions as feasible. Eliminating Iran’s centrifuges and enriched uranium stockpiles would be an ideal nonproliferation goal, but Iran is highly unlikely to agree to such terms and the United States already agreed in November that Tehran would be allowed to enrich uranium based on its practical needs. Those needs are small and the comprehensive deal should scale back Iran’s uranium enrichment accordingly.

Menendez and his colleagues in Congress must remember that negotiations require compromise, and policymakers must not jeopardize prospects of reaching a good agreement with Iran. They must also remember that a deal will include stringent monitoring and verification in addition to what is already in place that will quickly alert the international community if Tehran deviates from its commitments.

This does not, of course, mean that the United States should accept unlimited uranium enrichment. Menendez said that a deal must prevent Iran from having a path to a nuclear bomb. This is a reasonable demand. Iran should be restricted to only producing uranium enriched to civilian power reactor grade, and the amount produced should be tied to its civilian power needs. In exchange for significant sanctions relief Tehran should also allow international inspectors more extensive access to its nuclear facilities, visits on short notice, and provide more-timely information about future nuclear facilities.

Including these measures in a deal would ensure that Iran could not — if it decided to — dash to build a nuclear weapon before the international community would detect such activities and be able to block them. Evidence suggests that Washington’s team is already placing significant emphasis on achieving comprehensive monitoring and verification measures on Iran’s nuclear program beyond the standard International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) monitoring that Iran is already subject to as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Setting limits on Iran’s ballistic missiles would also increase international confidence that Tehran cannot deliver nuclear weapons, but requiring it to dismantle all missiles large enough to deliver them would be akin to the severe missile limits imposed on Saddam Hussein’s vanquished Iraq in 1991. A 150-kilometer range limit on Iran’s ballistic missiles would remove its most effective deterrent against its regional adversaries. Like any other state existing in such circumstances, Iran would likely view this as an unacceptable compromise to its national security.

While Iran may be willing to commit to some confidence building measures in these areas that will give the international community more information about flight tests, missile deployments, and even warhead loadings, Tehran will not agree to dismantle its short and medium-range ballistic missiles, which it sees as vital to its security in a hostile region.

Moreover, capping Iran’s ballistic missile development to small, very short-range systems is not essential for a comprehensive final deal. Strict monitoring and verification of Iran’s nuclear program would provide enough transparency and the confidence that Tehran is not pursing nuclear weapons, as well as the ability to detect a change in its behavior.

Of course, to get Iran to agree to any of these limitations, Congress must be prepared to pass legislation to lift proliferation-related sanctions and accept a civil Iranian nuclear program, which includes uranium enrichment. If Iran is not convinced that Washington is ready to take this step, a deal is highly unlikely.

Reaching a final deal with Iran will not be easy. Members of Congress should give our diplomats the best chance to negotiate a verifiable nuclear agreement with Iran by avoiding sabotage through unreasonable demands on centrifuge numbers and breakout timelines, which compromise only part of the issues at hand. A comprehensive deal remains the best chance to guard against an unrestrained and unmonitored Iranian nuclear program, but it must include enough reasons for Iran to agree to it.

– Kelsey Davenport is the Nonproliferation Analyst for the Arms Control Association. She focuses primarily on developments related to the nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea and nuclear security issues.

by Jim Lobe

Seemingly overshadowed by the crisis in Crimea and the disappearance of the Malaysian airliner, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu just don’t seem to be getting the kind of momentum in their perennial jihad against Iran that they’re used to coming out [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

Seemingly overshadowed by the crisis in Crimea and the disappearance of the Malaysian airliner, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu just don’t seem to be getting the kind of momentum in their perennial jihad against Iran that they’re used to coming out of AIPAC’s annual policy conference.

It’s true that the more than 10,000 AIPAC activists sent to Capitol Hill to lobby their representatives immediately after the conference May 4 should have been pleased by the House’s passage a day later by a 410-1 margin of the U.S.-Israel Strategic Partnership Act. It’s been a major priority for the group since last year and one that authorizes $1.8 billion dollars in additional U.S. weapons shipments to Tel Aviv, which already receives on average of about three billion dollars in annual U.S. military aid. It also opens the possibility that Israelis wishing to come to the United States would not require a visa.

But AIPAC’s and Netanyahu’s top priority — getting a new Kirk-Menendez sanctions bill against Iran enacted — clearly moved out of reach six weeks before the conference when all but 16 Democratic senators refused to sign on as co-sponsors and buck their president who had pledged to veto any such bill on the grounds that it risked undermining ongoing nuclear negotiations with Iran. With Plan A thus scuttled, AIPAC moved to Plan B, a non-binding resolution that would lay out conditions — several of them clearly unacceptable to Tehran — for any comprehensive deal with Iran which, if not included as part of the deal, would result in Congress’s refusal to fully lift U.S. sanctions. In that case, too, the White House made its strong opposition clear, and the effort quickly collapsed.

That left Plan C — a (necessarily non-binding) letter from lawmakers to Obama — laying out what conditions its authors expected to be included in any final agreement with Iran over its nuclear program. As I described last week, there were actually two letters, both approved by AIPAC: a Menendez-Graham version in the Senate whose harsh tone and demands (a final deal “must require”, etc.) no doubt more accurately reflected the views of both AIPAC’s leadership and Netanyahu than the softer version (“We are hopeful that a permanent diplomatic agreement will require” etc.) that was co-authored by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Minority Leader Steny Hoyer. Both letters were ambiguous on key points — to what extent would Iran’s existing nuclear program have to be dismantled and specifically whether a limited uranium enrichment program would be deemed acceptable  – and thus subject to different interpretations.) When the House version was subsequently endorsed by Senate Armed Services Committee chair Carl Levin (and, as I understand it, has since gained the support of more than 20 other Democratic senators, including most of the leadership) precisely because it appeared to give the administration more diplomatic space to negotiate a deal, AIPAC’s leadership was reportedly caught once more on the backfoot. Of course, as I noted last week, the White House still opposes both letters, but the fact that AIPAC’s plans 1, 2, and its preferred version of 3 have all been set back must give the administration considerable satisfaction. (I heard — but cannot confirm — that, at the conclusion of a White House meeting with top AIPAC officials back in early January, one of them told a senior administration official point-blank, “You have to know that we’re going to beat you on this.”)

AIPAC has kept silent on the number of senators who have signed either letter. At first I understood they were trying to persuade senators to sign the Menendez-Graham version only and actively lobby them against the Cantor-Hoyer-Levin letter. But that then embarrassed their allies in the House, so the group began asking — with some success — senators to sign both letters, thus contributing to the growing  impression on Capitol Hill that the nation’s most powerful foreign policy lobby simply doesn’t have its act together.

In any event, AIPAC is now actively pushing House members to sign Cantor-Hoyer, which apparently is the best it thinks it can do under the circumstances. As of Wednesday afternoon, according to AIPAC’s tally, 293 members had signed the letter, but 138 — including a surprising number of far-right Republicans, like Michele Bachmann, Joe Barton, and Louie Gohmert, who probably think AIPAC has turned way too mushy — have not. This is now ten days after the end of the AIPAC conference! For an organization whose top lobbyist less than ten years ago bragged that he could get 70 senators to sign on a napkin within 24 hours and which is used to the kind of virtually unanimous votes that took place last week for the U.S.-Israel Strategic Partnership Act, this is pretty pathetic. It cannot help that AIPAC got virtually no press during its conference and has gotten some really terrible reviews in Israel, notably one by Gideon Levy (admittedly a peacenik) in Haaretz, which was reposted by M.J. Rosenberg here.

In doing so, however, the group is misrepresenting what the letter actually says. For example, AIPAC says:

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) and House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) are circulating a bipartisan letter addressed to the President delineating the necessary terms for a final agreement with Iran, including dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear program.

But the actual letter states:

We are hopeful a permanent diplomatic agreement will require dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear weapons-related infrastructure, including enrichment-, heavy water-, and reprocessing-related facilities, such that Iran will not be able to develop, build, or acquire a nuclear weapon.

Of course, AIPAC is spinning the letter in favor of its hoped-for interpretation, but there is a substantial difference both tonally and literally in what the two statements say.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu appears increasingly and openly frustrated by the lack of attention his histrionics about Iran has been getting. Last week’s seizure by Israeli commandos of the KLOS-C merchant ship in the Red Sea off the coast of Eritrea and Sudan was no doubt timed to immediately follow Bibi’s anti-Iran tirade at AIPAC and his continuing presence in the U.S. He gave vent to that frustration in Eilat this week where he keynoted the display of the captured, supposedly Gaza-bound Syrian-made M-302 rockets which, according to Israel, had been hidden aboard the vessel in Bandar Abbas under sacks of Iranian cement, by fulminating about the “hypocrisy” of the West, especially EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who was then on a visit to Tehran, in not treating the incident with the seriousness that he believed it warranted (as if, for example, there were no “hypocrisy” in a nuclear-armed non-member of the IAEA constantly complaining to the same body about Iran’s nuclear program).

Now, it may be that those rockets were intended for Gaza, although Israel has not yet disclosed any of the evidence on which it based that charge, and most experts who have addressed this issue have expressed considerable skepticism about the Israeli thesis, especially in light of Egypt’s destruction of so many of the tunnels that link the Sinai to Gaza and the military regime’s enhanced intelligence cooperation with Israel on both the Sinai and Gaza since last July’s coup d’etat in Cairo. (Given that cooperation, why wasn’t the shipment intercepted by the Egyptians when it passed through southern Egypt or the Sinai?)

Still, I’m prepared to believe that high-level IRGC hard-liners who, like AIPAC and Netanyahu, are unenthusiastic, to say the least, about Hassan Rouhani’s efforts at rapprochement with the West, may have behind such a shipment, and may even have hoped that it would be discovered, precisely in order to undermine the nuclear talks. (I think Mitchell will be writing more about this question shortly.) But what is so interesting is precisely the lack of interest in Netanyahu’s charges on the part of western — and especially U.S. — mainstream media and politicians. Granted, the Ukraine crisis and the missing airliner are taking up an awful lot of news oxygen these days, but when the Israelis shout really loud, especially about terrorism and Iran, it usually gets attention. Not this time. Writing for Al-Monitor, Ben Caspit wrote an excellent piece about this Tuesday entitled “Israel fears it has lost world attention on Iran.” It seems the world has tired of Bibi and sees him increasingly as the boy who cried wolf, as hinted at in an interesting analysis posted Wednesday by Haaretz’s editor, Zvi Bar’El.

On the other hand, consider this colloquy at yesterday’s State Department press briefing. The final sentence is a little worrisome:

QUESTION: Can we go to Iran?

MS. PSAKI: Sure.

QUESTION: Your counterpart at the Iranian Foreign Ministry, Marzieh Afkham, described the whole ship episode and the press conference that took place – the ship that was allegedly going to Hamas – as a farce. And she described it in very graphic terms like Mr. Netanyahu is trying to sort of complicate whatever efforts you’re having in the negotiations. Could you comment on that?

MS. PSAKI: I would stand by the comments I made yesterday about the ship containing Iranian weapons. I spoke extensively to that yesterday. So I don’t have any –

QUESTION: Okay.

MS. PSAKI: — I think the facts are the facts in this case.

QUESTION: So let me ask you again. You have your own evidence, your own gathered evidence that this ship was laden with arms.

MS. PSAKI: The Israelis are the lead on this.

Photo: Israeli PM Benyamin Netanyahu at a press conference in Eilat regarding weapons he claims were bound for Gaza by Iranian order. Very few foreign press were reportedly in attendance.

by Jim Lobe

It’s been a difficult annual policy conference for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and its hopes of getting Congress to set the toughest possible conditions on any final nuclear agreement between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia plus Germany). As readers [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

It’s been a difficult annual policy conference for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and its hopes of getting Congress to set the toughest possible conditions on any final nuclear agreement between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia plus Germany). As readers of this blog know, AIPAC entered the conference, which ran from Sunday through Tuesday, in a rather parlous state as a result of its worst foreign policy setback in a generation; specifically, its failure to muster nearly enough Democrats to gain a veto proof-majority in favor of the Kirk-Menendez sanctions bill that Obama had threatened to veto. Attacked by hard-line neoconservative groups on the right, notably the Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI) and the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) for sacrificing its devotion to Bibi Netanyahu’s jihad against Iran in the interests of bipartisanship — namely, not unduly alienating Democrats in Congress and thus bolstering J Street — the nation’s most powerful foreign policy lobby found itself in a seemingly dazed and unfamiliar defensive crouch, lacking until the very last moment a coherent lobbying agenda for the 14,000 attendees signed up for the proceedings.

That was bad enough. But the Russian takeover of Crimea made things worse. The event dominated the news throughout the conference, making it virtually impossible for AIPAC to break through the blanket TV news coverage of the Ukrainian crisis. Even Netanyahu’s belligerent remarks delivered to the conferees Tuesday morning, designed to psyche them up for their subsequent shleps up to Capitol Hill, were relegated to the inside pages of major national newspapers.

Even the weather refused to cooperate. The snowfall that blanketed the area Sunday night and Monday morning effectively shut down the government and downtown, closing Congressional offices, making it highly inconvenient — and, in many cases, impossible — for the usual overwhelming majority of members of Congress, who customarily make cameo appearances at the conference to ensure their good standing, to get to the convention center, and generally cast a wintry pall over the three-day proceedings.

(And then, as if to add insult to injury, on Tuesday, the same day that Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu keynoted the conference, The Hill newspaper, which basically ignored the proceedings throughout, featured a flattering full-page profile of Jeremy Ben-Ami, while the even more influential Politico published an op-ed entitled “Why AIPAC Needs to Get With the Peace Program” by the J Street founder and president. Ouch!)

Ultimately, aside from Netanyahu’s belligerence (a embarrassingly amount of which was directed against the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement), what did AIPAC get on the Iran front? Although the smoke has not yet completely cleared on that question, it seems they got some form of its Plan C (after losing on Plan A — the Kirk-Menendez bill — and never getting any lift from Plan B, a non-binding resolution laying out impossible conditions for a final agreement) — a Congressional letter that the group helped to draft.

There are now, however, two such letters that are being circulated in Congress for signature — one hard-line version supposedly co-written by Sens. Lindsey Graham and Robert Menendez that clearly AIPAC and Netanyahu would prefer; the second, a softer one co-authored by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer. The question is, which version (both have been cleared by AIPAC) will get the most support on Capitol Hill?

As I’ve pointed out, both versions are ambiguous on key points, notably on the critical issue of whether Iran will be permitted — at least by Congress as a condition for lifting sanctions as part of any final agreement between the P5+1 — to maintain a limited uranium enrichment program on its own soil. The best analysis of the difference in both letters and the context in which they have been drafted and presented was provided yesterday in a statement by the National Iranian American Council’s (NIAC) policy director (and fellow-Seattle native), Jamal Abdi. Here it is:

…NIAC has serious concerns with the language in the Senate letter regarding demands for a final deal. NIAC outlined its position on what principles should guide Congressional action regarding U.S.-Iran diplomatic efforts in a recent letter to Congressional leadership that was signed by forty organizations. That letter urged that Congress uphold the JPOA [Joint Plan of Action agreed between the P5+1 and Iran last Nov 24], not issue demands on negotiations that contradict the interim terms or the terms outlined for a final deal in JPOA, and that Congress work with the Administration regarding the need to eventually lift sanctions.The House letter meets those standards. NIAC has minor concerns with the House letter, but will not oppose it and commends the efforts of those in the House who succeeded in securing a more balanced letter.

Unfortunately, the Senate letter does not meet those standards and NIAC therefore opposes the Senate letter.

The Senate letter uses new language to offer old ultimatums that will complicate ongoing negotiations, box-in U.S. negotiators, signal that the U.S. would violate the terms outlined in the JPOA, and serve as an invitation to hardliners in Iran to issue similar escalatory demands that will narrow options for compromise. Sections of the letter will be construed to rule out any final deal in which Iran retains a civilian enrichment program, in contradiction of the Joint Plan of Action. This, in combination with demands regarding dismantlement of infrastructure and facilities, and requiring the deal to have regional implications beyond its scope, can only interfere with the work of U.S. diplomats to resolve key concerns at the negotiating table.

NIAC urges that the Administration and Congress coordinate closely regarding ongoing negotiations and work towards the shared goal of preventing a nuclear-armed Iran and averting a disastrous war. NIAC urges that members of the Senate abstain from signing onto the Menendez-Graham letter and instead consider language that supports the ongoing negotiations towards a final deal instead of adding unnecessary complications.

Thus, in NIAC’s opinion, the House letter is preferable for understandable reasons, although the group doesn’t support it.

Now, the latest interesting development is that Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Carl Levin, who was among the first of the senior Democrats to speak out against the Kirk-Menendez bill, has endorsed the House (Cantor-Hoyer, or C-H) letter and proposed it as a substitute in the Senate for the (Menendez-Graham, or M-G) letter. My understanding is that Levin believes that, despite its ambiguity, the House letter gives the administration the room it needs to negotiate a final agreement that would presumably permit some limited enrichment. If, as expected, other Senate Democrats, such as Banking Committee Chair Tim Johnson and Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein, follow suit, the chances are pretty good that he can get the backing of the majority caucus (although bringing around the 16 Democrats who co-sponsored the Kirk-Menendez bill will be a challenge). And, with Cantor as the chief Republican sponsor of the C-H letter, it’s almost certain that a majority of the House will sign onto that. Especially because, like the tougher M-G letter, the C-H letter has also been blessed by AIPAC.

Thus, as recently three weeks ago, AIPAC was still lobbying hard in the Senate for the Kirk-Menendez sanctions bill, which was clearly designed by its drafters to sabotage the JPOA. When it failed to win at that, it tried briefly to get a resolution that would have set out conditions — known to be unacceptable to Tehran — that a final deal with Iran would have to incorporate, but the Democratic caucus would not go along. Twice rejected, it has been forced to settle for a letter and could very well wind up with the weakest one currently on the table. (See update below)

Moreover, the difference between Netanyahu’s maximalist position — no uranium enrichment, no centrifuges, no nothing — and the House letter endorsed by AIPAC is quite large, and Bibi must be rather upset by the gap. Indeed, his strongest supporters here are very upset.

Now, it bears mentioning that the White House, fearful of their effect on the negotiations and feeling perhaps a bit triumphant after frustrating AIPAC so badly over the last couple of months, opposes both letters, which could prove problematic if and when a final agreement with Iran is reached. While Obama can use his executive authority to ease or waive many sanctions, some sanctions can only be lifted by an act of Congress. Moreover, if Obama relies on his waiver authority, there’s no guarantee that his successor, who could even be a Republican, will continue waiving. As the NIAC statement warns “It is critical that Congress work with the Administration to ensure necessary authorizations are in place to enable nuclear-related sanctions to be lifted, as outlined by the JPOA. Those authorizations do not currently exist.” Thus, the administration’s opposition to Congress expressing its views on the subject could have the perverse effect of alienating key lawmakers whose support will eventually be required to fully implement a final agreement — a point made in an ironic tweet (“Pro-Israel and Pro-Iran Lobbies Agree: Iran Cannot Lift Sanctions Without Congress”) by the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies’ (FDD) Mark Dubowitz, who has long favored waging “economic warfare” against Tehran.

UPDATE: In the battle of the two letters on the Senate side, I understand that the Menendez-Graham version has currently fetched more signatures by a margin of 34-11. The 34 on the M-G side consist of 25 Republicans and 9 Democrats, while the 11 signatories to the Levin (or Cantor-Hoyer) substitute are all Democrats. Two Democrats who did not co-sponsor the Kirk-Menendez bill have signed both letters. I’ve been told that AIPAC is now actively lobbying against the Cantor-Hoyer version, despite the fact that it cleared the letter before the co-authors circulated it. If you have a preference, you should probably call your senator’s office. 

by Jim Lobe

First, it wanted the Senate to pass a binding bill (Kirk-Menendez, or S. 1881) that was certain to sabotage the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia plus Germany). When that stalled in mid-January at only 59 co-sponsors, all but [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

First, it wanted the Senate to pass a binding bill (Kirk-Menendez, or S. 1881) that was certain to sabotage the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia plus Germany). When that stalled in mid-January at only 59 co-sponsors, all but 16 of whom were Republicans, it initiated discussions about a non-binding resolution essentially endorsing Kirk-Menendez and laying out the conditions for a final “acceptable” agreement with Iran that was also certain to be rejected by Tehran.

It seems now that AIPAC, whose annual policy conference got underway Sunday and is scheduled to last through Tuesday despite ominous warnings of a new winter storm that may limit its 14,000 attendees’ lobbying capabilities, has been reduced to rounding up senators willing to sign a letter to Obama that softens or eliminates some of its previous language but suggests that some of its key demands — most notably, the abandonment by Iran of all uranium enrichment — may still be a sine qua non for Congressional acquiescence to lifting sanctions if and when a final agreement is reached. Gaining as many signatures on that letter as possible is now the top priority in AIPAC’s legislative agenda (although it will also continue pressing lawmakers to co-sponsor or otherwise support S. 1881).

The proposed letter is currently signed by six senators divided in equal parts between Republicans and Democrats. On the Republican side are Lindsey Graham, who’s been wanting to attack Iran for a really long time now; Mark Kirk; and Kelly Ayotte. On the Democratic side are Robert Menendez, Charles Schumer, and Christopher Coons. Of course, Kirk, Menendez, and Schumer were the three out-front and public co-sponsors of what became know as the Kirk-Menendez bill, while the three other letter signers also became co-sponsors. And, of course, Graham’s co-sponsorship, coupled with his long history of war-mongering, makes it difficult for the letter’s Democrats to indignantly insist, as they have in the past, that the letter is designed to reduce — rather than increase — the chances of war. (H/T to Ali)

One has to believe that if AIPAC could’ve gotten one of the Democrats who didn’t co-sponsor S. 1881, they would have preferred him or her to be among the original signatories of the letter. Their absence suggests that the group could run into similar resistance among Democrats even with a much toned-down letter. Indeed, a failure to get more than 59 senators to sign on to a mere letter — which, as I understand it, the administration still strongly opposes due to the baleful impact it could have on the P5+1 negotiations (both on Rouhani’s position and in light of the rapidly rising tensions with Russia over Ukraine ) — would constitute another very serious and highly embarrassing setback for AIPAC amid reports that some of its dissatisfied far-right backers are now mulling the possibility of creating a new lobby group.

But the letter appears to be part of a strategy to overcome that 59-senator threshold. By first asking recalcitrant Democrats to co-sponsor Kirk-Menendez, AIPAC knows it will likely be turned down, at least at this point. But then, by making a second “ask” — to sign a more innocuous-sounding letter — it no doubt believes that a number of Democrats who are uncomfortable about rebuffing AIPAC and/or not sounding “tough” on Iran and/or vesting complete confidence in Obama’s diplomacy strategy at a moment when it is under attack from the right over Ukraine, Syria, etc. etc., will go along in hopes that the Israel lobby will give them a gold star for campaign contribution purposes and not darken their doorway for at least a few months. It seems like a sound strategy, and, if successful, it would help demonstrate to AIPAC’s donors that its effectiveness has not diminished too much, in spite of its recent defeats.

Several points about the letter deserve highlighting:

First, AIPAC has dropped the “wag the dog” provision that called on Washington to provide all necessary help, including military support, to Israel in the event that its leaders felt compelled to attack Iran’s nuclear program. It also forgoes explicit military threats. And, of course, it is non-binding.

Second, it is ambiguous at best about whether its signers find acceptable any final agreement that permits Iran to engage in any uranium enrichment. Its ruling out any recognition of a “right to enrichment”; its demand that such an agreement preclude any “uranium pathway to a bomb;” and its insistence that any agreement cannot lead to any enrichment elsewhere in the region suggest that its authors have not given up on Israel’s “zero-enrichment” position, a stance that the administration and Tehran and Washington’s P5+1 partners all believe is completely unrealistic.

On the other hand, the assertion that there is “no reason for Iran to have an enrichment facility like Fordow” is more intriguing, depending on how you interpret its meaning. It may mean that the enrichment facility at Natanz is kosher, in which case it accepts future Iranian enrichment and demands only that an underground facility like Fordow, which is far more difficult to attack, be dismantled. Or it may mean that it objects to Fordow simply because it is an enrichment facility, thus making Natanz equally objectionable. Indeed, the ambiguity may be deliberate on AIPAC’s part, designed to appeal to those senators who choose to believe that the letter gives the administration the flexibility to accept a limited enrichment program, when, in fact, the letter’s intention is to reduce or eliminate that flexibility.

Third, the letter’s demand that any final agreement “must dismantle Iran’s nuclear weapons program” is tendentious  and provocative, not to mention factually inaccurate, simply because neither U.S. nor Israeli intelligence believes that Tehran has made a decision to build a weapon. What we know — and the Iranian authorities admit — is that it has a nuclear program with elements that could contribute to building a bomb, IF and only IF a decision is made to do so. So how do you dismantle a nuclear weapons program if your intelligence agencies believe there is no such thing?

You may see other problems with the language, the ambiguities of which, as noted above, may be intended to rope senators back into the AIPAC fold and get them to sign on to a letter that could be used against them in the future if they try to stick to the administration’s determination to exhaust diplomatic options. Much will now depend on the attitude taken by both the administration and the ten Democratic Senate chairs who came out early and strongly against a vote on Kirk-Menendez.

by Jim Lobe

The JTA is reporting a move by more than 90 House members to invite Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu to once again address a Joint Session of Congress when he comes to keynote AIPAC’s annual policy conference March 2-4. You’ll remember, of course, the last time this happened — [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

The JTA is reporting a move by more than 90 House members to invite Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu to once again address a Joint Session of Congress when he comes to keynote AIPAC’s annual policy conference March 2-4. You’ll remember, of course, the last time this happened — in 2011 — when our lawmakers thoroughly embarrassed themselves by bouncing up and down in their seats with 29 standing ovations — far more than what Obama has ever gotten from the same audience — for the Israeli leader’s 50-minute address, or an average of more than once every two minutes. (A great version of the performance, with musical accompaniment, was featured on the Israeli on-line journal, +972 Magazine, and can be seen here.)

Thus far, according to the JTA report, 79 Republicans and only 17 Democrats have signed on to the letter that is being sent to the House leadership requesting the invitation at the apparent instigation of its two main sponsors, Reps. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.) and Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) The fact that the signatories are overwhelmingly Republican naturally recalls what happened with the Kirk-Menendez bill when its primary sponsors, Mark Kirk and Robert Menendez, succeeded in rounding up only 16 of 55 Democratic senators once the administration, backed up by 10 Democratic committee chairs, made clear its opposition to the bill. Indeed, the increasingly partisan nature of Israel-related issues must be causing heartburn at AIPAC’s headquarters, which pulled the plug on Kirk-Menendez once it became clear that it could not get more Democrats to co-sponsor the bill. Now, it may be that Lamborn and Sherman can obtain many more Democratic signatories, but thus far this looks like a Republican initiative designed to embarrass and undercut the administration. Coming so soon after the Kirk-Menendez debacle, it seems doubtful that AIPAC is behind this. The question then becomes, besides Lamborn and Sherman, who is? Is it those groups, like the Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI) or the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) that publicly criticized AIPAC for making, in ECI’s words, “a fetish of bipartisanship?” Was Bibi’s new ambassador, Florida-raised Ron Dermer, involved? Did Bibi himself know? If so, and if so few Democrats were willing to sign, it would be highly embarrassing, not to say politically risky.

If Netanyahu were to appear before a Joint Session, it would be his third time, tying Winston Churchill for the record. (In addition to his appearance in 2011, Netanyahu also was given that honor when he last served as Prime Minister in 1996.) Of course, Churchill is regarded as a hero by Bibi, as he is by other neoconservatives (who extol Churchill’s imperialist and racist worldview, as well as his role in defeating Nazism), so he would no doubt be sorely tempted by an invitation, even at the risk of further alienating (if that were possible) the President of the United States. It’s worth noting that the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom has addressed a joint session of Congress eight times since 1941, while the Presidents and/or Prime Ministers of Israel, France, Mexico and Ireland are tied in second place at seven a piece. But Israeli leaders have appeared more frequently than those of any other country since Yitzhak Rabin became the first in 1976.

Lamborn represents the Colorado Springs area in Congress and clearly stands on the far right of the party. His Wikipedia entry appears not to have been written by admirers, and, aside from his alleged opposition to regulating dog-fighting, one thing that stands out in his profile given the current circumstances is his deliberate boycott of Obama’s 2012 State of the Union address to, in the words of his spokesperson, “send a clear message that he does not support the politics of Barck Obama, that they have hurt our country.” Here is his press release about his new initiative:

Congressman Lamborn Leads the Way on Inviting Israeli Prime Minister to Address Congress

Nearly 100 Members of Congress Want to Hear Netanyahu Speak

2/18/14

Nearly one hundred Members of Congress have signed a letter circulating in the US House of Representatives urging the House Leadership to invite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a Joint Session of Congress during his upcoming visit to Washington.

The bi-partisan letter, which was spearheaded by Congressman Doug Lamborn (R-CO) and Congressman Brad Sherman (D-CA) and is addressed to Speaker John Boehner and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, cites the importance of inviting the leader of “our closest ally in the Middle East” to speak to Congress at a time of widespread instability and turmoil in the region.

“Given the importance of our relationship with Israel we ask you to invite Prime Minister Netanyahu to address a Joint Session of Congress.  Doing so would send a clear message of support for Israel,” the letter reads.

“The strong support we have received for this initiative shows our close relationship with the State of Israel which is based on deeply shared values, as well as moral, historical and security ties,” said Congressman Doug Lamborn (CO-05).

Photo: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressing a joint session of US Congress, May 24, 2011

by Jim Lobe

In a remarkable demonstration of the the increasingly vulnerable state into which AIPAC appears to have thrown itself, the Israel lobby’s premier group released a new statement this afternoon clarifying that it still supports the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” Act less than 24 hours after announcing [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jim Lobe

In a remarkable demonstration of the the increasingly vulnerable state into which AIPAC appears to have thrown itself, the Israel lobby’s premier group released a new statement this afternoon clarifying that it still supports the Kirk-Menendez “Wag the Dog” Act less than 24 hours after announcing that it no longer supported an immediate vote on the legislation.

The statement came as two hard-line neoconservative (and Republican) groups — Bill Kristol’s Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI) and the Republican Jewish Coalition — implicitly denounced AIPAC for its retreat. The latest AIPAC statement, issued in the name of its president, Michael Kassen, suggests that it is being whipsawed between its Republican neoconservative supporters, who are used to getting their way in the organization, and its desire to remain in the good graces of key Democrats who have been increasingly alienated and angered by the degree to which Republicans are aggressively seeking to make Iran (and Israel) a partisan issue.

One very interesting question raised by the latest developments is whether AIPAC sought Bibi Netanyahu’s blessing before its statement yesterday opposing immediate action on the Kirk-Menendez bill. That AIPAC should feel compelled to make such a public statement just three weeks before its annual policy conference here will likely add to the impression among its members — 14,000 of whom are supposed to attend — that the group was not only defeated — at least for now — in its biggest legislative fight against a president of the past two decades, but that it also suffers from an indecisive and uncertain leadership typical of large organizations that have grown overconfident in their power when suddenly confronted with a major setback.

Here’s AIPAC’s latest:

I am writing today to correct some mischaracterizations in the press regarding our position on the Senate Iran bill. Some have suggested that by not calling for an immediate vote on the legislation, we have abandoned our support for the bill. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, we remain strongly committed to the passage of the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act. This legislation is one important part of a broad strategy that we have pursued over many years to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapons capability. As negotiations for a final agreement with Iran begin, we must—and will—continue our efforts on every front to ensure that any deal with Iran guarantees the dismantlement of its nuclear infrastructure and blocks its path to a bomb.

Yesterday, Senator Menendez—who along with Senator Kirk is the lead sponsor of the legislation—delivered a forceful speech on the Senate floor, in which he outlined what such a deal must include. In response, we issued a statement applauding Chairman Menendez’s leadership. We strongly support his assessment of the threat, his commitment to the critical role Congress must play, and his path to passage of the legislation, which includes building broad bipartisan support.

I want to thank you for your hard work thus far in earning the support of 59 senators for the Menendez-Kirk bill. We still have much work to do over the coming months. It will be a long struggle, but one that we are committed to fighting.

We will continue to work closely with friends on both sides of the aisle, in both the House and Senate, to ensure that everything is done to prevent a nuclear weapons-capable Iran.

Sincerely,

Michael Kassen
AIPAC President

Now, I personally didn’t see any press reports that asserted that AIPAC was withdrawing its support for the bill; only that it had withdrawn its support for an immediate vote on it. So what provoked this “correct[ion]?” I assume it was the remarkably hasty way in which AIPAC beat its retreat — less than two hours after Sen. Menendez delivered his floor speech in which he rued the attempt by his Republican colleagues to use the bill as a bludgeon against Democrats even as he himself stood it. While I had assumed that Menendez and AIPAC had choreographed the sequence of statements in advance — after all, Menendez was the Senate’s biggest beneficiary of pro-Israel PACS associated with AIPAC in 2012 — AIPAC’s announcement appeared to leave a number of its critical allies, such as The Israel Project (TIP), United Against a Nuclear Iran (UANI), and not least the American Jewish Committee (AJC) and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) — all of which have lobbied for immediate passage of the bill, hanging out there with a position that it had abandoned — hanging out to dry. (Remarkably, TIP’s “Daily Tip” — its news digest — completely ignored Menendez’s speech and AIPAC’s statement.)

But while those groups maintained silence Friday, ECI and RJC came out swinging, suggesting that AIPAC’s concerns about maintaining its bipartisan appeal were foolish. Here’s ECI’s statement “on the withdrawal of Democratic support for a vote on the Senate Iran sanctions bill,” issued in the name of Kristol himself:

We commend 42 [Republican] Senators for their strong letter demanding a vote on S. 1881, the bipartisan Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act, which has been cosponsored by more than half of the Senate. The bill is simple and reasonable. It would reimpose existing sanctions suspended under the interim agreement if Iran cheats; it would ensure that a final agreement requires Iran to dismantle its illicit nuclear infrastructure; and it promises to impose additional economic sanctions in the future should Iran fail to agree to a final deal that dismantles its nuclear infrastructure.

As the Senators put it in their letter to the Majority Leader, ‘Now we have come to a crossroads. Will the Senate allow Iran to keep its illicit nuclear infrastructure in place, rebuild its teetering economy and ultimately develop nuclear weapons at some point in the future?’

The answer to this question must be no. The Senate should act now to deliver that answer. It would be nice if there were universal bipartisan support for acting now to stop a nuclear Iran. But there apparently is not. And it would be terrible if history’s judgment on the pro-Israel community was that it made a fetish of bipartisanship — and got a nuclear Iran. [Emphasis added.]

And here’s what the RJC, speaking through the voice of its Congressional Affairs Director, Noah Silverman, put out:

As you know, the RJC has been the most consistent voice urging Congress to enact strong new legislation that will maximize pressure on Iran’s rogue regime to end its pursuit of nuclear weapons capability.

When Senator Kirk and Senator Menendez introduced their bipartisan bill to lock in new, crippling sanctions on Iran if the regime failed to follow through on its obligations under the Geneva accord, we launched an all-out effort to win support from Republican Senators.

Within days – thanks in large part to our efforts – 95 percent of the Senate Republicans had signed on as cosponsors of the Kirk/Menendez bill. Considering that the bill (S. 1881) has numerous Democrat cosponsors, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had pledged to permit Senate action soon when he delayed a vote on sanctions last year, success seemed within reach.

What happened next should trouble every pro-Israel American deeply. The Obama administration unleashed an unprecedented campaign to portray Kirk, Menendez and their backers as ‘warmongers.’

And they enlisted Democratic members of non-partisan pro-Israel organizations to work from within to undermine the push for Kirk-Menendez.

The Obama White House’s tactics have been disgraceful. But they’ve clearly had an effect. Democratic Kirk-Menendez cosponsors endorsed delaying a vote on the legislation they ostensibly support. Liberal news outlets attacked Republicans as ‘partisan’ for demanding a vote on bipartisan legislation.

And now the most prominent organization in the coalition of activist groups supporting Kirk-Menendez – the American Israel Public Affairs Committee – has reversed itself and is calling for Senate action on Kirk-Menendez to be delayed.

We still believe this legislation is urgently needed if there is to be any hope of convincing the Iranians to alter their course. And the good news is that Senate Republicans overwhelmingly understand this. Earlier this week, 42 GOP Senators sent Harry Reid a letter making it clear that Republicans who support Kirk-Menendez are determined to get a vote.

Now more than ever, Republican leaders in Congress will need our help. We want to thank you for everything you’ve already done – and to assure you that, no matter what others do, we are not going to give up on this effort. The stakes for our national security and for the survival of Israel are just too high.[Emphasis in the original.]

So now we have two hardline neoconservative Republican groups attacking AIPAC, albeit not by name, for mak(ing) a “fetish of bipartisanship,” as Kristol put it. And we no doubt have Democrats, like Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, who can’t be happy with the organization due to the kinds of pressure it exerted on them to oppose their own president and the fact that AIPAC had effectively aligned itself with the Congressional Republican leadership for so long. Nor can groups like TIP or UANI or the AJC be happy with AIPAC’s probable failure to consult with them before staking out its latest position. And then there’s the fact that AIPAC, which, as this blog has noted before, prefers to act behind the scenes, had not only been forced into the limelight as a result of its advocacy for the Kirk-Menendez bill, but has, through its back-to-back public statements, moved itself to center stage, even as it finds itself buffeted by both right and left. This can’t be a comfortable place for it to find itself. Indeed, it suggests not only weakness on the part of its leadership, but also the possibility of serious internal conflict.

There’s still the question of what motivated it to change its position so publicly and so ineptly? Was it the fact that the Clintons came out for delaying a vote? After all, it’s one thing to alienate Obama, who will only be around for another three years and may face a Republican majority in both houses of Congress less than a year from now; it’s another to embarrass Hillary who, it may think, has a virtual lock on the nomination with no Republican in sight who can beat her. Or was it that letter signed by the 42 Republicans, thus transforming the bill into a more clearly partisan issue, provoking Menendez, a generally very loyal Democrat (except on Cuba), to change his position, that persuaded AIPAC’s leadership that they had to move if they were going to retain any claim to bipartisanship (in which case Kirk, who appears to have organized the letter, made a very, very serious mistake)? Or did Netanyahu, whose national security establishment appears increasingly reconciled to and comfortable with the possibility of a limited Iranian nuclear program, come to a similar realization? Or did the White House say it wasn’t going to send any Cabinet-level official to the AIPAC conference March 2-4 unless it backed off the bill, as Peter Beinart suggested  in Haaretz last week? Or all of the above?