As pro-Palestinian pols win primaries, US Jews ask if it’s ‘a wave or a ripple’
This summer has been a good one for pro-Palestinian candidates running for the US Congress.Joel Pollak: Democrats Are Bringing a New Anti-Israel Caucus to Congress
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has slammed Israel’s West Bank occupation, shocked the political world with her upset victory over veteran congressman Joe Crowley for his New York House seat.
Illhan Omar, who has called Israel an “apartheid regime,” won the Democratic nomination for a Minnesota House seat.
And Rashida Tlaib, a Palestinian-American who calls for a one-state solution that would spell the end of Israel as a Jewish state, and for gutting US military aid to Israel, won her party’s nomination for a Michigan House seat.
All of these candidates are heavily favored to win the general election in their reliably blue districts. And they are posing a question for Washington’s pro-Israel establishment: What does their collective ascendance forebode about the future of US-Israel relations?
The answer depends on who you ask. Pro-Israel operatives who focus on maintaining bipartisan support for the Jewish State insist it means very little. Presuming they go to Capitol Hill, they will be just three of 535 members of Congress.
Despite Israel’s socialist roots, the far-left now identifies with the Palestinians, overlooking the brutality of Palestinian terror, the pervasive antisemitism of Palestinian society, and the authoritarian rule of both the Islamist Hamas regime in Gaza and the secular Palestinian Authority.J Street drops endorsement of Michigan candidate for backing one-state solution
In May, after Hamas used a phony “mass protest” to in an effort to breach the Gaza border and attack Israeli civilians, AOC sided with the terrorist group, calling the Israeli response a “massacre” — even though nearly all of the 62 killed were Hamas operatives. In July, she stated that while she believed “absolutely in Israel’s right to exist,” she was opposed to the “occupation of Palestine.” She could not, when pressed, explain what she meant by the term, which the far-left often uses to refer to all of the State of Israel.
But there are two incoming representatives even more hostile to Israel than AOC.
One of them is Ilhan Omar, a Somali-born state representative who won the Democratic Party primary for Minnesota’s 5th congressional district — the seat being vacated by Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) — this week. In the past, Omar has referred to Israel as an “apartheid regime.” In 2014, during a war in Gaza, Omar tweeted: “Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.”
More recently, like AOC, Omar has deployed pro-Israel boilerplate to placate voters, donors, and critics. Earlier this month, she told a candidate forum: “I support a two-state solution. It is going to be important for us to recognize Israel’s place in the Middle East and the Jewish people’s rightful place within that region.” She also said that she opposed the “Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions” (BDS) movement.
But in the state legislature, she opposed a bill against boycotts of Israel and urged divestment from Israel bonds.
The other is Rashida Tlaib, a Palestinian-American who won the crowded Democratic Party primary for the 13th congressional district of Michigan last week. She promptly launched a series of anti-Israel tweets, apparently in response to events in the Middle East, where Hamas launched nearly 200 rockets at Israeli civilians and the Israeli air force responded by targeting Hamas military infrastructure.
In the past, Tlaib supported Palestinian terrorist Rasmea Odeh’s bid to fight deportation, and is backed by anti-Israel Palestinian-American activist and Women’s March leader Linda Sarsour, who called for “jihad” against the Trump administration.
Curiously, Tlaib seems to be facing an onslaught of criticism from within the Palestinian-American community, for whom ordinary participation in American politics is seen as a form of selling out. One of her defenders tweeted that for Tlaib, “The first fight was for Palestine, always Palestine.”
J Street has withdrawn its endorsement of Rashida Tlaib, a Democratic candidate for Congress in Michigan who recently called for a one-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Tlaib, who is the daughter of Palestinian immigrants, also called for a reduction in foreign aid to Israel. She is likely to win her Detroit-area district.
J Street, the liberal Mideast policy organization, advocates for a two-state solution to the conflict, among other things. Tlaib had previously received the endorsement of the lobby’s JStreetPAC based on her support for two states.
“After closely consulting with Rashida Tlaib’s campaign to clarify her most current views on various aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, we have come to the unfortunate conclusion that a significant divergence in perspectives requires JStreetPAC to withdraw our endorsement of her candidacy,” read a statement from J Street Friday afternoon.
“While we have long championed the value of a wide range of voices in the discussion of the conflict and related issues, we cannot endorse candidates who come to the conclusion that they can no longer publicly express unequivocal support for a two-state solution and other core principles to which our organization is dedicated,” the statement said.
Morton Klein: Jonathan Neumann's Epic Takedown of 'Tikkun Olam'
Jonathan Neumann’s new book, “To Heal the World?: How the Jewish Left Corrupts Judaism and Endangers Israel,” is an important examination of the distorted theology employed by the radical left to lead many Jews astray.
Neumann describes how radical Jewish leftists distorted and turned a minor phrase, “tikkun olam” (repairing the world), into a left-wing political “social justice” universalist theology that is hostile to Israel and traditional Judaism, and which sympathizes with the Jewish people’s enemies.
Neumann explains that “tikkun olam” theology is relatively new, and is not grounded in traditional Judaism or an honest reading of Jewish sources. “Tikkun olam” is never mentioned in the Torah/Bible. The left takes occasional, insignificant mentions of the words “tikkun olam” in other Jewish writings out of context and reinterprets them.
For instance, a prayer (the “Aleynu“) that expresses the hope that G-d will establish his kingdom over the whole world, and that one day everyone will praise G-d and obey G-d’s laws, is reinterpreted by the left as a call for man to engage in left-wing political activism.
Neumann recounts how the Jewish Reform, Reconstructionist, and Renewal movements have rejected traditional Judaism in favor of universalist, left-wing “social justice.” However, their departure from tradition repelled some Jews who had a connection to or understanding of traditional Judaism. Thus, leftist leaders adopted a different approach: They falsely and deceptively claimed that revolutionary, left-wing “social justice” was really always part of the Jewish tradition. Thus “tikkun olam” theology was adopted by the liberal Jewish movements, and succeeded in turning many American Jews against the actual teachings of their own faith, and against the Jewish state.
“Tikkun olam” theology fixates on the Biblical creation story to support universalism above all else. Under this theology, there is nothing unique about, or even a need for, the Jewish people, because everyone came from the same creator.