Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, November 13, 2020

The US' first vice president of color was a Zionist (and a Republican)

Kamala Harris may become the first woman vice president of color, but she is not the first VP of color. That distinction goes to Charles Curtis:

Charles Curtis (January 25, 1860 – February 8, 1936) was an American attorney and Republican politician from Kansas who served as the 31st vice president of the United States from 1929 to 1933 becoming the first minority to hold the office and Senate Majority Leader from 1924 to 1929. A member of the Kaw Nation born in the Kansas Territory, Curtis was the first person with any Native American ancestry and with acknowledged non-European ancestry to reach either of the highest offices in the federal executive branch. He is the highest-ranking enrolled Native American ever to serve in the federal government. He is the most recent Executive Branch officer to have been born in a territory rather than a state.

It turns out that Curtis was also a fervent Zionist - and he was instrumental in getting the US government to support the Balfour Declaration. From JTA, October 22. 1928:

Senator Charles Curtis, Republican candidate for vice-president, was disclosed as the prime mover of the resolution adopted by Congress in June 1922 endorsing the Balfour Declaration, in an article by Max Rhoade, published in the current issue of the “Jewish Tribune.”

The writer, who lives in Washington, has, he declares, intimate knowledge of the history preceding the adoption of the resolution.

“The most important and interesting of these facts is that neither Lodge nor Fish but quite another person was the original sponsor of the resolution in Congress” writes Mr. Rhoade, “and it was his preparatory work that paved the way for its ultimate adoption. This ‘person’ was none other than Senator Charles Curtis of Kansas, who is now Republican candidate for Vice-President of the United States.

“The story goes back to the fall of 1921 when a certain Orthodox rabbi, Simon Glazer by name, then Rabbi of the United Synagogue of Greater Kansas City, decided, in his fervent Jewish patriotism and zeal, to establish some contacts which might lead to an official pronouncement of sympathy with the carrying of the Balfour Declaration by the United States Government through its then Republican administration, and thus clear the way for ratification of the Palestine Mandate. Gradually, Rabbi Glazer’s thoughts materialized into the idea of a resolution of Congress. Though untrained in the school of politics or diplomacy, the rabbi was gifted with rare instincts in that direction. He proceeded to establish acquaintance with Governor Henry J. Allen of Kansas, and laid his thoughts fully before him. The governor was completely won over by Rabbi Glazer’s enthusiasm and deep sincerity, and promised to exert every effort to enlist Senator Curtis of that State.”

Mr. Rhoade contnues: “Senator Curtis thereupon entered into negotiations with the State Department regarding the resolution, with the object of obtaining full sanction of that department. He took the matter up direct with Secretary of State Hughes. While these negotiations were still pending, a delegation of New England Zionists, under the direction of the Zionist Organization of America, presented the plan of such a resolution to Senator Lodge. Elihu D. Stone, assistant U. S. attorney, of Boston, now chairman of the National Executive Committee of the Zionist Organization of America, took the leading part in organizing this delegation and arranging the conference with Lodge. It was agreed as a result of this conference that Senator Lodge, owing to his position as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, should officially introduce the resolution. Senator Curtis readily consented to this arrangement in his desire to do anything that might facilitate the accomplishment of the object in view. Thus Senator Lodge became known as the official sponsor of the resolution, while Senator Curtis remained in the background. Curtis’ negotiations with the State Department, however, had already prepared the way for the resolution when Senator Lodge appeared on the scene.”

After the Hebron pogroms against Jews in 1929, Curtis said:

The Jews of Palestine have my sincere sympathy. It is my earnest hope that order may be speedily restored and the Jews fully protected in all their rights I hope the good work of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency may be amply rewarded. I know the officials of our government will do everything possible to protect American citizens in Palestine.

He also was at the launch of the American Palestine Committee, a Zionist lobbying group started in 1932.

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Obituaries about Saeb Erekat invariably emphasized how dedicated he was to peace, to a two state solution, and to finding a way to end the conflict.

Typical is this NPR article:

But Erekat had his admirers, including Joel Singer, one of his Israeli negotiating counterparts during the Oslo process.

"I see him as a courageous Palestinian who devoted his life to reaching peace with Israel, peace on terms that would be acceptable to the Palestinian people," said Singer. "But yet unlike some other Palestinian groups that don't want to reach peace with Israel, he genuinely wanted to reach peace and never gave up."

Peace did not come in Erekat's lifetime – something he reflected on in his conversation with NPR in 2010.

"We have come a long way. We have come a long way," Erekat told NPR, referring to both Palestinians and Israelis. "We are different people. Unfortunately, we don't have peace."

Current and former Western leaders similarly described Erekat as dedicated to peace, This statement from Tony Blair is typical:

Saeb Erekat and I had many differences over the peace process and how to bring it to a successful conclusion. But I never doubted for one moment his sincerity, his knowledge or his deep and abiding commitment to the Palestinian people and to peace. He was a legendary negotiator, aware of every intricacy and detail of the ‘two state solution’ and a tireless advocate of it. He dedicated his life to the cause of an independent sovereign State of Palestine and it is tragic that he never lived to see it come into being. But when it does, he will remembered as one of its core architects. My thoughts and condolences are with his family. May he rest in peace.

Now look at the obituary from the PLO's Negotiations Affairs Department, that Erekat headed:

With heart-wrenching sadness and pain, today we bid farewell to Dr. Saeb Erekat. The fierce fighter, proud patriot, human being, compassionate father, friend, and an exceptional colleague. Especially in this challenging phase in our cause's history, we will miss a stubborn and dedicated fighter for Palestine.
Dr. Erekat devoted his life to defending and fighting for the achievement of our right to freedom, self-determination, national independence, and the return of Palestine's refugees. His memory will remain eternal enlightening his people's conscience until the fulfillment of what he fought with them to achieve: the end of Israel's brutal occupation and the realization of Palestine's independence with Jerusalem as its capital.
We pray to Almighty God to bless Dr. Erekat with the breadth of his mercy and to dwell in his spaciousness. Our sincere condolences to Dr. Erekat's family and the people of Palestine. May God grants all of us patience and solace to bear this significant loss.

Not a word about "peace" or "dialogue" or "two state solution".

Similarly, see what PA president Abbas said about him:

The President of the State of Palestine, Mahmoud Abbas, today, Tuesday, in his name and in the name of the Palestinian leadership and the government, mourned to the masses of our people and our Arab and Islamic nation, and friends in the world, the great national leader and the martyr of Palestine, the Secretary of the Executive Committee of the PLO, a member of the Central Committee of Fatah, and a prominent academic Saeb Erekat, who spent his life as a fighter and a hard negotiator defending Palestine, its cause, its people, and its independent national decision.

President Abbas said, "The departure of the brother and friend, the great fighter, Dr. Saeb Erekat, represents a great loss to Palestine and our people, and we feel deeply saddened by his loss, especially in light of these difficult circumstances facing the Palestinian cause."

The president added, "Palestine today misses this patriotic leader, and the great fighter who had a great role in raising the banner of Palestine high and defending the rights of our people and their national constants, in all international forums, and he had a prominent role when he was a member of the Palestinian delegation at the Madrid conference for peace in 1991, Minister of Local Government, and his tireless work as Chairman of the Negotiations Department of the PLO, and a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council for two consecutive terms, culminating in his tenure as a secretariat and membership of the Executive Committee of the PLO."

And the president added: Our people will remember the great deceased Dr. Saeb Erekat, the righteous son of Palestine, who stood at the forefront defending the causes of his homeland and his people in the fields of work and the national struggle and in the international arena."

He mentions the Madrid peace conference but doesn't say anything about Erekat and peacemaking.

It seems that people project their own feelings and desires onto Erekat and by reading their descriptions of him, they are really describing themselves.

The PLO leaders, by virtually ignoring the word "peace" when describing Erekat, show that they are the ones who never wanted real peace. To them, associating Erekat with peace would be an insult, not a compliment.

(h/t Daniel Rubenstein)

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Alice Rothchild is a retired doctor who is a prominent member of Jewish Voice for Peace and a founder of the "JVP Health Advisory Council" whose sole purpose is to use health as an issue to bash Israel.

Yesterday, she tweeted that she gave a guest presentation to the Harvard University course entitled Medicine and Conflict: The History & Ethics of Healing in Political Turmoil. Of course, her lecture was an anti-Israel and antisemitic polemic disguised as an evenhanded view of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict through the lens of her own hate.

Here is the slide where she sums up her point:

The "crux of the problem" and the "fundamental issue" is the racism of Israeli Jews.

The students don't learn that Israeli Jews are trying to protect themselves from being stabbed, run over and blown up. They don't learn that before the intifada there was no border that stopped Palestinian Arabs from getting full access to the best health care. They don't learn that the Palestinian Authority is now stopping their people from getting treated in Israeli hospitals. They don't learn that Israeli Arabs get identical health care as Israeli Jews, which would be impossible if Israeli Jews are "racist."

No, all they learn from bigots like Rothchild is that Jews are racists who spitefully cause Palestinian Arabs pain just for the sheer fun of it.

And, of course, the logical conclusion is that these Jews are on the verge of committing genocide and ethnic cleansing, Because that is the fundamental nature of the evil Israeli Jew.

After her brainwashing session, she reports that she had "lots of positive response" from 93 participants.

She wants to give that lecture to other college courses as well.

Israel-haters try to find any way to push their message of hate. Rothchild uses her medical credentials.

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11/12 Links Pt2: An encounter with Rabbi Sacks, a Jewish leader who inspired a generation; WHO Meeting Deviates From Coronavirus to Single Out Israel As Violator of Health Rights

From Ian:

An encounter with Rabbi Sacks, a Jewish leader who inspired a generation

Rabbi Sacks was wise, kind and humble. We discussed many things, yet there was one piece of advice that has guided my thoughts ever since, embodying within it much of who Rabbi Sacks was. I was at a crossroads, I explained. I was learning for the rabbinate, beginning law and philosophy studies, and was passionate about Jewish leadership and Israeli politics. I expected to hear the advice Rabbi Sacks received from the Rebbe, maybe even hoping for it. I was positive that I had flown to London to hear that I must be a rabbi. But Rabbi Sacks was truly a leader, a creator of leaders. Above all, he knew how to translate the message, for a whole generation, and for each person individually.

Rabbi Sacks did not in fact advise me to be a rabbi. Israel is unique, he said. Its public sphere is not shaped by rabbis in the same way that Diaspora communities are. Listening to my story, he crafted the befitting message. The Rebbe had told Rabbi Sacks to become a community rabbi and train Jewish leaders. If I wanted to help shape the Jewish future, Rabbi Sacks claimed, being a rabbi, for me, may not be the only path.

Rabbi Sacks challenged me to seek the platforms to promote Judaism and Israel, and shape Jewish peoplehood in the special arena of a Jewish homeland. Jewish leadership in every place and generation takes different form. I should dedicate my life to Klal Yisrael by seeking those spaces in which the Jewish people need public servants for tomorrow.

Beyond his unbounded wisdom, humility and kindness, Rabbi Sacks uniquely carried the mantle of Jewish translation. Second-century tanna Rabbi Yehuda Hanasi translated the Oral Torah and kept it alive. The Rambam translated Judaism to philosophy. Rabbi Sacks translated Judaism to the world, and the world to Judaism.

He taught the UK, the queen and all who would listen, that Judaism promoted a particularism, a “dignity of difference.” And he translated a message of universalism to Judaism, inspiring a generation of Jews to try and “heal a fractured world.” During my brief, yet powerful encounter with Rabbi Sacks, he translated the advice he received in his youth, to help guide my life, recognizing the dignity and difference in everyone. May his memory be a blessing for all of us.

Remembering Jewish giants: Adin Steinsaltz, Jonathan Sacks – opinion

In the last month, two Jewish giants left us: Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz-Even Yisroel, and Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. Each in their own way left a great impression on the Jewish people and the world around them.

Rabbi Steinsaltz’s remarkable intellectual bounty included opening the Talmud with his historic translation. He authored dozens of works, including a modern commentary on the Torah synergizing classical scholarship with contemporary insights.

Rabbi Sacks’s strength was in connecting two worlds: the depth of Jewish scholarship and contemporary thought. He was able to bridge the secular bastion of Oxford and the world of Torah, becoming an articulate spokesman of Judaism to Jews and non-Jews, even on the airwaves of the BBC.

Both did not fit the conventional Jewish religious mold. While continuing to remain committed to Halacha, Jewish law, they were able to reach beyond the world of Orthodox Judaism and impact the broader society.

They shared the quality of individualism. Steinsaltz was the classic enfant terrible, always willing to challenge traditional thought. Some years ago, I organized the National Conference on Jewish and Contemporary Law headlined by Rabbi Steinsaltz and former US Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

Israel Advocacy Movement: DEBATE: Is anti-Zionism anti-Semitism?

Panellists… Joseph Cohen - Israel Advocacy Movement Dr Ronald Mendel - Palestine Museum Joanna Phillips - Jewdas Sabrina Miller Moderator: Izzy Posen

The quote is actually not far off from what Nasrallah said in a speech on Wednesday:

22-Nasrallah: Our stance on Israel is clear, and we repeat it on all occasions, particularly on Quds Day -- Israel, from an ideological perspective, is an illegal, cancerous, demonic entity. This won't change w/time. Israel is just a band of criminal settler gangs
— David A. Daoud (@DavidADaoud) November 11, 2020

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If Reinstated, Corbyn Vows To Minimize Carbon Footprint On Way To Lay Wreaths At Terrorist Graves (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

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: Credit: Chris McAndrew via Wikimedia Commons

London, November 12 - Ousted UK Labour Chairman Jeremy Corbyn continued to argue today in favor of revoking his expulsion from the party following an inquest finding that he failed to address burgeoning antisemitism in Labour's ranks, with a promise to do better by his constituents and all of Britain by demonstrating greater ecological sensitivity than before while engaged in paying tribute to antisemitic practitioners of violence as a political tool.

An investigation by Britain's non-partisan Equality and Human Rights Commission determined last month that under Corbyn, Labour failed to take adequate measures to deal with rampant manifestations of Jew-hate among its members, and even attempted to obstruct investigative and remediation efforts that did take place. The EHRC verdict imposes legally-binding actions on Labour as a result, and the party revoked Corbyn's membership; he had previously stepped down as its leader following an embarrassing electoral showing for Labour earlier this year, with analysts attributing much of the damage to the party's poor handling of the antisemitism allegations.

Now, however, the former chairman has vowed to fight his removal. He announced today (Thursday) that while he acknowledges errors and oversights in the party's bureaucratic bungling of the issue, he remains "opposed to racism in all its forms, including antisemitism," and resolved both to appeal to the courts to reinstate him as a Labour member and to improve his conduct as a beacon of hope and tolerance by committing to use only ecologically sound methods of travel when visiting the burial sites of murderous antisemites to lay memorial wreaths.

"I do not give up easily, as my friends in Hamas and Hezbollah can attest," he insisted. "I maintain my staunch support for peace-loving movements from Ireland to Idlib, where Western imperialism has destroyed lives and civilizations and led to prejudiced depredations of the worst sort. Simply ask Basher Assad what he thinks of the issue and you will get a similar answer. But I understand I have had, in my zeal for universal human equality, some blind spots, and I resolve to correct them. No longer will I mindlessly board a polluting aircraft when I pay my respects to fallen revolutionaries who all happen to have Jewish blood on their hands. The environment represents our future, and we cannot squander the glorious socialist future that awaits us by failing to protect the environment."

"I deplore bigotry in all its forms, as I have said repeatedly over the years," he intoned. "Systemic racism is real: it's what you get when policies result in discriminatory outcomes across the board. But let us not rush to assume that when my policies and rhetoric result in dead Jews across the world, that has any bearing on whether I harbor a single antisemitic bone in my body. That is a distraction from the real issues, one of which is why Jews conspired to paint me as condoning, even encouraging, rhetoric that calls them manipulative and sinister."

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11/12 Links Pt1: Arabs states draw closer to Israel to counter non-Arab powers Turkey and Iran; Iran storing 12 times more enriched uranium than nuke deal allows

From Ian:

Arabs states draw closer to Israel to counter non-Arab powers Turkey and Iran

The decision by three Arab states to make peace with Israel can be credited both to efforts by the Trump administration and the recognition by these Sunni states that their security would improve against the ongoing threats they face from Turkey and Iran.

Iran and its proxies interfere with Arab states while promoting their Shi’ite revolutionary ideology; likewise, Turkey pushes its Sunni revolutionary ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood throughout the region.

Turkey and Iran look to overthrow the Sunni Arab states that do not align with them, such as Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states. The normalization deals between the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Sudan have greatly upset Turkey and Iran, which ideologically view Israel as the enemy.

“Iran is a tactical enemy for the Gulf states because the regime is controlled by Shi’ite fanatics who want to destroy the Sunni regimes in the Gulf,” Harold Rhode, a longtime former adviser on Islamic affairs in the U.S. Defense Department of Defense who was in Iran during the early months of the Iranian Islamic Revolution, told JNS.

Israel’s burgeoning alliance with the Gulf Arab states reverses the situation the Jewish state had found itself in during the first few decades of its existence. In its early years during the successive Arab-Israeli conflicts, it relied on an alliance of non-Arab states, such as Turkey and Iran, as its only regional allies. However, this all began to change when the pro-Western Shah of Iran was overthrown in the Islamic Revolution in 1979 and has increased under the Islamist anti-Israeli policies of Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Rhode predicts that if the Iranian people successfully toppled the current regime, it would most likely be transformed into a country focused on rebuilding and re-establishing its connections with the world.

JCPA: Arab Normalization and Palestinian Radicalization: The Tug of War over the Middle East Peace Process

The Palestinian leadership has denounced the Abraham Accords signed by its longtime Arab allies and financial donors; they are now pivoting toward the radical, terror-sponsoring Iranian and Turkish regimes. Palestinians in eastern Jerusalem burned UAE flags and pictures of Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed.

The Palestinian Authority’s Mufti of Jerusalem even issued a fatwa banning the citizens of Sudan, the UAE, Bahrain, or any Arab country that may normalize relations with Israel from praying at the Al‑Aqsa Mosque in the future.

Turkish President Erdoğan’s hosting of Fatah, Hamas, and other Palestinian factions has ratcheted up longtime tensions with Egypt, Jordan, and the Gulf states. Istanbul has also served as a headquarters for Hamas leaders to mobilize West Bank terror cells and carry out cyberwarfare and counter-intelligence operations against Israel.

The Arab powers have grown tired of Palestinian intransigence, corruption, and rejectionism. Saudi Arabia has criticized the Palestinian rejection of Israeli peace offers and the Palestinian boycott of any cooperation with Israel.

The Palestinian leadership should honor the Abraham Accords’ call for unconditional mutual recognition and normalization of relations with Israel as the keys to opening a viable political and diplomatic agreement that can provide enormous benefits to the Palestinian people.

A Palestinian realignment with peaceful Arab states will enable the PA to sit at the negotiating table with its Israeli neighbor without pre-conditions, accepting the Abraham Accords’ principle of normalization, mutual acceptance, and goodwill in order to maximize the prospects for a successfully negotiated compromise.

Message to US President-elect Biden: On Israel and the region, first, do no harm

The US under Obama clashed heavily and relentlessly with Israel under Netanyahu in two central areas — the Palestinian conflict and Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions.

On the Palestinians, the administration criticized any and all Israeli building over the Green Line, including in Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem such as Ramat Shlomo, rather than focusing on preventing the expansion of settlements in West Bank areas Israel would ultimately need to relinquish in order to separate from the Palestinians and maintain a Jewish, democratic state.

More significantly still, Obama and his (second) secretary of state John Kerry insistently underestimated the devastating impact on Israel, physically and psychologically, of the Second Intifada — the strategic onslaught of suicide bombings that killed 1,000 Israelis and were launched from the major West Bank cities that Israel had relinquished under the Oslo process.

Everybody recalls Netanyahu going to the US Congress in 2015 to lobby against Obama’s Iran deal; most people have forgotten Obama coming to Jerusalem’s International Conference Center (Binyanei Ha’Uma) in 2013 to lobby against Netanyahu’s ultra-skeptical approach to negotiating with the Palestinians: “Peace is possible,” the US president assured a carefully chosen audience of young Israelis. “I know it doesn’t seem that way. There will always be a reason to avoid risk, and there’s a cost for failure. There will always be extremists who provide an excuse to not act. And there is something exhausting about endless talks about talks; the daily controversies, and grinding status quo.”

On Iran, meanwhile, Obama and Kerry wanted to believe that the promise of international rehabilitation, rejoining the family of nations, would help deter the Islamist regime from pursuing the bomb. They thus negotiated and approved an agreement, many of whose core provisions apply for a limited period only, that neither fully dismantled nor even completely froze the Iranian program. The ayatollahs were allowed to improve their uranium enrichment process and refine their missile delivery systems within the terms of the 2015 deal, which they were also handsomely financially rewarded for signing.

Rapacious ideologically and territorially, the Islamists in Tehran are playing the long game. They don’t want to rejoin the family of nations. They want to sit at the head of the table, set the agenda, and bend the rest of the world to their will. This harsh truth seemed lost on the Obama presidency.

The Palestinian Leadership Keeps Standing in the Way of Peace with Israel

A Washington Post front-page article on Nov. 1 noted a "promised peace" between Israelis and Palestinians "seems further away than ever." But it's not that peace is elusive.

Palestinian leaders have rejected numerous offers for Palestinian statehood in exchange for peace with the Jewish state. They refused U.S. and Israeli proposals for statehood in 2000 at Camp David, 2001 at Taba and 2008 after the Annapolis Conference.

The 2008 offer included 93.7% of the West Bank, with land swaps for the remainder, a capital in eastern Jerusalem and a state. Palestinians rejected Obama administration efforts to restart negotiations in 2014 and 2016.

Instead, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has incited anti-Jewish violence and refused to quit paying salaries to imprisoned Palestinian terrorists and their families. This is a violation of the Oslo accords that created the Palestinian Authority more than a quarter of a century ago.

Palestinian leadership could have chosen the path of peace, as the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have recently done. They've chosen otherwise.

This past election, once again the perpetual question that inevitably came up was about 'the Jewish vote': which candidate won it -- and why does it even matter? The Democrats consistently brag that they own the Jewish vote, while the Republicans just keep on claiming that they are just on the verge of acquiring it.

This bipartisan fight over the Jewish vote can be traced back to Herbert Hoover.

In their 2012 book "Herbert Hoover and The Jews," Rafael Medoff and Sonja Wentling propose that the Jewish vote became a thing in the leadup to the 1944 presidential election, when Roosevelt ran for his 4th term, against Thomas Dewey.

A review of that book notes that in contrast to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, it was Hoover -- 10 years after he was voted out of office -- who stood up for European Jews. Hoover publicly advocated for the US to open its doors to Jewish refugees and repeatedly spoke out for Jews during the Holocaust years.

The book also reveals that although, at the time, Rabbi Stephen Wise and the Jewish leadership were wary of Republican politicians in general and of Hoover in particular, Republicans such as

Hoover himself, Senator Robert Taft and Congresswoman Clare Boothe Luce espoused strongly pro-Zionist and pro-rescue planks that were incorporated into the Republican convention’s 1944 platform. Only this threat to their monopoly of the “Jewish vote,” Medoff and Wentling argue, forced FDR and the Democrats to adopt similar planks, which have ever since remained unshakable for both parties. [emphasis added]

But why would anyone ever bother with the Jewish vote to begin with? After all, for a voting bloc, there is not a lot to recommend it:

o Jews are about 1.5% of the American population
o  That percentage is about half of what it was 50 years ago
o  And this percentage is continuing to shrink
o  As a bloc, it is not even unified -- with religious Jews tending to vote Republican and non-religious voting Democratic
o  While the vast majority of Jews support Israel, come election time Israel does not rank as a major issue

So what is the big deal?

In a 2016 video, Jonathan Sarna, a professor of American Jewish history at Brandeis, listed some of the reasons why politicians vie over the Jewish vote, even despite its small size:

o Despite their small numbers, Jews turn out to vote in high numbers -- according to one estimate, 85% of all eligible Jews vote in presidential elections
o  Jews historically contribute large amounts of money to political parties -- both Democratic and Republican.
o  Jews happen to live in key states that presidential candidates want to carry, such as Florida
o  There are indications that the Democratic party is moving away from Israel, which may present an opportunity for Republicans to capture more of the Jewish vote

Four years earlier, in a 2012 article, Shmuel Rosner added another reason why politicians consider is important, and why the attention to the Jewish vote is out of proportion to its numbers:

One would say it's the influence that Jews have in the media and their solid presence in notable positions. Others would point to their presence in celebrity circles and the arts, while still others would look to the over-representation of Jews in American politics, as advisors, consultants, pollsters, analysts and elected officials.

But you can really just call it the bellwether factor. Jews are seen as major political players because they believe that their vote really counts, because they project self-importance. They might not tip elections, but they appear as if they can.

Going further back to 2010, Pew Research found indications that the perpetual prediction of Republican gains among the Jewish vote might actually be happening:

The religious landscape is far more favorable to Republicans than was the case as recently as 2008. Half of white non-Hispanic Catholics (50%) currently identify with or lean toward the Republican Party, up nine points since 2008. Among religiously unaffiliated voters, who have been stalwart supporters of Democrats in recent elections, 29% currently identify with or lean toward the Republican Party, up from 25% in 2008 (the proportion identifying as Democrats has fallen seven points since then). And 33% of Jewish voters identify with or lean toward the Republican Party, up from 20% in 2008. [emphasis added]

In a different article, Rosner finds indications that Jews are not actually trending Republican -- they are trending libertarian, meaning that losses in the Democratic share of the Jewish vote are not necessarily translating straight into Republican gains.

But either way, Democrats cannot take the Jewish vote for granted anymore -- despite what they may say publicly.

In 2006, a Washington Post featured an article Future of Orthodox Jewish Vote Has Implications for GOP, based not only on the conservative views of Orthodox Jews, but also on their higher birth rate.

To which Jill Jacobs, executive director of T'ruah, responded:

I’m not quite ready to buy this prediction. After all, who’s to say whether today’s Orthodox babies will grow up voting Republican, Democratic, Green, or Libertarian. (or whether today’s Orthodox babies will stay Orthodox, become Renewal rabbis, or even succumb the Jews for Jesus subway ads) Still, it’s an interesting assumption that Orthodox communities will always produce kids and adults who vote according to Jewish self-interest, narrowly defined.

Yeah, and who's to say whether the Democratic party will some day stand idly by as the radical left progressives of their party openly attacked not only Israel but also accuse Israel's supporters of dual loyalty?

Then there is the argument on how to even define, and measure, the Jewish vote.

Yossie Hollander, chairman of the Israeli Institute for Economic Planning, claims Contrary to popular belief, most US Jews support Trump.

His reasoning?

No one is counting the Jewish vote correctly because they are overlooking certain components of the American Jewish population:

o Israelis who emigrate to the US and are citizens with voting rights -- estimates of the size of this group range from 600,000 to one million. Pollsters do not know how to reach and measure this group and manage to measure only a very small percentage of it.

o The ultra-Orthodox -- while people talk about them as a political component of the Jewish vote, Hollander writes that because the percentage of their children is relatively higher compared to the average population, the number of eligible voters is not the same ratio as in other populations, and so they end up not being surveyed.

o Immigrants from the former Soviet Union and their children -- there are about 350,000 of them and for a variety of reasons, they are rarely surveyed.

o The "Southwest Belt" -- Over the past 30 years, there has been massive immigration in US population centers from the north to areas in Orange County California, San Diego County, Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Atlanta, and Florida. Jews are part of this migration, and as a result, the Jewish communities there are growing rapidly, mostly in conservative areas. According to Hollander, most polling models still use the old population model.

That is a criticism of the methodology behind the polls.

Compare that with political consultant Jeff Ballabon, who takes a more sociological approach and compares the Jewish vote with the Irish vote.

Ever notice that no one talks about politicians going after "the Irish vote?"

To be statistically meaningful or politically relevant, a characteristic must impact voting behavior. For example, there are almost 35 million Americans of Irish descent, but it’s been decades since presidential campaigns engaged in sustained Irish voter outreach. That’s because it’s long been difficult to distinguish anything sufficiently unique – identifiably Irish - about their political behavior. Most vote precisely as their education, profession, income, and zip code alone would predict. The exceptions tend to be active, practicing Catholics who elevate concerns relevant to their faith...

The use of the term “Jewish” interchangeably to mean both ethnicity (like “Irish”) and faith (like “Catholic”) obfuscates it, but the same phenomenon is true for America’s Jews. [emphasis added]

According to Ballabon, a large segment of American Jews, like Irish Americans, are arguably not uniquely Jewish in their own political behavior:

The American Left seethes with enmity towards President Trump and is thoroughly wedded to the Democrats. The vast majority of Jews who follow suit proudly confirm that they do so as progressives with universal concerns; not parochially – not as part of a “Jewish Vote.” Even when they profess concern over antisemitism, it’s glaringly limited to those alleged by progressives to be malefactors. [emphasis added]

Whether radical groups put the word "Jewish" in their name or name their group after a popular saying in Pirkei Avot, that often appears to be the full extent of their identification with their fellow Jews.

Meanwhile, as for the latest fight for bragging rights to the Jewish vote, the results of this last presidential election seem to validate that the Jewish vote is no longer limited to being a Democratic cheerleading squad.

While Biden easily got the majority of the Jewish vote -- there are indications that Trump improved his numbers for the Jewish vote, which made it possible to win the state of Florida, where an AP exit poll indicated he received 43% of the Jewish vote compared to 56% for Biden. Nationally, exit polls indicated Trump received the highest percent of the Jewish vote for a Republican in decades (30%), while the Jewish vote for Biden was low for a Democrat (68%).

There are hints that the conservative element of the Jewish vote may finally be coming into its own -- and the same Jewish vote that helped Biden in some states was successfully siphoned off by Trump to win others.

But at what cost is the Jewish vote being split?

Jonathan Tobin writes that Jews in America are among Trump’s fiercest opponents – but also his most fervent supporters:

For Jewish liberals, Trump is an ally of antisemites and a proto-authoritarian whose character and conduct, statements mark him as a unique threat to democracy. They can’t understand why even one Jew would consider voting for him.

...It’s not for nothing that the Jewish Democratic Council has produced ads that more or less accuse Trump of being a Nazi and, despite the offensive nature of these analogies, have found them resonating with many liberal Jews.

Tobin points out that Jews, like the rest of America, are divided into 2 political cultures which feed off of different circles on social media -- circles that usually don't include the other side. The overwhelming majority of non-Orthodox Jews identify with the social justice agenda of the Democratic Party and think it forms the core of Judaism and place it higher as a priority than support for Israel. On the other hand, Orthodox Jews, and non-Orthodox Jews who identify as politically conservative, see support for Israel as a decisive issue.

At home, the Orthodox and conservative groups don't see Trump’s embrace of nationalism as a threat. Instead, they see it as the best way to defend Jews against the antisemitism of the intersectional left which is assuming a more prominent and vocal role in the Democratic Party.

Even Jews who are members of the same, educated classes who find Trump so offensive, share the distrust that the working-class has for the mainstream media that made it their mission to defeat him, working together with the liberal social media to censor conservative views and unflattering stories about Democrats.

The choice boils down to how much value you place on having a president who may be flawed, but is historically pro-Israel and supportive of a conservative political agenda, as opposed to the cherished hope of Trump opponents: that a moderate liberal like Biden can restore a sense of pre-2016 normalcy, while also keeping in check the Democrats’ radical wing.

In comparison with everything we hear about the need to address the divide between American Jews and Israelis, this developing rift within the Jewish community itself, as reflected by the split in the Jewish vote, is being overlooked.

But it is unlikely to go away.

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In the waning days of the Obama administration, the US pushed the UN Security Council to pass UNSC 2334, which called on all nations “to distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967” and which explicitly included "East Jerusalem" in the definition of occupied territories.

It was the first anti-Israel resolution not vetoed by the US in the Security Council since 2002. It essentially strips the rights of Jews to the entire Old City, including the Jewish Quarter, the Temple Mount and the Western Wall.

It soon became apparent that the US orchestrated this resolution and cajoled all the other Security Council members to support it, where a US abstention would allow the resolution to pass.

Clearly this was a deliberate message from the Obama administration to Netanyahu. But what role did Joe Biden have in it?

According to Vladislav Davidzon writing in Tablet magazine, Biden directly participated in pressuring Ukraine to vote for the resolution:

A wealth of evidence is now emerging that, far from simply abstaining from a UN vote, which is how the Administration and its press circle at first sought to characterize its actions, the anti-Israel resolution was actively vetted at the highest levels of the U.S. Administration, which then led a pressure campaign—both directly and through Great Britain—to convince other countries to vote in favor of it.

Tablet has confirmed that one tangible consequence of the high-level U.S. campaign was a phone call from Vice President Joseph Biden to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, which succeeded in changing Ukraine’s vote from an expected abstention to a “yes.” According to one U.S. national security source, the Obama Administration needed a 14-0 vote to justify what the source called “the optics” of its own abstention.

“Did Biden put pressure on the Ukrainians? Categorically yes,” said a highly-placed figure within the Israeli government with strong connections to Ukrainian government sources, who confirmed to Tablet that the Americans had put direct pressure on both the Ukrainian delegation—and on Poroshenko personally in Kiev. “That Biden told them to do it is 1000% true,” the source affirmed.

The phone call between Poroshenko and Biden, which took place on December 19th, has been officially acknowledged by both parties. The Ukrainian presidential administration’s official statement on the particulars of the discussion contains no mention that the settlement vote was discussed. Vice President Biden’s national security advisor Colin Kahl—who, incidentally, was one of the staffers instrumental in a failed attempt to have any mention of Jerusalem removed from the 2012 Democratic Party platform—has tweeted several denials.

But a spokesman for the Ukrainian Presidential administration pointedly refused to either confirm or deny that a section of Biden’s call not covered in the read-out consisted of the US Vice President personally lobbying Ukraine to vote “Yes” on the Security Council resolution. The American pressure campaign, according to multiple sources, went beyond the single phone call between Poroshenko and Biden; according to these sources, the Ukrainians had wanted to postpone the vote by several days as a gesture to the Israelis, but the U.S. refused.

The Jerusalem Post seems to confirm the story:

Environmental Protection Minister Ze’ev Elkin claimed to The Jerusalem Post on Monday that US Vice President Joe Biden intervened ahead of Friday's vote on UN Resolution 2334 in order to persuade Ukraine to vote in favor of the resolution.
In response, the vice president's office intensely denied Elkin's comments as utterly false.
The resolution is the first in Security Council history specifically condemning Israel for its settlement activity in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Elkin said openly that Biden spoke to the Ukrainians, and that they would have abstained had he not intervened. A source said Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's office confirmed that Biden called but would not confirm or deny that the conversation had to do with Israel.

Given that the US was working furiously behind the scenes to get this vote passed - and that the Obama administration denied that they were behind it - plus given the fact that Biden clearly called Poroshenko at the same time, indicates strongly that Colin Kahl's denials are untrue. (Dan Shapiro and Ben Rhodes also denied that the US had anything to do with the timing or text of the resolution.)

Interestingly, the Jewish Democratic Council of America, in an article about Biden's Israel record, chooses a different tack when discussing Biden's role in UNSC 2334. Instead of distancing him from the vote, they try to downplay the resolution altogether:

Fixating on a lone U.N. vote to call Obama’s commitment to Israel into question is absurd. By that standard, every previous administration’s commitment to Israel could be called into question, because every previous administration since at least 1967 abstained and voted against Israel more than the Obama administration.
What made Obama different from previous administrations in this respect was not that he broke with Israel on a U.N. vote, which all administrations have done, but that he only did it once, and on a vote with little if any practical effect on Israel.

They are conflating Security Council resolutions with regular General Assembly resolutions. And the denials by Obama administration officials that the US had anything to do with the resolution

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Continuing on on reporting by JTA that quotes Joe Biden...

November 13, 1984:

U.S. policy in the Middle East is based on myth, a leading member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee charged here yesterday.
Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, the second ranking Democrat on the committee, said the “three myths” which “propel U.S. policy in the Middle East” are “the belief that Saudi Arabia can be a broker for peace, the belief that King Hussein (of Jordan) is ready to negotiate peace, and the belief that the Palestine Liberation Organization can deliver a consensus for peace.”
Biden addressed the 59th anniversary convention of the Herut Zionists of America at the Hotel Pierre. The two-day gathering closed last night. The Senator, who was re-elected to a third six-year term last week, told the convention delegates, “My first order of business in the new Senate will be to educate my colleagues on the financial sacrifices Israel has made as a result of Camp David.”

December 12, 1984:

A leading member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee proposed Sunday night that the U.S. refinance Israel’s debt, as it has done for other countries in severe economic straits.
Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, the second ranking Democrat on the Committee, said he and Sen. Daniel Inouye (D. Hawaii) would draft a refinancing plan for Israel when the new Senate goes into session next month. Biden spoke at the Annual Metropolitan Dinner of the Zionist Organization of America here.
He noted that the U.S. has been able to refinance the debt service of other economically troubled nations such as Mexico, Nigeria and Argentina. He also chided those who complain that the U.S. provides excessive economic and military aid to Israel. "The U.S. spends over $100 billion a year on NATO and worries about spending $2.7 billion on Israel," he said.
Biden, long one of Israel’s staunchest friends in Congress, observed "that the consciousness of guilt" over what America left undone to prevent the Holocaust "does not exist for most of the younger generation. America’s most articulate spokesmen for Israel are gone, replaced by men and women with no institutional memory," he said.
"The security of every Jew in the world is tied to Israel. If Israel dies, Judaism will be in jeopardy," the Senator said, adding, "but I am confident that Israel and Judaism will survive."

March 29, 1985:

When the Senators were asked about the growing influence of Arab-Americans on Capitol Hill, Biden replied they were not the main reason that supporters of Israel had lost some fights in Congress, such as the sale of AWACS to Saudi Arabia in 1981. He said one reason is that there are no more “giants” in the Senate like Sens. Hubert Humphrey (D. Minn.), Henry Jackson (D. Wash.), Jacob Javitz (R. NY), and Frank Church (D. Idaho) who could sway the Senate with their moral force.
Biden said the major power that helped force the AWACS sale through the Senate was the large corporations with “significant economic investments” in Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries. He said they brought pressure upon Senators opposed to the sale from larger corporations well as from small companies on the local and state level. He stressed that “economic muscle” still plays a major role in foreign policy.

April 22, 1985:

Sen. Joseph Biden (D. Del.), who spoke briefly from the reviewing stand [of the Salute to Israel Parade in NYC], declared that today’s Salute to Israel Parade “is the answer to Bitburg.” He was referring to the German war cemetery in Bitburg, West Germany where, to the anguish of Jews and non-Jews, President Reagan will lay a wreath next month at the graves of German soldiers who fought in World War II, including members of the notorious Waffen SS.

March 5, 1986:

Sen. Joseph Biden (D. Del.) asserted Tuesday that a bill that would have reduced Israel’s debt to the United States by $3.5 billion was postponed in the Senate last December in the wake of the arrest of Jonathan Pollard for spying for Israel.
A bill that would have passed was withdrawn within 24 hours of Pollard’s arrest because “American public opinion shifted dramatically,” Biden told the nearly 3,000 young Jewish leaders attending the closing session of the United Jewish Appeal’s Fifth National Young Leadership Conference.
...
Biden charged that for the past two Administrations there has been a lack of “a comprehensive foreign policy” for the Middle East. He said this has allowed American public opinion to move out of focus and thereby become susceptible to reducing its commitment to Israel.
In addition, Biden noted that where Israel was once considered the “David” of the Middle East, it is now viewed as the “Goliath.” Biden also claimed that while a former generation of Jews and non-Jews viewed Israel as a moral issue because of the Holocaust, younger Americans do not.
He said the U.S. must announce that Israel is an ally and treat it like one, keeping any differences in private and not making public criticism of Israel.
Biden stressed that the strategic importance of Israel, to the United States should also be pointed out. We don’t apologize for our $100 billion commitment to NATO,” he said. “Why the hell should we apologize for a $3 billion commitment to Israel.”

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11/11 Links Pt2: David Collier: Amnesty and the left wing media, finally spill the truth; CNN Features Anti-Semite Lawrence Wilkerson; UAE and Israel building a better future for children

From Ian:

David Collier: Amnesty and the left wing media, finally spill the truth

The removal of tents We know all of these reports are lies. Last week I reported on the deception. Since then both Honest Reporting and CAMERA have produced articles exposing the depth of media lies. Israel advocacy movement also published a video dealing with the deception and focusing on the outrageous ‘ethnic cleansing’ claims of Ilhan Omar.

We all know there was no village. Instead there was a few tents, an outpost, placed illegally inside a military firing zone. Khirbet Humsa is in an area that the Palestinians agreed would be under full Israeli control. The tents were placed their illegally There were seven of them It is a military zone The grazing outpost is new – it was only created *after* Israel had declared this area out of bounds There is no village These Beduin took their case to court and lost – they were told they had no legal right to remain They have been moved dozens of times before These people know they have no legal property rights there They also know they are lying when they say they have lived there forever Nobody gave them just ‘ten minutes’ to move – the authorities have been sending them notices for YEARS. They chose to ignore it all. This is an illegal outpost. Put up provocatively in a military area. Military land v sheep is not new or restricted to Israel. There are examples the world over. Farmer (Romania), finds good grazing land – builds without permits – has to move on. Yada yada yada. Farmers (UK) need to move off land when firing exercises take place – yada yada yada. Military orders (Sth Korea) expel an ACTUAL village (not imaginary one) – yada yada yada.

The misreporting raises another issue. This from the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs:
We condemn the recent demolition of 4 homes in the occupied Palestinian Territories by the Israeli authorities.

This essential infrastructure was built with Belgian funding. Our country asks Israel for compensation or restitution for the destructions.

▶️ https://t.co/QDneY6i6R1 pic.twitter.com/r5DsUfIkHA
— 🇧🇪 Belgium MFA (@BelgiumMFA) November 6, 2020

Apparently these people receive funding and supplies from the EU. How on earth are members of the EU justifying sending funding to illegal outposts in Area C – an area under full Israeli control? This is the relevant question our media will never ask. How our irresponsible media support the conflict

Here is an ABC question. If every time that a Palestinian illegally sites a tent – even in a closed military area – Israel receives negative headline press for removing it – what do you think the outcome would be?

Hence, because our own media are tripping over themselves to publish any disinformation about Israel that they can, they enable and empower those seeking to toxify the atmosphere even further. Would these families still have deliberately sought out this ongoing confrontation (which they did) if the media were not eager to print this story?

We know that there are anti-Israel provocateurs looking for trouble in areas such as the Jordan valley. Just as we are aware the livelihood of some NGOs is dependant on frequent tensions. These are all shady groups with little or no accountability.

Our media are different. As there are real consequences to the swallowing of lies and anti-Israel propaganda that openly encourages further actions of the type – we should hold them to account for the part they play. This relationship between an anti-Israel media and willing actors inside Area ‘C’ is rarely fully understood.

Medal of Honor

The greatest comic book you’ll read this year doesn’t feature a band of intergalactic avengers staving off alien invaders. It has nothing to do with raging green beasts or playboy billionaire inventors or Norse gods locked in sibling rivalry. Unlike anything by Marvel or DC, this one isn’t bloated and flashy—it’s 11 pages long, and spends more time on facial expressions than on flashy effects. Which is just as well, given that its hero is a real-life person whose story is infinitely more moving, thrilling, and inspiring than any of the masked machos its creators helped bring to life.

He is Tibor Rubin, and when we first meet him, he is dug into the dirt on a Korean mountainside. He is alone, but the Chinese army is closing in quickly. The fire emanating from Rubin’s machine gun isn’t the silly stuff of comics; it’s a hellish tongue, lapping everything in its way, a perfect visual representation of man’s inhumanity to man.

And that’s just the first panel; by the second, we meet Rubin again, this time as a child, dressed in a prisoner’s uniform and guarded by the SS. “Rubin learned early about the depth of cruelty his fellow man was capable of,” the comic book laconically informs us, and then conjures a fat-faced German who, looking bemused, tells Rubin that none of the death camp’s Jewish prisoners will survive.

Rubin, thankfully, defies the odds, and when he’s liberated by American soldiers he makes his way stateside and, though not yet a citizen, volunteers to become an American soldier himself.

From that point on, the comic book reads like one of those gritty montages that made old-fashioned war films so fun: Outnumbered by the enemy, Rubin’s outfit, the Third Battalion, decides to withdraw to the Pusan Perimeter. But Rubin decides to stay behind, eager to give the impression that the hill is still fiercely defended by scores of men; he jumps from foxhole to foxhole, seizing carbine and machine gun and grenade, unleashing that infernal fire wherever he goes. By the time the action’s over, the comic book gives us Rubin in profile, looking stoic amid the pale gray rock and the ink-blue sky. “The number of casualties he inflicted,” the text curtly informs us, “was staggering.”

All that would’ve been enough to make anyone a hero, and Rubin’s colleagues moved to file the necessary paperwork to recommend him for the Medal of Honor. They never had the chance to submit it: On Nov. 1, 1950, Rubin and his friends were awakened by the sound of bugles, and soon learned that nearly 400,000 Chinese soldiers were upon them.

A Comforter and Friend on the Front Lines

How Rabbi Harry Richmond viewed his historic role as a chaplain in the U.S. Army

In 1917, the year the U.S. entered World War I, Rabbi Harry Richmond was a newly minted graduate of Cincinnati’s Hebrew Union College, the culmination of nine years of higher education, including a stint at the University of Chicago and an undergraduate degree from University of Cincinnati. Richmond was regarded for his keen intellect, earning the Reform seminary’s top prize for academic achievement.

At a symbolic vote of the student body, Richmond had been the only student at Hebrew Union College to cast his vote opposing the U.S. entering WWI.

That same year, after Congress passed a law designating military chaplains for various religious groups, the Jewish Welfare Board was established to attend to the spiritual needs of approximately 225,000 Jewish soldiers in the American armed forces. The board set about recruiting rabbis for chaplaincy service. According to Louis Barish in his 1962 article in The American Jewish Historical Quarterly called “The American Jewish Chaplaincy,” out of 400 English-speaking rabbis in the U.S., only 34 were endorsed—including Richmond, who received a JWB recommendation.

In July 1918, 28-year-old Richmond was the first rabbi to volunteer for military service in WWI, waiving his clerical exemption and enlisting as a private. It is unclear if Richmond had changed his position on the war, but his classmate and fellow chaplain, Rabbi Elkan Voorsanger, later expressed the concerns of himself and others—like Richmond—who volunteered to serve despite opposing the war; Voorsanger is quoted in Albert I. Slomowitz’s book Fighting Rabbis: Jewish Military Chaplains and American History:

“I am entering this war to register my protest against the war,” he wrote. “I can do that in no better way than to go to the front to alleviate the suffering of those who know not why they go.”

Over the next 25 years, Richmond would serve as an Army Chaplain on the battlefield in France, witness the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, and serve as the only Jewish chaplain to represent the U.S. Army overseas in both WWI and WWII.

Vic Rosenthal's weekly column

In the Fall of 2012, Bibi Netanyahu and then Minister of Defense Ehud Barak had a plan to destroy Iran’s capability to make nuclear weapons. The plan was not executed because of opposition from the Cabinet, the Israeli security establishment, and of course the Obama Administration, which was facing an election and secretly negotiating with Iran toward what would become the JCPOA.

The “nuclear deal” that was ultimately signed in 2015 provided Iran with cash for its Hezbollah terrorists and its expansion into Iraq and Syria, as well as fully legitimizing Iran’s nuclear project in 10-15 years. Even before then, the JCPOA lacked adequate safeguards to prevent cheating, and Iran took advantage of the loopholes to pursue development of uranium and plutonium bombs.

The Obama Administration was following a playbook developed – in part by advisor Ben Rhodes – in the 2006 Iraq Study Report, which intended to extricate the US from Iraq and bring about overall stability in the region by appeasing and empowering Iran and Syria (there was still an independent Syria then) at Israel’s expense. It seemed to me then, and still does today, that the negative consequences for Israel from the plan were not simply an unfortunate byproduct of it, but rather a desired outcome.

President Trump took the opposite tack, choosing to weaken Iran and empower America’s traditional allies in the region, Israel and the Sunni Arab states. He took the US out of the JCPOA, re-imposed sanctions on Iran, recognized Israel’s sovereignty in the Golan and Jerusalem (the 2006 plan envisioned Israel transferring the Golan to Syria), and encouraged an alliance between Israel and the Sunni Arab states.

If Trump’s policy to build up a strong countervailing power while weakening and isolating Iran would continue, then it might be possible to force Iran to give up its nuclear dreams without military action. But if, as seems likely, Joe Biden takes office as President of the US on 20 January 2021, then everything may change.

The following is sheer fantasy. I don’t know what the PM of Israel is thinking, I am not acquainted with anyone in the Trump Administration, the Biden team, or Israel’s defense establishment, and I have no insider knowledge about anything.

By Chanukah 5781 [10 December 2020], it became clear to the Prime Minister of Israel that President-elect Biden, although personally not particularly anti-Israel, was assembling a team heavy with individuals that were less than sympathetic to our point of view, like Susan Rice, Jake Sullivan, and Daniel Benaim. Biden had also made appointments that were concessions to the extreme left wing of the Democratic party that had almost defeated him in the race for the nomination. Intelligence reports showed a continuous flow of communications between Biden and the headquarters of the group led by Barack Obama, located only about 3 km. from the White House.

The PM of Israel was worried. Biden had already announced his intention to re-engage with Iran, which would probably mean a loosening of sanctions. The PM knew that the Iranians had recently made significant progress toward the development of a nuclear arsenal. He had no confidence that the Biden Administration would have the will to stop them; he could imagine a repeat of the JCPOA process, in which Iran made a fool of US negotiators.

Israel would have to stop Iran, or nobody would.

The PM knew that during the Obama Administration the Americans considered Israel a prime target for intelligence-gathering. The Americans had been operating a radar installation in Israel since 2008 that could spot air activity anywhere in the country, even small drones. Electronic communications in Israel’s defense headquarters, the Kiriya in Tel Aviv, have been tapped for some time. It would be very hard to take almost any kind of military action against Iran without the Americans finding out.

The PM decided that if Israel were to take action, it would have to be before 20 January, when Biden would be inaugurated. Indeed, considering the precedent of the incoming Obama team which aborted the ground invasion of Gaza in January 2009, it would have to be before Biden’s people got themselves organized. Otherwise, he was sure the Americans would act, diplomatically or even kinetically, to prevent Israel from striking the Iranian nuclear program.

Such an operation would not be simple or easy. The Iranian assets that would need to be destroyed are buried deeply underground and defended by surface-to-air missile batteries. The moment Israel attacked, the Iranians would unleash Hezbollah in Lebanon, which had some 130,000 short range rockets and longer range missiles, some with precision guidance. They are fitted on mobile launchers and ensconced in the homes of civilians. Hezbollah has plans to invade across the northern border, and kill Israelis and take hostages.

But the IDF has been preparing for this for some time. There is a plan called tochnit zayin [Plan Z]. The Prime Minister convened his mini-security cabinet, a subset of a subset of the cabinet, including the Minister of Defense and several others, together with the IDF Chief of Staff and a few key officers, including the Air Force and Navy commanders. The meeting took all of 15 minutes. The clock began to tick on tochnit zayin.

The IDF announced that it would carry out a defensive exercise on our northern border. It was not a massive exercise, and only a small number of reserve units were called up. Several days later an Israeli submarine moved into position in the Persian Gulf (or, if you prefer, the Arabian Gulf). At 0200 on the 4^th day of Hanukah, the submarine fired a missile almost straight up. The missile contained a small nuclear bomb designed to maximize the production of gamma rays, and it exploded high in the stratosphere at an altitude of about 100 km. A person on the ground might see a small dot of light if he knew where to look; he would not be injured or even feel anything.

Most of the gamma radiation from the explosion was absorbed by the air. The gamma rays ripped electrons from atoms in the air, and the electrons spun downward; their motion in the Earth’s magnetic field produced a powerful pulse of electromagnetic radiation, lasting only one millionth of a second but containing an enormous amount of energy. Much of Iran was blanketed by this pulse. Electrical conductors that it passed over had high voltages induced in them, and semiconductor devices, especially those connected to power lines or antennas, were reduced to inert lumps of silicon. Telephone and cellular networks, broadcasting equipment, internet routers, the power grid, and countless other things became inoperative. Even emergency generators, with their solid-state controls, didn’t start.

When Israeli aircraft arrived to bomb the nuclear sites with multiple bunker-busters, Iranian radar was dark. When eyewitnesses tried to alert their commanders, they were unable to do so. When they finally drove to Teheran to inform their leaders (most vehicles were still operative, especially older ones), their leaders could not communicate with each other, or, importantly, with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Lebanon is too close to Israel to receive the same treatment, but units of Israeli special forces penetrated its borders and destroyed communications infrastructure and cut cables at key points. A bombing campaign followed, aimed primarily at the nervous system of the country – the power grid and communications systems. In 2006, the IDF was surprised by its inability to intercept and interrupt communications over Hezbollah’s fiber optic network. Since then, it’s been documented and mapped. It was quickly destroyed. Since 2006 the IDF has collected good intelligence about Hezbollah’s installations, including the hiding places of mobile rocket launchers and weapons depots. Many of them were destroyed almost immediately.

The Hezbollah leadership was targeted; unlike in 2006, the IDF knew where they were and was able to kill them. Without a head and a nervous system, and without support from Iran, Hezbollah was demoralized, and was unable to sustain a massive rocket attack. There was some damage to Israel’s home front, but Iron Dome and Arrow antimissile systems significantly reduced it.

All this happened in a couple of days. By the time Hanukah was over, the Lebanese government – less Hezbollah – was suing for peace. In Iran, economic paralysis had begun to set in.

The US and the Russians, who had been informed only an hour before the operation, offered to help Iran and Lebanon to rebuild, as did Israel and the Gulf states – on condition that the mullahs in Iran and what was left of Hezbollah in Lebanon would have no role in the government. They accepted.

By the time Joe Biden became president, he faced a whole new Middle East.

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