The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) is peddling lies about Barack Obama’s record on Israel and, in so doing, harming the Jewish State.
That was the emphatic message of several speakers yesterday at the National Jewish Democratic Council policy conference in Washington, DC.
Here’s Mel Levine, former Congressman and member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and one of Barack Obama’s Middle East foreign policy advisors: “I have never seen anything … that resembles this type of outrageous slander directed against Barack Obama being led by the Republican Jewish Coalition.”
Here’s Shelley Berkley, a Jewish Congresswoman from Nevada: “You cannot dissect and destroy and split our community in the interests of getting someone elected — and that’s exactly what they are doing.”
What has Berkley and Levine and many others in the Jewish community so upset is the push-like polling that RJC is conducting in swing states like Florida, New Jersey, and Ohio, phoning voters, and, after ascertaining that they’re Jewish, falsely linking Obama to the PLO and other anti-Israel forces.
As the Jewish Week reports, citing the AP:
Jewish voters in Florida were contacted by callers claiming to be survey researchers asking if they would be influenced if they “learned that Obama has donated money to the Palestinian Liberation Organization.”
Jewish voters in other states were also asked: “What if you were told that the president of Iran endorsed Obama?” and “What if you were to find out that Obama supported a united Jerusalem and then switched his opinion and believed in a divided Jerusalem?”
All of which are outright lies.
Obama has never donated money to the PLO.
Ahmadinejad has never endorsed Barack Obama. (I found this statement direct from Ahmadinejad on Presstv.ir, the English language Iranian international news network: “I have never voiced support for Barack Obama. I merely said they would not allow him to become the US President,” adding: “It makes no difference to us who wins [the US election].”)
And in any event, Obama is on record, in absolutely unambiguous terms, opposing Ahmadinejad and everything he stands for. Here’s a recent AFP article:
CLEARWATER, Florida (AFP) — Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Tuesday condemned Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s anti-Zionist and anti-US remarks in his speech at the UN General Assembly.
“I strongly condemn President Ahmadinejad’s outrageous remarks at the United Nations, and am disappointed that he had a platform to air his hateful and anti-Semitic views,” Obama said in a statement.
“The threat from Iran’s nuclear program is grave. Now is the time for Americans to unite on behalf of the strong sanctions that are needed to increase pressure on the Iranian regime,” Obama said.
And, finally, Obama has not flipped on his Jerusalem policy, and does not in any way believe in a “divided Jerusalem.” Here’s Obama’s recent statement to CBS news:
My policy hasn’t changed, and it’s been very consistent. It’s the same policy that Bill Clinton has put forward, and that says that Jerusalem will be the capital of Israel, that we shouldn’t divide it by barbed wire, but that, ultimately that is a final status issue that has to be resolved between the Palestinians and the Israelis.” (Obama, CBS News, 7/22/08)
Yet the facts to don’t stop the RJC from shamelessly attempting to scare Jewish voters away from Obama. This — despite that fact that ultimately, it hurts Israel.
“What the RJC is doing is undermining bipartisan support for Israel and … weakening Israel in terms of the long-term U.S.-Israel relationship,” said Levine, who knows a thing or two about the topic, having worked for a decade in Congress between 1983 and 1993 to try to gin up Republican support for Israel, including at times when the GOP was cool to the Jewish state.
“What the RJC is doing,” he added, “is denigrating the record and associations of strong friends of Israel, starting with Barack Obama.”
“The RJC is intent on tearing apart someone for purely partisan reasons … regardless of the impact on the long-term U.S.-Israel relationship.”
“In my view it is irresponsible, it is harmful.”
For the record, Obama has a perfect voting record of support for the Jewish State, including backing all foreign aid to Israel, in the U.S. Senate.
In 2006, Obama told Palestinian university students in Ramallah that the U.S. would never distance itself from Israel.
Obama is cosponsor of the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act of 2006, which outlaws direct assistance to any entity of the Palestinian Authority controlled by Hamas.
Obama authored and introduced the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act in May 2007 – aimed at containing Iran through tough sanctions and preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. (The bill, which would make it easier for state and local governments to divest their pension funds from companies that invest in Iran’s energy sector, has been blocked in the Senate by Republicans who don’t want to give Obama a victory in an election year – again, like the RJC, putting partisanship over Israel.)
Obama has written a letter to the European Union pressing the EU to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization.
The Jews who know Obama best, in Chicago – including Lester Crown and Penny Pritzker – have attested to Obama’s rock-solid commitment to Israel and its security for years.
And, yet, the RJC shows no signs of letting up in its campaign to undermine Obama.
“They have apparently made a decision that they are willing to do anything to try and destroy Barack Obama’s reputation in the Jewish community,” Levine said. “They don’t care what the facts are – they are just out to destroy Barack Obama.”
“I regret coming to that conclusion,” he added, less angry than wistful. “But I have no doubt that’s the conclusion.”
Tags: Jerusalem, Mel Levine, NJDC, RJC