Column one: AIPAC’s moment of decision

32 Comments / 32 Comments

1. yamit82 Said:

   yep

   yup !!!!!!

2. yamit82 Said:

   hog wash

   This is a kosher site, Bear does not paste ” hog wash” !!!!!

3. honeybee Said:

   Cause the Jooos wish to be taken for ersatz WASPs.

   yep

4. @ Bear Klein:

   Klein don’t know from where you cut and pasted that hog wash but it’s a litany of failures. Not all their fault much of it belongs to Israeli leaders who speak with consummate mixed messaging…..No clear direction or directives and always under pressure capitulating to the Americans.

   AIPC is used by all admins to blame for their own failures in policy and is touted erroneously as have disproportionate influence but history has shown that when any American Admin wants to institute a policy negative to Israeli interests AIPAC has shown it self to be impotent a paper tiger but the fiction of their power is maintained by all sides fro partisan interests. In fact they are a toothless golem especially when it counts.

   Obama has instituted a full to partial arms embargo against Israel from all of his 7 and half years in office… Where was AIPAC???? https://www.israpundit.org/archives/22906/comment-page-1

5. yamit82 Said:

   Klein nobody takes the Jooos seriously anymore they vote democrat and give their money or most of it to Dems

   Cause the Jooos wish to be taken for ersatz WASPs.

   The Amer. Joos are more concerned with the ” plight of the Blacks, Hispanic , lgbtgs,pals and the xyzs then the are themselves and Israel. They martyr themselves for other peoples cause. Messiah complex ????

6. @ Bear Klein:

   Klein nobody takes the Jooos seriously anymore they vote democrat and give their money or most of it to Dems…. So congress at best pays lip service to the Jooos and votes their own interests as they see them….. They lose nothing by paying lip service in support of Israel which is on the decline these days and pay no penalty if they vote for anti Israel legislation and or support anti Israel policies of the President for them it’s a win win with no downside…. Only stupid Jooos and stupid antisemites believe the Jooos have any real say or power in Washington and each year their numerical numbers are declining . Not enough Jooos to take notice in the real-politk world. Jewish money still powerful but those Jews assimilated bunch for the most part have no loyalty or interest in Jewish or Israeli matters. They are goyim for all practical actions and concerns.

   Look what the black and Hispanic lobbies do???? They are feared for threatened violence and have the numbers to clinch elections up and down the lists…. The Arabs are even better they quietly fund and create groups in support of their agenda.

7. Apparently a noted commentator on this site is confusing the J-Street types with AIPAC. Here is an article written in 2014 about AIPAC.

   Created in the 1950s and empowered by Israel’s 1967 war victory, the American Israel Public Action Committee, better known as AIPAC, has grown evermore influential since the mid 1970s.

   Known in Washington all too simply — and tellingly — as “The Lobby”, AIPAC’s power has historically stemmed from two major sources: domestically — from the influential and organized Jewish communities; all 49 leaders of major Jewish organizations have seats on AIPAC’s executive committee. And internationally, it stems from Israel’s regional utility to the United States in the context of the oil-rich Middle East and Cold War rivalry.

   Eventually, these two factors have paved the way for greater political alignment between the Jewish lobbying group and various interests groups ranging from Christian Evangelicals to ideological militarists to make up the larger “Israel lobby” in America.

   AIPAC’s influence over Congress and its legislative agendas are paramount for its overall lobbying effort in the capital, on the White House and America’s foreign policy in the Middle East and beyond.

   AIPAC’s strategy is one of barter, pure and simple. AIPAC helps congressmen and women get elected — financially and otherwise —­ in return for their support of its legislative agenda. Likewise, AIPAC helps U.S. presidents pass their various agendas through Congress in return for White House support for Israel.

   And that has worked quite successfully over the past few decades as the U.S. has poured more money and arms into Israel than any other country in the world. And thanks to AIPAC and other like-minded lobbying groups, Israel’s status continued to improve in Washington despite its many strategic failures and political fiascos since the 1973 October war.

   In fact, regional experts argue rather convincingly that the Israel utilitarian argument fell short on accomplishments at least since the end of the Cold War. So much so, they argue, that strategically for America, Israel has been more of a burden than an asset.

   But while AIPAC’s record on behalf of Israel has been astounding, the overconfident group has overreached on a number of occasions leading to major crises in the relations.

   AIPAC has generally succeeded when it functioned as an American watchdog over Israel’s immediate interests and its tight relationship with the United States.

   But when the lobby acted like an Israeli attack-dog aggressively going after any and all American detractors of an Israeli narrow security or/and colonial agenda, the results have been mixed at best.

   AIPAC’s Failures

   AIPAC has started every decade since the early 1980s by picking a fight with the White House on behalf of Israel. In 1981, it was the AWACS sales to Saudi Arabia, in 1991 it was the loan guarantees to Israel, after 2001 it was Bush’s anti-terror Arab coalition, and since 2011 it has been negotiations with Iran.

   Ronald Reagan was the first presidential candidate to garner more Jewish votes than his Democratic rival, and became the most stanch supporter of Israel upgrading its relationship to major international strategic ally.

   And yet, there was little or no hesitation at AIPAC when the group launched a political assault against the Reagan administration and especially on the likes of Secretary of Defense Weinberger for supporting the $8 billion Airborne Warning and Control System surveillance planes to Saudi Arabia. AIPAC dragged the issue but lost the battle with complete humiliation.

   But the lobby took the offensive once again in 1991, after the Bush administration had made a $10 billion of loan guarantees contingent on Israel freezing its illegal settlement building. This was a small price to pay if the Bush administration was to introduce a new regional Pax Americana after its Cold War and Gulf War victories. Alas, AIPAC and its Israeli patron couldn’t see the larger picture.

   Soon after his election for a second time in 1992, Israeli Premier Yitzhak Rabin’s first challenge was to restrain AIPAC. A dress down soon followed when Rabin, himself a former ambassador to Washington, scolded the lobby for unnecessarily straining Israel’s relationship with Washington.

   In no time, Washington had provided the loan guarantees as settlement building picked like never before. The number of settlers increased by 50 percent during Rabin’s rule from 1992 until his assassination in 1995.

   Again in October 2001, AIPAC echoed Ariel Sharon’s warning to the United States that it risked appeasing Arab nations the way European democracies appeased Hitler on the eve of World War II.

   The nasty provocation could’ve easily escalated into an all out political confrontation between the U.S. and Israel if it weren’t for the staunch pro-Israeli stance of the Bush administration and W Bush’s willingness to follow in Israel’s footsteps in his “war on terror”.

   This was to be repeated again after 2010/2011, as AIPAC began to confront the Obama administration over the peace process and Iran’s nuclear program. Tensions escalated earlier this year after AIPAC tried to get Congress to impose new sanctions against Iran in contravention with the interim deal signed between the U.S. and the World powers with Iran.

   Undermined by popular support for the deal and deterred by a presidential veto, AIPAC has put its sanctions on hold.

   Meanwhile, the real opposition to AIPAC is coming not from the White House but rather from the American Jewish community that has been generally supportive of Israel but not necessarily AIPAC’s way. New Jewish voices critical of AIPAC and of Israel’s colonial policies are on the ascendance even if they remain a minority within the organized Jewish groups. And relatively new Jewish groups like J Street are also making their imprint on the political scene in Washington.

   AIPAC as Israel’s Chutzpah

   During a recent Jerusalem meeting with Netanyahu, according to The Jewish Daily Forward, the members of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations were essentially told to “renew their confrontation with the White House over increased sanctions, just 11 days after the effort was publicly abandoned by AIPAC”.

   It remains to be seen whether this proves counterproductive and backfires against Israel or simply works in favor of Netanyahu’s ongoing bargaining with Obama over Iran and Palestine. Israel would backtrack on Iran for now, only if Washington lets go of Palestine.

   Expect the Obama administration — like its predecessors — to prod the weaker Palestinians to make more concessions towards another framework agreement than to nudge the intimidating Israelis ahead of midterm elections.

   Judging by the mute reactions of the Obama administration to recent insults against Secretary Kerry by Israeli Defense Minister Ya’alon, Netanyahu has a good reason to be confident about Israel and AIPAC’s capacity to get their way with the Obama administration on a host of issues.

   As Netanyahu told some Israelis during the 2001 elections campaign: “America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction. They won’t get in their way.”

8. @ Bear Klein:
   @ yamit82:

   We all seem to be “drinking from the same well”.

9. @ yamit82:

   Another opinion :

   http://www.jewishledger.com/2011/02/president-ronald-reagan-and-the-jews/

   http://www.science.co.il/People/Ronald-Reagan/20070321-Kengor.php

   Could it be that Reagan was a complicated man with complicated opinions ?

   ” A foolish consistency is the hob-goblin of small minds” Emerson

10. @ Bear Klein:

    Don’t give me AIPAC sel-serving talking points…..AIPAC exists to Lobby Congress and the US Government on behalf of Israel and support of what’s in Israels interests. Give me or better show me their succeses based on their stated mission statement…..

    Re: Iran, no item or policy of the American government has been more critical and important to the ultimate survival of the state of Israel…. To deflect the deal they would have to attack Obama directly and personally as well as all Democrats who supported the deal. They were not prepared to do that, so they belatedly spent some millions on ads?>?? Get real. Majority of the American people were against in all polls by a wide margin and the Republicans allowed Obama to avoid Senate approval by agreeing to compromise and were therefore complicit I am speaking of the “Corker bill”….

    Do you see the Saudis the most powerful Lobby in Washington spending money on ads????? AIPC is nothing but an apendage of the American government and even more since they are mostly American Jews the Democrat Party nuff said!!!! Losers!!!! Btw they are the most ardent supporters of a 2 state solution construction freeze in Y&S…. So one might conclude that their support for Israel is limited to pronouncements and support of Policies inimical to the survial of the State of Israel.

11. @ honeybee:

    Supported twice election of Nazi Waldheim at the UN.

    Stacked his admin with pro Nazi CIA administrators and imported then integrated hundreds of so called ex Nazis in the CIA and Intel services.
    supported Nazi influenced PLO terrorists.
    Praised Nazi war dead at German cemetary.

    Sought by policy to finish the unfinished Nazi final solution.

    Supported and praised the Taliban or the Mujadaen that later became the Taliban even had them to the WH.

    Was very anti Israel and did all he could to bring Arafat to power.

12. AIPAC Agenda

    Legislative Agenda

    Congress has been a bedrock of support for the U.S.-Israel relationship by supporting aid, helping stop Iran’s pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability, supporting Israel’s right to defend itself and reinforcing American policy that peace will only be achieved through direct negotiations. Below are the current legislative priorities that will strengthen American and Israeli security and the bonds that unite these two allies.

    Respond to Iran’s Regional Aggression
    Supreme Leader of Iran

    Congress must send a strong message to the Iranians that the United States will push back if it violates its international obligations. Please urge members of Congress to support the extension of ISA and a tough response to Iran’s ongoing ballistic missile program, including the imposition of tougher sanctions on those responsible for recent missile tests and those entities providing material support to the program.

13. @ yamit82:The anti-Israel crowd in the USA sure disagrees with in regards to AIPAC they claim US foreign policy is made by AIPAC. This is obviously a gross exaggeration with at times anti-Semitic implications.

    AIPAC does not win all their battles but is a very strong Pro Israel advocacy group. No evidence has yet been shown to the contrary. Their efforts are far from token.

    Even in its current effort to persuade lawmakers to reject President Barack Obama’s landmark nuclear deal with Iran, AIPAC has made use of a surrogate — Citizens for a Nuclear Free Iran — that has been running commercials in 23 states and the District of Columbia urging lawmakers to vote against the deal. That effort, variously estimated to have cost somewhere between $20 million and $40 million, failed to persuade enough Democrats to block the deal in Congress, and AIPAC waged a last-ditch lobbying effort to persuade Democratic Senate leaders to even allow a resolution rejecting the Iran deal to get an up-or-down vote on the Senate floor. Patrick Dorton, a spokesman for Citizens for a Nuclear Free Iran, declined repeated requests for comment.

    Although it appears headed for a legislative defeat, the effort hasn’t been a total failure. AIPAC has seen the numbers of Americans who disapprove of the deal increase while it has raised more money so far in 2015 than in any previous year. The group hopes to double its budget within five years, and the fight over the deal — even though it ended in a loss — could help AIPAC get there.

    http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/09/11/how-aipac-may-win-by-losing-the-iran-deal/

14. @ yamit82:

    Read the material. If true , it is certainly anti-Israel interest, but does that make Reagan a Nazi?

15. @ Bear Klein:

    AIPAC has never won a confrontation with the WH but only went thru the motions at best so that they would never be accused of dual loyalty which they are anyway by Israel’s detractors… It’s a a dog and pony show in reality. I am speaking primarily of the AIPAC leadership who are not so pro Israel when it comes to opposing Presidents especially Democrat Presidents.

16. @ Bear Klein:

    The ‘First Intifada’ was a US-PLO strategy used to represent the Arabs in West Bank and Gaza as supposedly oppressed ‘underdogs’

    http://www.hirhome.com/israel/hirally2.htm#1987

    The US was going out of its way, as usual, to attack Israel.

    Long story short, by the end of 1988, as Ronald Reagan got ready to hand over power to his successor, George Bush Sr., a UPI article with the headline “Reagan lays foreign policy groundwork for Bush” could state the following:

    “Reagan has crossed the bridge and decided that the U.S. can carry on a dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organization. Reagan said PLO chairman Yasser Arafat had met the U.S. conditions for such negotiations…”[152]

    The US had come out of the closet and was now officially doing what it had been doing all along: supporting the PLO. Since US Intelligence had always been cozy with the PLO, it was fitting that “Bush,” as the same wire observed, “will be the first president to have headed the CIA.”

    The next year, a US Defense Department study would put its seal on the new official stance towards the PLO, and that brings us to 1989.

    Read whole chapter linked above!!!

17. @ Bear Klein:

    It is also worth pointing out that the CIA director in 1985 was William Casey, who was appointed to that post by Ronald Reagan after Casey ran his presidential campaign. Who is William Casey?

    Well, in the section on 1945, it was explained that the US absorbed almost the entire Nazi war criminal organization and out of that created the CIA.

    “Frank Wisner, a dashing young Wall Street lawyer who had distinguished himself in underground OSS intrigues [the OSS is the precursor to the CIA] in Istanbul and Bucharest, headed the coordinating team.”

    This coordinating team was tasked with the job of absorption of the Nazi war criminal infrastructure [my emphasis, below].

    “Frank Wisner’s Special Intelligence Branch staff, which was engaged in work with [Nazi war criminal Reinhart] Gehlen [who was the most important Nazi asset], had more than its share of brilliant operatives who were to leave their marks on the history of US espionage. They included Richard Helms, for example, later to become CIA deputy director for clandestine operations and eventually agency director under Presidents Johnson and Nixon; William Casey, CIA director under President Reagan; Harry Rositzke, soon to become chief of CIA clandestine operations inside the USSR and later CIA chief of station in India; and, of course, Wisner himself, soon to be chief of all American clandestine warfare operations worldwide.”[131]

    That US president Ronald Reagan should have sought to normalize the Nazis, and to re-normalize antisemitism, is surprising only to those who do not know this history.

18. @ Bear Klein:

    Who was in charge of US covert operations in 1985?
    _______________________________________________

    Given so much US overt and also covert activity to attack Israel, you may wonder, who was in charge of US intelligence operations during the year of 1985? That was Vincent Cannistraro, “Director of NSC Intelligence from 1984 to 1987” where he was responsible for “coordinating intelligence programs throughout the [Reagan] administration.”[127]

    Cannistraro was the man in charge.

    http://www.hirhome.com/israel/mprot2.htm

    http://www.hirhome.com/israel/mprot3.htm

    http://www.hirhome.com/israel/mprot4.htm

19. @ Bear Klein:

    After the war, the US illegally and in secret absorbed the entire Nazi war criminal organization in order to create the CIA (see 1945 section). It is hard to argue, therefore, that America’s belated entry into the World War stems from the US Establishment’s in-principle objection to Nazi ideology. Isn’t it more reasonable to suppose that the US invaded Europe because the Soviets were on their way to the Atlantic? That the US had no objection to Nazis can be seen from the fact that, as soon as the Nazis were whipped into obedience again in 1945, the US immediately redeployed them. From this perspective it is hardly surprising that Reagan should have sought a) to re-normalize German Nazism, and b) to re-normalize antisemitism with a high-profile spitting session on the Jews.

    And that’s what this was.

    The US president was very careful to insult the Jews. In the uproar that followed the proposed itinerary of his visit to Germany (made public well in advance, so as to guarantee the uproar), prominent Jewish leaders such as Elie Wiesel explained publicly to the American president that

    “there could be no trade-off by combining visits to a camp and to the cemetery. ‘A visit to this particular cemetery is to us unacceptable,’ he said.”[121]

    The way a master dismisses a nagging slave, Ronald Reagan replied that maybe he would add a visit to a Nazi concentration camp site, but that in any case “no thought was being given to eliminating a visit to the Bitburg [Nazi] cemetery.”[122]

    I emphasize: this was all carefully premeditated and deliberate. German chancellor Helmut Kohl had actually

    “proposed that Reagan join him…in visiting both a World War II cemetery and a concentration camp site, [and yet] Reagan’s advance men accepted the first, but declined the second.”[123]

    I am not trying to make Helmut Kohl look good – to include the Nazi cemetery was an outrage anyway, and in fact Kohl was apologizing for the Nazis in public.[124] My point is that the American president went out of his way to out-Nazi the German chancellor and make known his intentions to lay a wreath to honor the Nazis and to simultaneously disrespect the victims of the Shoah.

    In fact, Reagan announced this a whole month in advance of his trip, guaranteeing an extended pandemonium that carried the news all around the world. And to make sure nobody thought there had been a mistake, when the protests began he did not give an inch. Then he

    “unleashed a new wave of Jewish fury… by claiming that German soldiers buried [in that cemetery] were ‘victims’ of the Nazis ‘just as surely as the victims in the concentration camps.'”[125]

    But some might think this was Reagan’s idiosyncrasy, or his administration’s. To dispel any such notion, powerful members of the American Establishment, such as Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, added their voices, calling on president Reagan not to cancel his visit to the Nazi cemetery.[126] Amazing, because even in Germany many were confused and disturbed by this, so Reagan could have taken the easy way out by calling it all a ‘mistake.’

    No. In the end he laid his wreath. On the graves of Nazis.

    If worldwide Jewish pressure could not get Reagan to do the slightest of symbolic retreats on such an obvious moral issue, with the whole world watching in amazement, what was the ulterior meaning?

    Simple: this was ‘the leader of the free world’ doing Holocaust denial via diplomacy-speech. That’s what this was.

    US president Ronald Reagan, the most important man in the world, took the loudest megaphone in history, the Western mass media, and screamed at the top of his voice, for a whole month, that antisemitism was normal again. The Jews, who continue to think (whether approving or disapproving) that the US establishment is pro-Jewish and pro-Israel, were deaf to how this reverberated on the walls of everybody else’s subconscious.

20. @ Bear Klein:

    From its new base in Tunis, the defeated PLO would find it very difficult to attack Israel, which is why it resorted to such high jinks as taking hostage the Italian ship Achille Lauro in 1985 (see below). The US would therefore make sure to revive the PLO, and eventually bring it to power in the West Bank, where it could once again easily kill innocent Israeli civilians.

21. @ Bear Klein:
    
    It’s a love affair!

    A bit later, a rival Lebanese faction assassinated Bashir Gemayel, the leader of the Lebanese phalangists. Two days after that, in the resulting chaos, a massacre was committed in Sabra and Shatila, blamed on these now-headless phalangists. Despite the fact that nobody was blaming Israeli soldiers, Ronald Reagan (who was then using the Contra terrorists to kill innocent civilians in Nicaragua) launched a ferocious diplomatic attack against Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin and his Likud government, claiming Israel was responsible for this. Edgar Bronfman Sr., president of the World Jewish Congress, again provided cover for Reagan by supporting this attack wholeheartedly

    The US did what it could to make sure that the remaining PLO troops would get out of Lebanon safely:

    “White House spokesman Larry Speakes said the Reagan administration wished for the ‘unhampered’ withdrawal of the Palestine Liberation Organization troops loyal to Arafat.” ” the Reagan administration became quite strident about this, in fact.

    “The United States said today that it had told Israel that it ‘hopes and expects’ the Shamir Government will halt its military actions around Tripoli and allow Yasir Arafat and his Palestine Liberation Organization fighters to be evacuated from the city.

    …officials said privately that Washington was losing patience with the Israeli tactics that have delayed Mr. Arafat’s withdrawal.”

    What has been reviewed for the years 1982-83 does not suggest in the least that the Reagan administration really intended to have good relations with the Israelis. To confirm that, it suffices to read on and find out what happened in 1985.
    From HIR Link I gave you above!!!

22. @ Bear Klein:

    This is true as a general rule: only Jews who go out of their way to attack Israel (openly or not so openly) have any influence in Washington.

    Now why might that be?

    what was Bronfman endorsing?

    “The Camp David peace accords call for an interim, five-year period of autonomy for the Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza during which the final status of the territories is to be negotiated.”

    Autonomy leading to final status was code for a peace process leading to a Palestinian state. We have already seen that the US was quite keen to have Yasser Arafat and the PLO terrorists run such a state (see 1977 section). Thus, Reagan’s plan to create a Palestinian state, which Bronfman endorsed, was another American attack on Israel.

    Even as US President Ronald Reagan was pressing for a Palestinian state run by the PLO, these terrorists were attacking Israeli civilians from their bases in Lebanon

    Because the PLO was murdering Israeli civilians, Israel invaded Lebanon, and launched a

    “campaign that Israel said would wipe out the PLO as a political and military force and open the way for true peace in the Middle East.”[74]

    The Israelis very nearly did just that. They failed, however. But not for lack of trying. Rather, what happened is that as Israeli troops got ready to deliver a knockout blow to the PLO, the US intervened to save them. The Washington Post noted the contrast between the PLO’s earlier exit from Jordan, and from Lebanon:

    “From Amman [Jordan], the PLO troops left unheralded, in ridicule. From Beirut [Lebanon], they left in a compromise negotiated by the United States, waving their Kalashnikov rifles. Arafat left not in the middle of the night but with an emotional dockside sendoff from the Lebanese prime minister, a French Navy escort and U.S. air cover.”[75]

    But why did the US do this? Because the PLO is the US’s pet, and the US meant to use it again as an attack dog (as we shall see). If any further evidence for this ‘master-pet’ relationship were needed, consider that, in Lebanon, the US had been using the PLO as its *guard* dog:

    “The Lebanese occupation by Israel caused the Palestinians to have to leave Lebanon eventually…They had been the protectors for the American diplomatic community in Beirut…There was liaison with the PLO, and the Americans were depending on them for their security.” — Vincent Cannistraro, senior intelligence official.[76]

    
    From HIR Link I gave you above!!!
    

23. @ Bear Klein:

    ” Reagan, first, endorsed a Saudi ‘peace’ plan that called for the establishment of a Palestinian state “with its capital in East Jerusalem,” and which didn’t recognize Israel’s actual existence, let alone recognize its right to exist.

    Then, Reagan said that no, the Saudi plan would not be followed, and neither would he pay any attention to the Europeans, who were calling for a PLO state. Instead, the “Camp David process” would be his policy.

    But the “Camp David process” was Jimmy Carter’s policy, and it called for Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza, the creation of a self-governing Palestinian Arab authority, and, after three years, “negotiations will take place to determine the final status of the West Bank and Gaza.”[67] Since Carter had pushed very hard for including the PLO in the Geneva ‘peace’ conference, it is obvious that this strategy, which looks and sounds exactly like what the Oslo process later became, was meant to create a PLO state in the West Bank and Gaza.

    Adding insult to injury, Reagan decided to sell arms to Saudi Arabia (in addition to the secret buildup that nobody knew about ” From HIR Link I gave you above!!!

24. washington | Ronald Reagan’s presidency was a time when U.S. Jewish power grew to new levels of influence — and when Jews learned of its limits.

    Thanks to Reagan, who died Saturday, June 5, at age 93 after a long struggle with Alzheimer’s, the years 1981-89 saw the consolidation of bipartisan support for the causes Jews held dearest: a secure Israel and the freedom of Soviet Jews.

    It also saw the Republican Party become an acceptable option for Jews, ensuring that no single party could take the Jewish vote for granted.

    “Historians will look back and say the Reagan years were the years the Jewish community looked back and tried the Republican Party on for size,” said Marshall Breger, Reagan’s liaison to the Jewish community from 1983 to 1985. “That began the process of developing a comfort level which is now only coming to fruition. The Reagan administration turned the Jews into a two-party community.”

    Yet Reagan also dealt the Jewish community two severe blows when he triumphed in pushing through Congress the sale of powerful spy planes to Saudi Arabia and when he delivered a forgive-and-forget paean at the Bitburg cemetery in Germany, where Nazi SS troops are buried.

    In the end, Reagan added a trip to Bergen-Belsen to appease American Jews, but many remained upset about the episode.

    On the domestic front, some analysts have said the Reagan administration created the problems that beset issues important to many Jews, such as abortion rights, poverty relief and government medical assistance.

    Despite such concerns, Reagan’s presidency now is seen by many as halcyon days for Jewish issues in foreign policy, principally because of the effects of Reagan’s greatest triumph: the collapse of the Soviet bloc.

    “The end of the Cold War was important not just for the free world but for diminishing the cause of rejectionist Arab states and enabling Soviet Jews to be free,” said David Makovsky, then a leading Soviet Jewry activist and now a top Middle East analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “We can only be grateful for this.”

    Mark Levin, also a prominent Soviet Jewry activist in those days, emphasized that for Reagan, Soviet Jewish freedom was central to the struggle against the “evil empire.”

    Reagan made sure Soviet Jewry was a priority at each meeting between U.S. Soviet officials, along with nuclear disarmament and economic assistance, recalled Levin, now the executive director of NCSJ: Advocates on Behalf of Jews in Russia, Ukraine, the Baltic States and Eurasia.

    “He was someone who was truly committed to overturning the communist system and gaining freedom for all people, but he had a particularly soft spot in his heart for Soviet Jewry,” Levin said.

    In a letter of consolation sent to Reagan’s wife, Nancy, Israeli Cabinet minister Natan Sharansky, a former Soviet refusenik, expressed his gratitude to the ex-president.

    “Former President Reagan changed the march of history and the fate of millions of people because he was one of the few, outstanding leaders who brought about the collapse of the Soviet Empire,” Sharansky wrote.

    Reagan, who was California’s governor from 1967 to 1975, also earned Jewish admiration for appointing secretaries of state who were sympathetic to Israel. Alexander Haig and George Schultz both broke with the traditional “bad cop” role that the Cabinet officer has often played with the Jewish state.

    But the president’s visceral sympathy for Israel was undermined by his uneasy relations with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin. The leaders’ styles inevitably clashed: the avuncular, give-me-the-big-picture movie star versus the proper European-born lawyer.

    When Begin said “no problem” about settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, Reagan assumed Israel was agreeing to a freeze. But Begin merely was saying, with characteristic confidence, that the settlements should not pose a problem.

    “Theirs were different personalities,” Breger said, so much so that Reagan expressed relief in 1984 after his first meeting with Begin’s successor, Yitzhak Shamir — even though Shamir sometimes took a harder line than Begin.

    The first crisis of Israel ties during Reagan’s presidency was occasioned by Israel’s attack in June 1981 on Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor.

    Reagan, a proponent of nuclear power in the United States, was upset that an ally ostensibly was reinforcing perceptions that all nuclear power posed dangers, and he suspended arms shipments to Israel in response. Reagan said Iraq, which the United States then supported, may have been persuaded to use the nuclear reactor for peaceful purposes.

    Reagan also resented the lobbying by Israel and its supporters against the sale of AWACS spy planes to Saudi Arabia in 1981. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, outraged that Reagan was reneging on a campaign promise so soon after his election, got the House of Representatives to oppose the sale.

    When the battle went to the Senate, Reagan, eager for a triumph with an irascible Congress, played hardball. He and his aides raised the specter of dual loyalty charges.

    “The administration was out there saying ‘Reagan or Begin,'” recalled Ira Forman, then a political director for AIPAC and now the executive director of the National Jewish Democratic Council.

    Begin’s opposition to the sale especially peeved Reagan, and on Oct. 1 of that year, Reagan famously said, “It is not the business of other nations to make American foreign policy.”

    That set off a wave of anti-Semitic hate mail to senators. The AWACS sale triumphed in the Senate, and the apparent succumbing to warnings about excessive Jewish influence was a shock for a pro-Israel community that had been confident in its influence since the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

    Reagan attempted to make amends after the vote by proposing a strategic relationship with Israel in November 1981. Begin and the Knesset surprised Reagan a month later by annexing the Golan Heights, territory claimed by Syria.

    Reagan withdrew his offer, and two months after Reagan’s October remark Begin got back at Reagan, saying that Israel was nobody’s “banana republic.”

    Less than a year later, in June 1982, tempers flared again when Israel invaded Lebanon in order to oust the Palestinian Liberation Organization from its stronghold there.

    Reagan secretly formulated a plan not only to pull Israeli troops out of Lebanon, but to force Israel into withdrawing from the West Bank and Gaza. He ultimately envisioned Palestinian autonomy in a federal system with Jordan.

    When Reagan announced the plan on Sept. 1, 1982, Begin said it was “the saddest day of my life.” Ultimately, resistance by the Likud Party-led Cabinet killed the plan.

    Only days later, Israel’s Christian allies in Lebanon, the Phalangists, raided a Palestinian refugee camp and slaughtered hundreds of civilians there. The ensuing controversy over the degree of Israel’s responsibility poisoned Israel’s image in the West. It also led to the resignation of Israel’s then-defense minister, Ariel Sharon.

    Reagan reacted to the event, known as the Sabra and Shatila massacre, by creating a multinational force to help keep the peace in Lebanon.

    It didn’t help Israel that when a suicide attack the following summer in Lebanon killed 241 U.S. Marines, some blamed Israel for dragging the United States into the conflict there. In truth, Israeli officials had tried hard to persuade Reagan not to deploy troops to the region.

    The attack on the Marine barracks created an impression that would dog Israel throughout the 1980s: Israel somehow was responsible for anti-American terrorism.

    Despite such tensions, affection for Reagan persisted among Jews. He earned a respectable 31 percent of the Jewish vote in the 1984 elections, though it did not match the 39 percent he had won in 1980, when the pro-Reagan Jewish vote largely was the result of voter backlash against the policies of President Carter.

    The most serious test of Reagan’s relationship with the Jews came after those elections, when Reagan announced in April 1985 that he would visit Bitburg, a World War II military cemetery, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of D-Day.

    The president wanted to look ahead, not backward, he said. But U.S. Jews were stunned, especially when they learned that more than 40 members of the Waffen SS were buried at Bitburg. Not even a personal appeal from Elie Wiesel, America’s best-known Holocaust survivor, could dissuade Reagan.

    The failure to keep Reagan from Bitburg was another reminder of the limits of organized Jewish suasion. But again, Jewish bitterness eventually melted away because of the bigger picture that encompassed Reagan’s friendliness to Jews.

    Reagan also had a vivid imagination, reportedly telling both Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir and Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal that he was part of a team that filmed the concentration camps. In fact, he spent his Army service involved making training films in Hollywood, and he never went abroad.

    On another issue, Reagan often was accused of clumsiness when it came to understanding minorities — his remarks on “welfare queens” drew fire from blacks, to cite one notable example — but he acted swiftly whenever anyone close to him expressed outright bigotry.

    Reagan forced James Watt, his interior secretary, to resign in 1983 after Watt said of one of his department’s committees, “I have a black, a woman, two Jews and a cripple. And we have talent.”

    Reagan promised social reforms to Christian conservatives, but he never pursued those pledges with great enthusiasm. In 1982, he introduced a school prayer amendment but let it die in Congress; in 1987, he did little to stop the steamrolling of his Supreme Court candidate, Robert Bork.

    Still, the symbolic weight he gave to the ideas of the Christian right, through repeated appearances with its leaders and through his speeches, gave that constituency a political foothold.

    “He set the stage over many of the battles over social issues, choice, marriage amendment, school prayer,” said Mark Pelavin, then a legislative assistant with the American Jewish Congress and now the associate director of the Reform movement’s Religious Action Center.

    Still, that did not diminish Reagan’s other achievements, Pelavin said.

    “The end of the Cold War, strengthening the U.S.-Israel alliance — he was a pivotal figure and his achievements will be long-lasting.’

    http://www.jweekly.com/article/full/22926/jews-learned-their-power-and-limits-during-reagan-years/

25. @ yamit82: I am truly interested if they are not supporting Israel. My impression is that they try hard to be bi-partisan and support Israel. All the evidence is they tried to kill the deal.

    You make lots of assertions but where is your evidence. AIPAC Statement made public below.

    AIPAC has consistently supported diplomatic efforts to end Iran’s nuclear weapons program, and we appreciate the commitment and dedication of President Obama and his administration throughout these negotiations. Unfortunately, this proposed agreement fails to halt Iran’s nuclear quest. Instead, it would facilitate rather than prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and would further entrench and empower the leading state sponsor of terror.

    During these negotiations, we outlined criteria for a good deal that Congress itself had set in five critical areas: inspections, possible military dimensions, sanctions, duration, and dismantlement. In each of these areas, the proposed agreement has significant flaws:

    The proposed deal does not ensure “anytime, anywhere” short-notice inspections;
    The proposed deal does not clearly condition sanctions relief on full Iranian cooperation in satisfying International Atomic Energy Agency concerns over the possible military dimensions of Tehran’s program;
    The proposed deal lifts sanctions as soon as the agreement commences, rather than gradually as Iran demonstrates sustained adherence to the agreement;
    The proposed deal lifts key restrictions in as few as eight years;
    The proposed deal would disconnect and store centrifuges in an easily reversible manner, but it requires no dismantlement of centrifuges or any Iranian nuclear facility.

    In return for this flawed agreement, Iran will receive over $100 billion in sanctions relief. Tehran will use these funds to fuel its hegemonic ambitions, support the killing of civilians in Syria, fund the terrorist organizations Hamas and Hezbollah, and spur deadly conflicts throughout the region.

    This agreement not only fails to achieve its objectives in the nuclear arena, but it releases Tehran in a matter of years—regardless of Iranian behavior—from ballistic missile sanctions and an arms embargo imposed by the United Nations Security Council. This late, unexpected concession will provide additional arms for terrorism and proxy wars, while strengthening Iran’s capabilities against our regional allies.

    This accord threatens the future of the nuclear non-proliferation regime. By leaving Iran on the threshold of a nuclear weapon—despite its history of violating international obligations—other countries in the region will have a dangerous incentive to initiate their own nuclear programs. The resulting nuclear arms race would severely destabilize the region.

    Proponents of the proposed agreement will argue that the only alternative to this agreement is military conflict. In fact, the reverse is true. A bad agreement such as this will invite instability and nuclear proliferation. It will embolden Iran and may encourage regional conflict.

    We strongly believe that the alternative to this bad deal is a better deal. Congress should reject this agreement, and urge the administration to work with our allies to maintain economic pressure on Iran while offering to negotiate a better deal that will truly close off all Iranian paths to a nuclear weapon.

    Congress should insist on a better deal.

    http://www.aipac.org/learn/resources/aipac-publications/publication?pubpath=PolicyPolitics/Press/AIPAC%20Statements/2015/07/AIPAC%20Statement%20on%20Proposed%20Iran%20Nuclear%20Agreement

26. @ honeybee:

    Because he was and much more

    Read: 1981-89 http://www.hirhome.com/israel/hirally2.htm#1981

27. yamit82 Said:

    the Nazi lover Jew hating Reagan.

    Why do you say that?

28. @ Bear Klein:

    You are as blind to AIPAC as you are to BB and the Likud… what more is there to say….. You think a few ads on TV moves anyone in politics to change hearts and minds? They were pressured by grass roots to do something against their will and they made a public show of opposing but no stick or sanctions either threatened or employed when they lost and they have lost every battle since the AWACS debacle under the Nazi lover Jew hating Reagan. They have long become an arm of the Democrat party and are mostly self serving for their leaders so they can hob nob with the president and attend Washington cocktail parties….. Advocates for Israel?? they are a joke still pushing party line of Obama

29. I do not get article. See no evidence that AIPAC is anything but pro Israel.

30. Strange AIPAC fought the Iran deal I believe.

    In fighting the deal, AIPAC and its affiliates mustered all of its considerable resources: spending tens of millions on television ads in the home states of undecided lawmakers and organizing a fly-in to blitz legislators on Capitol Hill – another is planned for next week when Congress returns from August recess to vote on a resolution of disapproval. But all that noise amounted to a humbling and rare defeat this week, when President Obama secured enough backing in the Senate to protect the pact from efforts to dismantle it.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2015/09/03/how-aipac-lost-the-iran-deal-fight/

31. @ bernard ross:

    Been a long time trend ever since Obama became president…. Look at their positions and lack of real opposition over the Iran deal.

32. Looks like AIPAC joined the liberal jews of jstreet and ADL against Israel. Jstreet was created by soros as a jewish fig leaf for anti zionist leftist platforms he intended to introduce in the party under obama. It was created purely as an Obama Jewish support group.