I was coerced by my wife to go to our local JCC and enjoy a free day of learning about various Jewish topics. I generally avoid people due to my lack of social graces and awkward public behavior, but my wife can only tolerate me isolating myself off for so long. One of the classes I signed up for was about whether U.S. policy towards Israel has changed with the election of Barack Obama. The organization was called Jews for Peace and Truth or something like that. The organization contains members that are affiliated with all political parties who hold the belief that the U.S. should support Israel. The diary will be about what I learned, what various people had to say, and what I conclude form my experience.
The first speaker was Ivan Lang. Basically a brilliant guy that got his Bachelors in Mathematics, a Phd in BioPhysics, and wrote in several prominent Jewish and non Jewish publications. Oh, yeah, but one problem that makes me skeptical. He likes Sara Palin. He gave a power point presentation on various nominees or affiliates of Barack Obama that raise questions of his loyalty to the state of Israel. Jeremiah Wright, that one terrorist dude in Chicago, Samantha Powers, Van Jones, and a bunch of other minor players I never heard of. He listed quotes by each that clearly proved they were anti-Zionist. If not that, then anti-semitic. He pulled direct quotes from Obama spoken at Cairo that implicated the President in siding with Israel's enemies if not outright condemn Israel to a fiery death of suicide bombings, nukes, and a mighty military that will come from somewhere. He discussed some other conference where Obama spoke and displayed John Bolton's reaction to the speech for everyone to see. Most definitely the most anti-Israel speech ever. Really the presentation was quite good once you got past the association blame game. Most of it was probably exactly derived from things people said, out of context of course. The sum of it would best be described as: Obama hates the settlements, funds our enemies, and surrounds himself with nut jobs. Most importantly of all: Clinton and Bush were awesome towards Israel and only a blind fool couldn't see it.
The rebuttal was performed eloquently by an independent of voted for President Obama. I believe his name was Slazer. He claims that U.S. policy towards Israel has never been that great and essentially is unchanged. In fact, the U.S. position on the settlements hasn't changed since Johnson. Basically, we don't want Israel to have the West Bank, we really wanted Jordan to take it, but Jordan didn't want it, and please Israel stop building settlements in the West Bank. Oh, and here's some money to help your military in case you get attacked. He rebuked the charge that Obama surrounds himself with anti-Zionists by speaking of Mrs. Clinton's role as Secretary of State which has more power then all these other obscure positions that supposedly contain anti-Zionist's. Clean, to the point, and irrefutable. I thought he would have done even better by mentioning Rahm Emmanual, Geinther, Summers, Bernanke, Axelrod,...etc. He discussed Reagan selling arms to Iran and how Bush I put in place more policies that were anti-Israel than anyone since Eisenhower. Again, not a bad display of knowledge and presentation.
The fun starts when the audience is given the chance to contribute. The first speaker was from J-Street and she expressed her frustration with the right wing nonsense our first speaker enlightened us with. She was shaking the whole time and really let him know how disgusted she was with it. That followed by her ramblings about how things were changing and Jews were asking questions about U.S. policy towards Israel. She said this was good because questions will lead to action which will get American Jews to move Israel to a long run sustainable equilibrium.
This was followed by an Israeli ranting about how Jewish culture is in Israel and that all Jews everywhere must except it. Some where in there he mentions that Israel bends over backwards to appease American interest. That followed by I used to work in the department of Homeland Security and boy let me tell you how crazy the bureaucrats are getting. They are starting to question the loyalty of dual citizens from Israel. They are telling all kinds of Jewish jokes and hoping Jews die,...etc. My thought to that was and...that's it? Shit its been that way since the dawn of time. I doubt this is a recent phenomena due to the election of Barack Hussein Obama, terrorist sympathizer who was born in Keyna. Oh sorry, just one of my crazy delusional rants pouring out of my head.
The craziness just keeps on pouring in. We got one guy who was in the Yom Kippur war fighting communist North Koreans and Chinese, a Christian Zionist lady that tried very hard to not confuse the Tenack and Torah, while emphasizing over and over that this is all a part of HaShem's plan and can't we just see how great Bush was?, followed by another perfectly rational guy think its perfectly okay for Sara Palin to say ridiculous things about Barack Obama because its not a low blow or inaccurate and as an aside its not J-Street, its Jump Street. We cant' forget that Saudi Arabia helped fund a library which means the Clintons' are really anti-Israel or something. Thank G-d the second presenter calmed fears about a possible Israeli attack on Iran which everyone seemed certain was going to happen. Hell, even the Israeli said its all hogwash and Israel has nothing to fear from Iran. Its all politics and Iran has its sites on the Arabian peninsula not Israel.
One of the things that disturbed me the most was the use of the word Arab. Not one person called them Palestinians. Not one. You can't keep calling these group of people Arabs and somehow distinguish them from other Arabs and pretend we care about what happens to them. I mean we call Jordans Jordanians, Egyptians Egyptians, and so on. If Palestinians called themselves slekji, then I say we call them what they identify themselves as. This ignoring they're identity thing is cumbersome and pointless. Show a little respect.
I must also say that people are paranoid and afraid of a non-existent problem. When I think of the Obama administration, anti-Israel is just not something that crosses my mind. In fact, I consider Obama to be fair. Asking for no more settlement building in the West Bank makes sense. Trying to make peace with all the Middle East by opening dialogue, I fail to see how that can be a bad idea.
Feel free to ask me questions in the dairy, harass me for bad writing, or bring up any topics you want.