I take it for granted that being Jewish is likely to predispose a politician to certain positions (generally siding with the coalition of the fringe against the core). Also, having Jewish constituents and Jewish funding will undoubtedly influence politicians.
For instance, it is completely against America’s interests to be so deeply supportive of Israel and so deeply enmeshed in the Middle East, but that’s the reality. Why? Because money and lobbying and influence (by Jews, non-Jews, Saudis, etc) play a big role.
I guess it is a thought crime to notice patterns.
Free Beacon: The New York Times has come under fire from Jewish organizations for launching a website aimed at tracking how Jewish lawmakers are voting on the Iran nuclear agreement.
The online chart, which tracks whether lawmakers who opposes the accord are Jewish, is being criticized as anti-Semitic in nature and an attempt to publicly count where Jews fall on the issue, which some have sought to turn into a debate about dual loyalty to Israel.
The feature, titled “Lawmakers Against the Iran Nuclear Deal,” includes a list of legislators currently opposing the deal.
Critics say the chart feeds into a larger narrative promulgated by the Obama administration that Jewish Americans oppose the deal because they feel that it would endanger Israel. The issue of dual loyalty—or claims that lawmakers are more loyal to Israel than America—has become a trademark criticism of administration supporters seeking to discredit opponents of the Iran deal.
“Though more Jewish members of Congress support the deal than oppose it, the Democrats against the deal are more likely to be Jewish or represent Jewish constituencies,” the Times writes on the site.
The article shows in graph form all lawmakers in the House and Senate who oppose the deal and whether they are Jewish. It also includes the composition of a lawmaker’s district, displaying the percentage of Jewish individuals they represent.
Jewish leaders criticized the Times for feeding into anti-Semitic stereotypes.
“It’s a grotesque insult to the intelligence of the people who voted for and will vote against [the deal],” said Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, which combats anti-Semitism.
Cooper said it evokes images of “Jewish pressure” and “Jewish money” influencing the Iran vote.
This type of reporting “does a disservice to the issue and that’s the exact opposite job of the New York Times,” Cooper said. “They have some explaining to do. Why’d they do it? Shame on the New York Times for the timing and implications of this piece.”
A nationwide poll released this week found that a plurality of American voters, or 37 percent “see accusations of Jewish lawmakers having dual-loyalties on the Iran deal as anti-Semitic,” according to the findings, which were published by the Israel Project.
“This includes pluralities across all partisan and ideological lines,” the poll found. “Even among supporters of the deal, 37 percent view these accusations as anti-Semitic.”
“As a point of comparison, 35 percent said they saw the Confederate Flag as a symbol of racism in a New York Times poll in July 2015, a position that the paper vocally endorsed,” said Nathan Klein, lead pollster at Olive Tree Strategies, which conducted the poll on the Israel Project’s behalf.
JOSHUA KEATING WRITES: It’s not exactly a secret that the prime minister of Israel has been the most prominent critic of the Iran deal, arguing that it poses an existential threat to the Jewish state; that pro-Israel lobbying groups have spent record sums trying to defeat it; and that a significant portion, though not the majority, of American Jews strongly oppose the deal. Even if the people holding #JewishLivesMatter posters at Wednesday’s rally against the deal on the Hill are in the minority, the debate within the American Jewish community and concerns over what the deal will mean for Israel’s security are real.
It’s not a coincidence that President Obama gave a Web address on the deal aimed specifically at American Jews. When prominent Jewish lawmakers, such as New York’s Jerrold Nadler, have come out in support of the deal, several outlets have found their religious affiliation worth noting in headlines. The Israeli media has focused in particular on how many Jewish members of Congress have supported the deal. And the pro-deal liberal Jewish lobbying group J Street prominently featured the fact that 60 percent of Jewish members of Congress support the deal in a two-page New York Times ad, an example of Jew-counting if I’ve ever seen one.
