{"id":90274,"date":"2016-03-17T11:24:28","date_gmt":"2016-03-17T19:24:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=90274"},"modified":"2016-03-17T14:48:49","modified_gmt":"2016-03-17T22:48:49","slug":"why-anguish-over-aipacs-invitation-to-donald-trump-is-misplaced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=90274","title":{"rendered":"Why Anguish Over AIPAC\u2019s Invitation to Donald Trump Is Misplaced"},"content":{"rendered":"

J.J. Goldberg writes<\/a>: The core mission of the powerhouse pro-Israel lobby is to ensure good relations between the American and Israeli governments. Those relations begin at the top, with the White House and its occupant. And the voting on Super Tuesday greatly increased the odds that Trump will be one of the two candidates contending to win the presidency next fall, like it or not. Now is the time for the lobby to start, well, lobbying.
\nIt\u2019s a safe bet that most readers won\u2019t like it. Twitter and the blogosphere are filled with condemnations of the AIPAC invitation. Some come from critics who say the lobby \u2014 or Israel \u2014 has shown its true colors. Others come from anguished citizens who believe AIPAC has implicated the Jewish community and Israel in Trump\u2019s bigotry. Rob Eshman, editor in chief of the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles, wrote in a stern column<\/a> that the lobby made a \u201ccore moral mistake\u201d by inviting the billionaire candidate, thereby lending its \u201cimprimatur\u201d to his bigotry and offending key constituencies whose support we need, particularly Muslims and Latinos.<\/p>\n

Eshman wrote that while AIPAC can\u2019t \u201cnecessarily\u201d retract, it could salvage the situation by condemning the candidate\u2019s \u201cincendiary statements\u201d about various groups, denouncing his \u201cclear incitement to physical violence\u201d and making clear that \u201cthose who foment hate and violence have no place in American politics, or on an AIPAC dais.\u201d Making clear, that is, that Trump shouldn\u2019t be appearing on the dais on which he\u2019s been invited to appear.
\nThe anguish is understandable, but the hard truth is that it\u2019s misplaced. If AIPAC were a different Jewish organization \u2014 say, a federation of congregations, an institution of religious education, or a league for combating bigotry or promoting intergroup relations \u2014 then the thought of honoring Trump by offering him a platform should indeed appall us. Trump\u2019s message, his behavior and the very fact of his candidacy fly in the face of Jewish values as the vast majority of us understand them.
\nTo expect that of AIPAC, though, is to mistake the purpose of the lobby \u2014 and, in a way, to misunderstand the nature of Jewish organizational activity. Though it\u2019s not always apparent from their public statements, the main Jewish organizations constitute a rough sort of governing structure in which each component has a job to do. Many are tasked with examining, teaching or advancing the values of our heritage, as variously interpreted. Others act on them by caring for the poor or sick. AIPAC\u2019s job is to ensure that America stands with Israel. It\u2019s pretty good at it.<\/p>\n

Some fret that it protects Israel from paying a price for its mistakes and thus perpetuates those mistakes. But the alternative \u2014 leaving Israel defenseless in the face of very real threats \u2014 is far worse. And given its mission, it\u2019s important that the lobby keep itself on decent terms with whatever powers govern in Washington. Who holds those powers is an important question, never more so than this year, but it\u2019s not a question AIPAC exists to answer.<\/p>\n

RABBI URI PILOCHOWSKI FROM NCSY COMMENTS ON ROB ESHMAN’S COLUMN<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“I am a realist and I live in Israel. While plenty of my neighbors assume all will be well in Israel since the IDF arms itself with magic dust having nothing to do with American military aid, and others in America get to sit in safety from rockets and stabbings and debate the morality of AIPAC inviting someone who makes racist and antisemitic comments like Donald Trump, I don’t have that luxury. I am constantly threatened by people who want to kill me, and am protected by soldiers carrying weapons and flying helicopters and planes that say, “Made in the USA” on them. Donald Trump could very well be the next President and if so, will have a very significant influence on my family’s safety. If nothing else, AIPAC is about effective political advocacy on behalf of the U.S.-Israel relationship. Ensuring that all aspiring elected officials are Pro-Israel is one of AIPAC’s missions and greatest achievements.
\nFor all who think that we’ll be fine as long as we’re in Israel, that America will continue to help Israel whether or not we lobby, and who think making a point is more important than being effective, please, go ahead and preach. The other 18,000 of us will head to Washington next week and hope to strengthen the U.S.-Israel relationship by talking and listening to anyone who aspires to hold office in the United States. It’s called effective political advocacy, and it’s what we practice.”<\/p>\n

Y. emails: “Just saw your recent quote by Uri Pilichowski about Trump’s supposedly anti-Semitic statements. I have never seen an anti-Semitic statement by Trump. The most controversial statement he has ever made to a Jewish audience was that he would never be swayed by Jewish organizations’ contributions because he won’t take any; to me, that means he thinks he knows what’s right when it comes to American-Israeli relations. I’m sure he wouldn’t be swayed by Islamic organizations’ contributions either.<\/p>\n

Unless Little Uri hacked into Trump’s e-mail account and found some Jewish stereotype jokes that Trump shared with a friend, I have no idea what he’s talking about. Can anyone point to an anti-Semitic statement that the man has ever made?”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

J.J. Goldberg writes: The core mission of the powerhouse pro-Israel lobby is to ensure good relations between the American and Israeli governments. Those relations begin at the top, with the White House and its occupant. And the voting on Super … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9306,29752],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aipac","category-donald-trump"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=90274"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90274\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90303,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90274\/revisions\/90303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=90274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=90274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=90274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}