J Street backs Obama’s Israel proposal amid partisan debate

J Street, the left-leaning alternative to the more established American Israel Public Affairs Committee, put out a statement of support for Mr. Obama on Wednesday. “To oppose the president without laying out a credible alternative basis for a two-state solution is to embrace a status quo leading to the eventual loss of Israel as we know and love it,” its statement said. Mr. Obama’s proposal, the group said, is supported by many Jews in the United States and Israel. It is “the path that most of Israel’s recent prime ministers have attempted to blaze, from Rabin to Barak to Olmert.” Republicans, however, are confident that their emphasis on unconditional support for Israel holds appeal both for many Jews and for conservative Christians. Yet it is the Republican Party’s close identification with evangelical Christians in recent years that is perhaps its biggest hurdle to winning over significant numbers of Jewish voters and donors. On issues that are crucial to the conservative Republican base — like opposition to abortion, gay rights, liberalized immigration and much government spending — most American Jews are on the other side, and strongly SO. “If Republicans can mischaracterize this president as anti-Israel, they can distract from the fact that on every other issue their party is in disagreement with the American-Jewish community,” said David A. Harris, president of the National Jewish Democratic Council, a group of Jewish-American Democratic activists. Mr. Netanyahu on Monday experienced first-hand the tension arising from that complaint among Democrats, and Republicans’ rejection of it, in a private meeting he held with representatives of the National Jewish Democratic Council and the Republican Jewish Coalition to underscore American Jews’ bipartisan consensus on Israel. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_023523