[Peace] On the Importance of Being _Important_

[Robert Naiman]

https://www.facebook.com/robert.naiman/posts/10158778178582656


On the Importance of Being _*Important*_



I once met with Dick Durbin at a fundraising party in Champaign at a time
when President Obama was facing harsh pushback from pro-Netanyahu American
Jews for his attempts to negotiate the Iran nuclear deal. Like, “Obama is
leading Jews to the gas chambers,” this kind of thing was appearing
regularly in the Jewish press. The question I asked Durbin was: “How come
Democrats in Congress are being so quiet when Obama is getting pummeled for
doing the thing that Democratic voters asked him to do?” Pursuing diplomacy
with Iran was a major issue in the 2008 Democratic primary and general
election. For a lot of Democratic voters the thing that distinguished Obama
was not just his early opposition to the Iraq war, running against Hillary
Clinton and John McCain who had supported it, but his promise to pursue
diplomacy with Iran to avoid another war like the Iraq war. It is why I
supported Obama: why I voted for him, why I gave his campaign money, why I
knocked on doors for him in Indiana, why I organized MoveOn calling parties
for him in Champaign-Urbana.



Durbin answered at first with something mealy-mouthed, like “I can see why
a lot of my colleagues are concerned…” I challenged him: “Dianne Feinstein
is speaking up for diplomacy. How come you’re not speaking up for
diplomacy?” At the time it seemed that Dianne Feinstein was the only
Democrat in Congress saying anything against the anti-diplomacy onslaught.



Durbin leaned in and lowered his voice. “Dianne Feinstein is a very _
*important*_ voice,” Durbin said.



At the time I interpreted this to mean: “This anti-diplomacy onslaught is
coming from pro-Netanyahu Jews. Dianne Feinstein is Jewish. So we’ve all
agreed that Dianne Feinstein is going to take the incoming fire on this and
the rest of us are going to hide behind Dianne Feinstein.”



Sometime after that, I was at a party in Champaign where I met a woman who
worked for the Champaign-Urbana Jewish Federation. In the course of
describing my relationship to Jewish things, I said: “I’m a member of J
Street and Jewish Voice for Peace and I read the *Forward*.” She said: “J
Street and the *Forward* are _*important_ *institutions.” She said the word
_*important*_ exactly the same way Durbin had said it. This showed that the
word _*important*_ wasn’t just a Jewish code word for “Jewish.” It referred
to Jewish people and institutions seen as existing inside a perceived
perimeter of Jewish respectability.



The perceived perimeter of Jewish respectability in the United States is a
major determinant of how much peace we’re allowed to have in U.S. foreign
policy in the Middle East. The perceived perimeter of Jewish respectability
in the United States is not determined by a democratic vote of Jews, any
more than the perceived position of gun owners on gun regulation is
determined by a democratic vote of gun owners. Moneyed interests and the
institutions they fund play a huge role. U.S. policy in the Middle East
would never survive a referendum of American Jews, any more than U.S.
policy on gun regulation would survive a referendum of gun owners. There’s
nothing natural about this hegemony. This hegemony has been constructed by
moneyed interests and their surrogates to try to bring about certain
outcomes.



Although the perimeter of Jewish respectability is not determined
democratically, democratic organizing can move it, because who gets elected
to the presidency and Congress dramatically shapes what the perceived
perimeter is.



In 2000, Joe Lieberman was Al Gore’s running mate. In 2006, Joe Lieberman
was defeated in a Democratic Senate primary in Connecticut over Joe
Lieberman’s support for the Iraq war. Jews who opposed the Iraq war had a
lot to do with Joe Lieberman’s defeat. I know this because I knocked on
doors for Ned Lamont. And I saw a bunch of Jews there doing the same thing
I was. “We need to get rid of this guy who is claiming that he is
representing Jews when he advocates for war in the public square.”



At the beginning of the Obama Administration, AIPAC was perceived as
all-powerful and J Street was perceived as a 90 pound weakling. This
dynamic changed significantly during the Obama Administration, in part
because of the relationship between J Street and Obama. Today AIPAC is
still perceived as more powerful than J Street. But the margin isn’t nearly
as great as it was in 2008. This year, MoveOn called for Dem POTUS 2020
candidates to boycott the AIPAC policy conference. Nancy Pelosi went to
AIPAC, where she was a keynote speaker, but no major Dem candidates for
President went. [Biden dodged this choice by announcing later.] In
contrast, a bunch of presidential candidates went to the J Street
conference this week. Biden and Warren didn’t go. But Bernie went. Julian
Castro went. PeteB went. Even Amy Klobuchar went.



That’s a big change. When he was running for President, Obama went to the
AIPAC policy conference. Obama told the AIPAC conferees that Jerusalem must
be the united capital of Israel – exactly the policy that Trump later
implemented, just like Trump has said. Obama talked about doing it, Trump
did it. Obama wasn’t interested in peace in general. Obama was interested
in pivoting the U.S. relationship with Iran, like Nixon pivoted the U.S.
relationship with China. Every other peace concern in the Middle East,
Obama was willing to throw under the bus to appease the Saudi and Israeli
governments. Obama destroyed Libya, Obama destroyed Syria, Obama destroyed
Yemen. That was all collateral damage, claimed to be necessary to appease
the Saudi and Israeli governments.



J Street was good on nuclear diplomacy with Iran primarily because Obama
was good on it. Nuclear diplomacy with Iran was Obama’s priority in the
Middle East. Nuclear diplomacy with Iran was the fight that Obama was
willing to have with AIPAC and Netanyahu and Saudi Arabia. Obama wasn’t
willing to have any other fights with AIPAC and Netanyahu and Saudi Arabia.
J Street helped very little on ending the catastrophic Saudi war in Yemen
started by Obama. J Street helped even less in preventing the U.S. from
visiting the catastrophe on Syria started by Obama. And during the Obama
Administration, J Street didn’t move the ball in DC on peace and justice in
Israel-Palestine, mainly because Obama wasn’t really interested in that,
even though supposedly that was a key reason that J Street was created, to
move the ball in DC on peace and justice in Israel-Palestine.



The half-full of this is: the better the next Democratic President is, the
better J Street will be. If we could elect a Democratic President who was
seriously interested in peace in the Middle East, J Street would improve
dramatically, because they’d be blocking for a much better Democratic
President on peace than Obama. To get a better Democratic President than
Obama on peace in the Middle East, we have to beat Haim Saban and his
surrogates in the primary. That’s the most important thing we have to do.



The second most important thing we need to do is go after AIPAC’s most
extreme assets in Congress, like the Crown Prince of the Warmongers. We
could have a big impact just by picking off a few of them. The defeat of
Joe Lieberman in Connecticut in the Democratic primary in 2006 had a big
impact on how Democrats nationally thought about the Iraq war. If we picked
off a few of AIPAC’s most extreme assets in Congress, J Street would
improve.



I once went to a movie about Iran. I invited some Iranian-American friends.
The movie was made by a friend of the comedian Jon Stewart. So Jon Stewart
introduced the movie. When Jon Stewart’s face came on the screen, one of my
friends said, I’m tired of Jon Stewart, Jon Stewart is not that
progressive. I said: look, here’s why I love Jon Stewart. He’s the most
famous and popular Jew in America who doesn’t want to bomb Iran. They
laughed.



The sentence I said to my Iranian-American friends is no longer true. Jon
Stewart is no longer the most famous and popular Jew in America who doesn’t
want to bomb Iran.



If there’s another plausible path to defeating Haim Saban in 2020, I have
no idea what it is.
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