TEL AVIV, November 15, 2008 (WAFA)- Haaretz Israeli Newspaper expected a diminish in the role of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the traditional right-wing defender of Israel, with the emerging of a new Jewish lobby, J street, proposing a new left-wing liberal alternative.
In its editorial entitled “Welcoming a new Jewish voice”, Haaretz considered, Friday, that Barack Obama's election as president of the United States generates new hope not only for a change in policy but primarily for the implementation of a different point of view. All signs indicate that Israel would not be able to count on the new U.S. administration to accept the Israeli policy of foot dragging.
Haaretz pointed that many in Israel and the American Jewish community see Obama's election and his apparent policy leaning as a threat.to the Israeli policy forged by AIPAC, opposed to renouncing the territories occupied in 1967. AIPAC, known for its pro-Israeli activity, managed to create the illusion that American Jews spoke with one voice, exclusively and automatically, for the Jewish right wing and Israeli government
Recently, a new Jewish lobby has been formed, J Street, which proposes a left-wing liberal alternative to AIPAC. This is important news to both peace supporters in Israel and the U.S. Jewish community. Judging by the new lobby's public opinion poll, some 76 percent of U.S. Jews support negotiating with 'Israel's worse enemies,' 58 percent support pulling out of the Golan in exchange for peace and 59 percent support withdrawing from the territories. This is a large and important chunk of the Jewish American community, whose voice is usually silent, or silenced with the argument that it is a marginal group of 'self-hating Jews' or 'Israel haters.'
