J Street
Tuesday, April 29th, 2008
J Street was founded to promote meaningful American leadership to end the Arab-Israeli and Palestinian-Israel conflicts peacefully and diplomatically. We support a new direction for American policy in the Middle East and a broad public and policy debate about the U.S. role in the region.
One of the last great writers at Salon.com, Gary Kamiya has a great article on this movement: Taking back the debate over Israel
For years, liberal American Jews who have chafed under the taboo against criticizing Israel have dreamed of starting a political organization that would speak for them. Now, with the launch of J Street, that dream has become a reality.
Thank you Gary and J Street. I was hoping a movement would emerge that I could identify with and it seems it has with J Street.
The issue of Israel’s security and existence has been framed in binary terms: “love it or leave it” or “you’re either with us or you’re against us” but as a Jew I can tell you that I’ve never seen Israel in those terms, nor do I see the United States in those terms.
The United States and Israel are both democracies; both countries do great things and both countries do despicable things. I don’t think it weakens Israel for me to question their leveling Lebanon going after Hamas, nor do I think the statements of Jerimiah Wright on US domestic and foreign policy weaken the United States.
Of course, the folks who hang out over in the Salon community are turning this into another binary argument. Maybe everything turns into a sore if you rub on it enough.
