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M.J. Rosenberg is Director of Policy Analysis for , a long time Capitol Hill staffer and former editor of AIPAC's Near East Report.
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By M.J. Rosenberg
August 1, 2004
It happens every four years. Supporters of each of the respective candidates for President try to convince pro-Israel voters that the other candidate is either anti-Israel or, at best, lukewarm in their feelings toward the Jewish state.
There is not much evidence that the tactic works. Jewish voters are not single-issue voters by any means. There has never been a single poll demonstrating that Mideast policy is number one on the Jewish voter's list of priorities when he or she goes to the polls to vote for President.
Since 1928, Jewish voters have voted overwhelmingly for Democratic candidates for President - not because they believe Democrats to be more Zionist but because on the wide array of issues facing the American people, they have been more comfortable with the Democrats than with the Republicans.
That pattern may or may not hold this year. We won't know until after Nov. 2 when we see the election returns and the New York Times/CBS exit polls which break the results down into various demographics, including religious affiliation.
But one thing we do know is that it will not be Israel policy that primarily drives the Jewish vote. It will be the economy, the war on terrorism, Iraq, choice, etc - the same issues that non-Jewish voters consider in going to the polls. To suggest that an American Jew living in Long Island or Des Moines votes based on considerations entirely different from his non-Jewish next door neighbor is insulting. It is also wrong.
This is not to say that Israel does not loom large in American Jewish lives and minds. It does. It is to say, however, that with virtually no exceptions, there has been little if any difference in the Mideast policies of the major party nominees since 1948. With such essential unanimity on an issue, there has been no reason for it to become decisive in anyone's vote.
This has been especially true since 1967 when the current struggle over the West Bank and Gaza began.
Partisans have tried to make Israel an issue anyway.
Almost every President elected since 1968 (and their losing opponents), has been accused of being weak on Israel. Nevertheless, each of the six Presidents elected since 1968 has maintained the basic policy first endorsed by President Lyndon B. Johnson following the 1967 war, i.e. to support the U.S.-Israel "special relationship" and to implement United Nations Resolution 242 (and later 338), calling for the exchange of the lands occupied in the Six Day War for a secure and permanent peace.
Certainly, the Presidents have differed on the particulars. President Jimmy Carter, for instance, chose to personally mediate the Arab-Israeli dispute and secured the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty, which continues to govern relations between the two countries today and has saved countless Israeli and Egyptian lives. President Reagan's initiative called for a complete settlements freeze as both a confidence-building measure and a prelude to negotiations toward permanent peace. The first President Bush convened the Madrid conference, which brought Israelis and Palestinians together around a negotiating table for the first time. Building on Madrid, President Bill Clinton helped secure the Oslo agreement, which produced the peace treaty with Jordan and, by the time he left office, brought Israelis and Palestinians closer to a final status agreement than ever before. President George W. Bush put forth the "roadmap" to peace, which declared, for the first time ever, that the United States would pursue the end of terrorism and the establishment of a Palestinian state with viable borders while offering a step-by-step approach to achieving these goals.
Each President since LBJ has favored the land for peace formula, and so will the next President.
But that fact hasn't deterred the campaigns from using the Israel issue for maximum advantage in 2004, because that is what politicians do. It is a game called "gotcha." It is played by scouring an opponent's record or utterances to find the one phrase or comment that will cause a particular interest group to come down on him like a ton of bricks. "Gotcha" is at the heart of every negative campaign and it often works.
The fact is that both Democrats and Republicans are very adept at this game and sometimes the sheer effrontery of it is astonishing. Democrats attack a Republican for "selling out" Israel even though the policy advocated by the Republican is the same one they supported when a Democrat advanced it. And Republicans do the exact same thing.
This is especially offensive when a candidate is "accused" of being too zealous in pursuit of Middle East peace. This year I have already heard Democrats say that George W. Bush has "backed away" from a commitment he made to Ariel Sharon regarding changes in Israel's borders in order to advance negotiations. I have already heard Republicans say that John Kerry will be too much like Bill Clinton i.e. that he will engage too forcefully in the peace process.
The underlying assumption is that the best President, from Israel's point of view, is the one who is least engaged in helping Israel achieve peace. That makes sense if one believes that continued stagnation and terrorist threats are best for Israel. It does not make sense if you believe that an Israel at peace, free of terror and the threat of terror, is what the Zionist dream has always been about.
And then there are the interests of the United States. As President Bush and Senator Kerry both understand, continuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict endangers U.S. interests throughout the Middle East (we still have 130,000 troops in Iraq) and the world. It is simply inconceivable that any President, determined to defend this nation from terror over the next four years, is going to sit back and allow the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to pour fuel on a fire that could consume us all.
The bottom line is this. Americans need to vote based on the issues that divide the two candidates and not on the issues on which they share similar, if not identical, views. Israel is in the latter category no matter what partisans are telling you. Kerry and Bush are both "good on Israel."
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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