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June 23, 2024
Key Takeaways:
- It's been 261 days since October 7, 2023, when, on Simchat Torah, Hamas terrorists infiltrated Israel and murdered 1,200 people (including 44 Americans). More Jews were murdered on that day than on any day since the Holocaust. Hamas wounded 3,300 and took 240 hostage during a day of brutal savagery and unspeakable, undeniable sexual violence; 120 hostages, 43 confirmed dead (but certainly more), some raped and possibly pregnant, remain captive in Gaza today.
- The 120 remaining hostages comprise five religions and 25 nationalities, including eight Americans, five probably alive: Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Keith Siegal, Omer Neutra, Edan Alexander, Sagui Dekel-Chen, Itay Chen, Judi Weinstein Haggai, and Gad Haggai.
- The question should not be how large Biden's victory over Trump among Jewish voters will be. The question should be why Trump will get any Jewish votes at all. Biden's overall record as president is superior to Trump's and his record on Israel and antisemitism is superior to Trump's.
- Netanyahu created new daylight between Israel and the U.S. in an inflammatory video that proved nothing except that inviting him to address Congress on July 24 was a mistake that will further exacerbate tensions.
- The Biden administration has repeatedly condemned Hamas's sexual violence. Last week, Vice President Kamala Harris met with a survivor of Hamas's sexual violence and invited her to speak at a White House program that included a screening of Sheryl Sandberg's documentary on October 7 sexual violence by Hamas and another speech from Harris condemning Hamas's sexual violence.
Read to the end for corrections, what you may have missed last week, fun stuff, and upcoming events.
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Hi Steve,
I have mixed feelings when I'm asked what Joe Biden has accomplished. It's a reasonable question to ask of any incumbent in any election. But when the opponent is Donald Trump, if the answer was "nothing but sit around and eat ice cream," wouldn't you still vote for President Biden?
For the record, Biden's accomplishments are here (scroll until you've seen enough). Biden's accomplishments on Israel and antisemitism are here and Vice President Harris's record on Israel and antisemitism is here. If this election is a referendum on the Biden-Harris administration, Biden and Harris should win overwhelmingly.
But elections are not referendums. They are choices. In this case, the alternative is Donald Trump. Stealing and retaining classified documents, inciting an insurrection, refusing to accept the results of a lawful election, legal liability for sexual abuse, 34 felony convictions--any one of those should be disqualifying in the eyes of any decent American.
Republican Jewish Coalition Chair Norm Coleman wrote in March 2016 that he would never vote for Trump because Trump is ''a bigot, a misogynist, a fraud, and a bully." Events have proven him right even though the RJC subsequently endorsed Trump for president in the 2016, 2020, and 2024 elections.
For any Jewish American to ignore Trump's affronts to our humanity, to ignore Trump's racism, xenophobia, and contempt for democracy, not to mention his unhinged mind, his detachment from reality, his hostility to reproductive rights, and his terrible record as president because of faux concerns about Israel and antisemitism when the facts show that Biden is great on both and Trump is terrible on both makes no sense.
We shouldn't even need to get to antisemitism and Israel, but if we need to go there, let's go there.
Trump's long record of antisemitism is a matter of record. Trump repeatedly invokes Hitler and the Nazis. Trump dined with Kanye West and white nationalist/Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes. Trump said that white nationalists marching with tiki torches in Charlottesville chanting "Jews will not replace us" were "very fine people."
Trump is not good on Israel. When Biden talks about the "hostages" he is working to bring home, he's talking about the 120 people held by Hamas in Gaza. When Donald Trump talks about "the hostages" who are treated "horrifically," he's talking about January 6 insurrectionists held in U.S. prisons who he plans to pardon. Trump has shown no sympathy--only callousness--for the hostages.
Biden coordinated the allied defense of Israel against Iran's attack on April 13, preventing a day that could have been far worse than October 7 in part by deploying U.S. forces to defend Israel for the first time in history. Ironically, we'll forget April 13 and remember October 7 because on April 13, Biden's defense of Israel was successful and on October 7, Netanyahu's defense wasn't (Hamas was to blame on October 7, just as Iran was to blame on April 13--that does not absolve our side of acting responsibly).
But as Michael Berenbaum writes, "Trump is not a president who can be relied on to send warships to restrain Iran and Hezbollah or coordinate a response to direct attacks from Iran. Trump's 'go it alone' attitude would only exacerbate Israel's increasing isolation in the world."
If you think that Trump could have put together the coalition Biden assembled that saved thousands of Israelis from Iran's April 13 ballistic missile attacks, read what two hawkish Republican national security experts say about Trump's fitness for office.
Trump attacked Israel and its leaders days after October 7. Trump said nothing while Republicans were blocking vital emergency aid to Israel for six months. During that same period, Biden approved over 100 arms sales to Israel.
Trump walked away from the Iran Deal while the deal was working and Iran was still in compliance. Then his “maximum pressure” strategy failed, his efforts at the UN to continue the arms embargo against Iran failed, and his efforts at the UN to snap back sanctions against Iran failed. Trump's Iran policy was a disaster.
Trump's moving the embassy to Jerusalem made Israel neither safer nor more secure. Few cared where the embassy was until Republicans decided it would bolster the presidential candidacy of Sen. Robert Dole (R-KA). Now it’s Trump’s antisemitic dog-whistle to right-wing Evangelicals.
If Trump were president and if he wanted to give his Evangelical base their money's worth, he would have let those Iranian missiles hit Israel on April 13 (even if he was competent enough to stop them). Israel would have responded with massive attacks of its own, Iran would have retaliated, and we'd have the Armageddon our friends at Christians United for Israel dream of. That's why they "support" Israel in the first place.
Imagine if someone as petty and petulant as Trump was mad at Israel's Prime Minister (it won't be Netanyahu forever) or at ungrateful Jews on the day when Iran attacked Israel. Why would anyone want someone as unstable as Trump in the White House when Israel's security is on the line?
Anshel Pfeffer wrote that Trump’s recognition of Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights was an empty gesture--"just as his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital was. It won’t change the status of the Golan in international law and with the exception of a few client-states in Latin America, no other country is going to follow suit.”
There has been public daylight between the U.S. and Israel in every administration since 1948. Last week, Netanyahu went out of his way to create new daylight in a video falsely attacking the Biden administration of withholding weapons. The White House denied withholding weapons from Israel. Israeli journalist Anshel Pfeffer called Netanyahu's broadside "bullsh*t." Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) said that the video undermined the bipartisanship of the U.S.-Israel relationship.
JDCA CEO Halie Soifer said that no president "has a longer or stronger record of support of Israel than Joe Biden. Since 10/7, he has provided an unprecedented amount of military aid to Israel, and sent 100+ weapons shipments. Biden is a self-declared Zionist who stands with Israel and Jewish voters stand with him."
Alon Pinkas writes, "After Biden provided over $14 billion in emergency military aid, after authorizing the sale of dozens of F-35 and F-15 jets, after dispatching two aircraft carrier strike groups to the Mediterranean, Benjamin Netanyahu just stood there and accused the Americans of holding up arms shipments...
"The video is just a prequel to his visit to Washington, where he invited himself in cahoots with the Republican speaker of the House of Representatives to address a joint session of Congress on July 24. He is doing so to hurt Biden and turn Israel into a larger partisan wedge issue ahead of the U.S. presidential election on November 5."
Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk said since Netanyahu attacked the United States based on "a lie that he made up, the Speaker and Leader should withdraw his invitation to address Congress until he recants and apologizes."
Shani Louk's family refused to attend a meeting Netanyahu held with family members of murdered Israeli hostages. Nissim Louk, her dad, said he declined because "it's Netanyahu's circus." I wouldn't be surprised if many Democrats decline to attend Netanyahu's circus on July 24 when he addresses Congress.
The Biden administration has repeatedly condemned Hamas's sexual violence. President Biden, Vice President Harris, and our UN representative, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, have all been vocal on this critical issue.
On June 17, Harris said, "In the days after October 7, I saw images of bloodied Israeli women abducted. Then it came to light that Hamas committed rape and gang rape at the Nova Music Festival, and women’s bodies were found naked from the waist down, hands tied behind their back, and shot in the head. I’ve heard the stories from a former hostage of what she witnessed and heard in captivity. And I just met with Amit [Soussana], a survivor who has bravely come forward with her account of sexual violence while she was held captive by Hamas."
On the same day, the White House released a Fact Sheet describing Biden-Harris "policies and programs to prevent conflict-related sexual violence and all forms of gender-based violence, to support survivors and ensure accountability and justice." Harris mentioned some of the countries and conflicts listed in the Fact Sheet in her speech but her strong condemnation of Hamas's sexual violence garnered most of the media coverage, in part because the program included remarks from Amit Soussana, the first released Israeli hostage to come forward about the sexual abuse she endured in captivity, as well as a screening of Sheryl Sandberg's documentary on the October 7 sexual violence.
Soussana referred to President Biden as "Israel's best friend."
The Fact Sheet was designed to outline a new announcement on Dignity in Documentation, which is beyond Israel, and the work that the administration has done, including the first-ever Presidential Memorandum and dedicated sanctions on conflict-related sexual violence. Vice President Harris was clear, as the administration has been since October 7, that Hamas perpetrated sexual violence that the world must condemn.
Corrections. I'm entitled to my own opinions but not to my own facts, so I appreciate it when readers bring errors to my attention. No one pointed out any substantive errors in last week's newsletter. There was one typo that did not change the meaning.
In Case You Missed It:
Tweet of the Week. Satchel Paige meets Willie Mays.
Facebook Post of the Week. Sharon Kleinbaum.
Video Clips of the Week. Willie Mays (the "Say Hey" Kid) makes a cameo on Bewitched, Jerry Seinfeld responds to an anti-Israel heckler, and Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys turned 82 last week--watch him get arrested by John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd in 1976.
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I periodically update my posts on why Democrats are better than Republicans on Israel and antisemitism and on the IHRA definition of antisemitism. My definition of "pro-Israel" is here (it's a work in progress, as am I).
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