Who Israelis want as U.S. President

By Josh Pasek

Less than a week after new polling data shows that Israelis prefer Barack Obama by 37-28% (with 35% of Israelis undecided) [1], the RJC reposted an interview where one commentator said that Obama doesn’t have “what Israelis look for in a U.S. President” [2].  Sounds like that commentator is a little off on whether Obama has what Israelis want.  Indeed, Obama showed during his trip that he understands “the real security threats facing Israel and the United States” [2][3]. The bigger question may be whether McCain realizes that Iran is a much bigger threat than Iraq.  As we have previously mentioned, he has failed to press for serious sanctions in the past [4][5].

Media to RJC: Put Quotes in Context

By Josh Pasek

During his international trip, Obama used a speech in Jordan to show Jordanians how acts of terror could derail the search for peace.  In response to a question, Obama said:

And that’s why terrorism is so counterproductive, as well as being immoral, because it makes, I believe, the Israelis want to dig in and simply think about their own security regardless of what’s going on beyond their borders. I think the same would be true of any people when these kinds of things happen and innocent people are injured. [1]

 While Obama was using the speech to help Jordanians see an Israeli perspective, the RJC had a very different interpretation.  According to the RJC, who only published a misleading part of the quote, Obama was talking to Israelis and telling them to “put terrorism in context” [2].  This smear was so inaccurate that even the Jewish Telegraphic Agency jumped on the Republican Jewish Coalition [3].

By Matt Rozsa

The Republican Jewish Coalition has made a career out of claiming that the conservative movement is a more hospitable home for Jews than its liberal counterpart. Unfortunately for them, their own flagship media outlet, Fox News, has set that particular lie back even further.

On July 1st, Fox News responded to an article critical of them in The New York Times by attacking the two reporters who wrote the piece. While such conduct is hardly unusual of the right-wing network, it becomes even shadier than usual when one looks at the way they attached these reporters – and in particular, a reporter named Jacques
Steinberg, who happens to be Jewish.

While discussing these two men on Fox & Friends, the network chose to share photographs of the reporters, each of them conveniently Photoshopped to accentuate those physical attributes Fox’s producers clearly thought would send the most negative image to the audience (they did this, by the way, without indicating that the pictures they were showing had been altered in any way).
Here’s the picture they showed of Steven Reddicliffe:

And here’s the one of Jacques Steinberg:

Isn’t it interesting that the characteristics they chose to exaggerate on the Jewish reporter are the same ones frequently exaggerated by anti-Semitic caricaturists the world over? For more examples of this, go to the dailykos’s blog.

Neutral Sources

By Josh Pasek

Many of the documents linked to by the RJC come complete with newspaper images and links.  These are effective political tools because they offer the aura of legitimacy for what is being said in the article.  Yet the articles are almost universally opinion pieces (or op-eds).  This means that their actual text is simply the perspective of a single individual.  Further, the text of these articles is often written by members of the RJC board.  While we are all for referring to news articles, the links that the RJC provides are not checked for accurate information by the newspaper, so everything in them is at the word of the author.  With the RJC’s history, it may not be too good an idea to simply accept their members’ view of the facts.

New Yorker’s Adelson profile paints grim portrait of RJC-style plutocracy

by Daniel Sieradski

Offering a rare glimpse at the grim realities of 21st century plutocracy, The New Yorker has profiled billionaire casino magnate and top RJC contributor Sheldon Adelson in a lurid epic that should give pause to any Jew who values the precept of Jewish self-determination.

The revelations are staggering. Some highlights: