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You are here: Home / Someone Actually Wrote This

Someone Actually Wrote This

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Who the fuck do they think they are fooling:

The president of the pro-Israel lobbying group American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) rebuked Donald Trump on Tuesday, scolding him for his harsh comments about President Obama.

“Last evening, something occurred which has the potential to drive us apart, to divide us,” AIPAC President Lillian Pinkus said during the final day of the organization’s annual policy conference in Washington. “We say, unequivocally, that we do not countenance ad hominem attacks, and we take great offense against those that are levied against the president of the United States of America from our stage.

***

Obama, Trump said, “may be the worst thing that ever happened to Israel.”

The current White House has treated Israel “very, very badly,” Trump added.

The comments, and the reaction to them, threatened to undercut AIPAC’s position as a nonpartisan group. The organization already found itself on the other side of the White House after last year’s landmark nuclear deal with Iran, and support for comments like Trump’s could have further jeopardized its standing among Democrats in Washington.

LOL.

Reader Interactions

97Comments

  1. 1.

    Mike in NC

    Drumpf will show the Israelis how to build even bigger, classier walls and make the Palestinians pay for them, too.

  6. 6.

    Baud

    Despite Cole’s emphasis in this post, the fact that the president of a major D.C. interest group felt the need to say something like that after the GOP’s frontrunner’s speech is pretty major news.

  7. 7.

    p.a.

    Who the fuck do they think they are fooling

    Those who make a living of being fooled fools: MSM, Both Siders, Middle Wayists. AIPAC wants to maintain plausible deniability.

  12. 12.

    raven

    Tweety and Peter King both agree that Obama “didn’t do enough” in response to Brussels.

  14. 14.

    dedc79

    Good statement from the ADL today (blasting Ted Cruz):

    As we saw in Brussels today, violent terrorism is a legitimate concern for the home front. But demonizing all Muslims is a misguided and counterproductive response to the terrorist threat posed by those motivated by a radical interpretation of Islam. It is an irrational approach that harkens back to the fear and bigotry that led to a dark and tragic chapter in American history – the relocation of more than 100,000 Japanese-Americans to internment camps during the Second World War simply because of their ethnicity.
    The overwhelming majority of Muslims in America are law-abiding people who are as outraged by terrorism and bigotry as Americans of every other faith. Sweeping generalizations about them can serve only to foment discrimination and hate crimes against innocent, devoted Americans. Furthermore, our law enforcement agencies need the cooperation of Muslim communities and community leaders to combat and deter crimes, including violent extremism.

    Ordering special patrols of Muslim neighborhoods will almost certainly create an adversarial relationship between law enforcement and the communities they have sworn to protect, making those communities more vulnerable, more frightened, and often less willing to help. The approach is contrary to the principles of individual rights, equality, justice, and religious freedom on which this nation was founded.

  15. 15.

    aimai

    @Baud: Yeah. I’ll take it. I am glad they finally decided to stop attacking Obama and realized its time to make nice. I’d rather an insincere rebuke to trump than a full throated acceptance of his shitty speech.

  16. 16.

    geg6

    @raven:

    And what did they suggest he do, exactly? Panic and jump on AF1 and fly around aimlessly while Biden huddles in the WH situation room, telling everyone he’s in charge?

  18. 18.

    dedc79

    @aimai: They shouldn’t have let him speak in the first place though. For many reasons, but among them that there was no question he was going to use it as a platform to blast the President.

  21. 21.

    ? Martin

    Actually, I don’t disagree with the statement. Obama got 78% of the Jewish vote in 2008, and he certainly got a decent chunk of the vote in that room.

    AIPAC certainly looks like a neocon group, but they seem to have no trouble getting Democrats to sign on to that viewpoint if only in the specific case of Israel. There’s no structured opposition to AIPACs position from the left, as much as we might wish it so, so why wouldn’t AIPAC see itself as bipartisan? They’ve certainly been successful in a bipartisan way.

  22. 22.

    raven

    @geg6: Capeheart countered King’s “no hair on fire” comments by say “The Republicans ALWAYS do this”. Tweety said that was unfair.

  23. 23.

    chopper

    @Baud:

    that’s what the article meant about aipac being “non-partisan”. they don’t actually endorse a political party. they just try to influence them both as much as they can.

    still seems like there should be a different term for that. ‘non-partisan’ just seems silly in this instance.

  24. 24.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @raven: What exactly the fuck is that supposed to mean? What, Obama didn’t head to AF1 and fly to Brussels to further make the lives of the Belgians more difficult?

    Oh, wait. I forgot. Obama is blah. Never mind.

  28. 28.

    Baud

    @? Martin: I agree.

    @chopper: I don’t know. NARAL is probably officially non-partisan, but I bet a very high percentage of their support goes to Democrats because Dems are the only ones who agree with them.

  29. 29.

    SteveinSC

    AIPAC has a vested interest in keeping the United States mired down in the Middle East. A fair foreign policy (anathema to AIPAC and Likud) is the only hope to begin to end the root cause of the horrors in the region. We gain precious little from our embrace of Israel and forever relinquish any role as peacemaker. The religious fanatics in the US think they are bringing forth the Apocalypse and AIPAC is happy to encourage the delusion. These religious fanatics are one of the important organs in Trumpenstein, originally engineered by the Republican panderers. And I say this as someone who finds Arabs thoroughly disagreeable for interpersonal, ethnic and intellectual reasons.

  30. 30.

    BBA

    My grandpa was a ZOA member. To him AIPAC was always that squishy liberal group who sold Israel out. But even the ZOA meetings I was dragged along to had a few Democrats.

    Nowadays I’ve come around to the view that Zionism was always criminally wrong, even in Theodor Herzl’s time (go ahead, look him up, I’ll wait). Give Palestine back to the Palestinians.

  32. 32.

    dedc79

    @? Martin: The line in there that deserved to be bolded was this one “the organization already found itself on the other side of the White House after last year’s landmark nuclear deal with Iran.”

    AIPAC, as all-powerful as it is claimed to be, picked a major fight and lost badly.

  35. 35.

    Mike J

    @? Martin:

    There’s no structured opposition to AIPACs position from the left,

    J Street has certainly tried, but it’s a tough market to break into.

  38. 38.

    dedc79

    @BBA: Yeah, i mean what was Herzl thinking? The jews had it great in Europe in the late 19th and early 20th century and things only got better from there on. The Drefyus affair, pogroms in russia, and then that whole extermination thing. Why ever would they want a country of their own where they could control their own fate?

    Note – this is not a defense of the current government, the settlement enterprise, etc.. But casually suggesting that an entire country be dismantled and its people sent somewhere else is not ok.

  39. 39.

    jl

    @geg6:

    ” And what did they suggest he do, exactly? ”
    I guess, going off what Trump said on it, Obama should have flown to Belgium and personally overseen torture of Salah Abdeslam and any other suspects, or suspected suspects, and whoever they rounded up just to be sure they are holding everyone who might possibly be involved. (Edit: and being a soft weak lefty, I forgot about the families)

    @Baud:

    ” invade Paraguay ”

    Actually, that could, in some barely conceivable possible world, be dangerously relevant to DAESH terrorism in Belgium. I am beginning to doubt you are a real GW Bush… um… I mean, Reagan conservative.

  40. 40.

    SteveinSC

    @raven: Yeah tweety with his severe case of DT’s and Peter King of IRA/Provisional fame. Someone needs to put that asshole Mathews out of his misery. He’s really nearly incoherent these days with bits and pieces of gibberish analogies, malaprops and false “both sides do it.”

  41. 41.

    Weaselone

    @Villago Delenda Est:
    Maybe, but it probably has to do with him being a Democrat. It’s by definition a no win condition. See as an example Hillary’s speech to AIPAC yesterday. She got raked over the coals here for pandering too much and being too much of a hawk. She was simultaneously being pilloried in rightwing media for being anti Israel and not aggressive enough on terrorism.

  42. 42.

    ? Martin

    @p.a.: No, I agree. The opposition that does exist is on the left. I’m just saying that there isn’t much of it, and it has little political power.

  43. 43.

    ThresherK

    @raven: Someone has to warn Tweety to not stand so close to King. We’ve reached the point where the scared Republicans are ready wet other peoples’ pants.

  46. 46.

    blueskies

    @dedc79: So then, you agree that Herzl et al shouldn’t have done that very thing to the Palestinians who lived, you know, in Palestine.

  47. 47.

    Turgidson

    @chopper:

    Bingo. If they don’t have invasion plans for Luxembourg drawn up by now, they’re totally doing it wrong.

  48. 48.

    Roger Moore

    @chopper:

    that’s what the article meant about aipac being “non-partisan”. they don’t actually endorse a political party. they just try to influence them both as much as they can.

    I think that’s a big difference from groups like, say, the NRA or NAACP, which aren’t officially affiliated with a political party but everyone knows which way they lean.

  49. 49.

    dedc79

    @blueskies:
    1) Herzl didn’t displace anyone. He was long dead by then.
    2) I’m saying whatever your views on the creation of Israel, the idea that Israel should (or would) negotiate itself out of existence and disperse its jews is a non-starter and rightfully so.

  50. 50.

    BBA

    @dedc79: I’m just trying to counteract the ZOA brainwashing I got as a kid. If I keep repeating it, maybe someday I’ll believe it.

    To be clear I think it’s an absolutely terrible idea. It’s just that all the other ideas are even worse.

  53. 53.

    Roger Moore

    @dedc79:

    But casually suggesting that an entire country be dismantled and its people sent somewhere else is not ok.

    Somebody needs to remind Israel of that once in a while.

  55. 55.

    PhoenixRising

    @dedc79: Returning to 1967 boundaries would not require an entire people to be sent elsewhere, but that’s not even the problem.

    The problem is that Israel is both still necessary in today’s world and an apartheid state perpetrating war crimes against people who were born there too.

    One of those conditions can be controlled but only by a Jewish left, and the worst aspect of HRC’s speech at AIPAC was the degree of wishful thinking about a next Rabin who the US could support. Not gonna happen. So, great example of how US Presidents are constrained by a set of shitty awful bad choices.

  56. 56.

    dedc79

    @Roger Moore: No argument there. Again, i have nothing nice to say about the current government or the israelis who think they can deny the palestinians their own state forever. Was just responding to a particular comment (which it now appears was not made entirely seriously) that Israel should up and disappear.

  58. 58.

    Roger Moore

    @dedc79:

    Yes, the new head of the organization seems to be a vast improvement.

    That makes sense, since he’s a former staffer in the Obama Administration- something that I’m sure Republicans will bring up when they discount anything he says.

  62. 62.

    dedc79

    @efgoldman: When things got particularly bad for jews in Russia (although not as bad as they’d get a few decades later), Herzl expressed interest in an emergency resettlement of russia’s jews in Uganda.

  63. 63.

    Adam L Silverman

    Everyone who works for AIPAC should have to register under the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA). As should everyone at their think tank/research institute: The Washington Institute for Near Eastern Policy, also known as WINEP or just the Washington Institute.

    Additionally, whenever Wolf Blitzer covers a story at CNN about Israel and/or the Palestinians they should run a disclosure at the bottom of the screen that he was formerly a senior AIPAC official.

  64. 64.

    debbie

    @Baud:

    Maybe it’s finally sunk in how screwed up the GOP is. They always had AIPAC’s back and now who would want to have to rely on that nuttiness? Maybe AIPAC’s beginning to regret the choices they’ve made over the past 8 years.

  68. 68.

    Roger Moore

    @dedc79:
    I guess I’m less prone to defend Zionism, even in the 19th Century, because my Jewish ancestors took the alternative course and came to the US. Their success in making a good life for themselves makes me deeply suspicious of the idea that it was necessary to create a new state just to protect the Jewish people. I guess I’m also suspicious of Zionism as a way of protecting the Jewish people as a people because it looks dangerously like putting all one’s eggs in one basket; yes, it empowers Jews to defend themselves, but it also makes them a concentrated target for anyone who wants to commit genocide.

  70. 70.

    dedc79

    @Roger Moore:

    I guess I’m also suspicious of Zionism as a way of protecting the Jewish people as a people because it looks dangerously like putting all one’s eggs in one basket; yes, it empowers Jews to defend themselves, but it also makes them a concentrated target for anyone who wants to commit genocide.

    That is the risk and the jury is still out…

  71. 71.

    blueskies

    @dedc79: Sure, ideas don’t displace people. People displace people.

    It’s how the current country “Israel” started and it’s how it’s done bidness since. The current crew are no worse, and arguably are less worse (as bad as they are) than the originators. I’m not saying there wasn’t a need, but who says European Jews’ need for land and peace was any greater or of a higher moral standing than that of the people who were already living there? Why should they have been the ones to take it on the chin? Because of some old fairy tales?

  72. 72.

    Ohio Mom

    I sometimes think that long after I’m dead and gone, a Jewish social scientist will look over the history of liberal American Judaism in an attempt to figure out exactly why it just about died out (the Ultra-Orthodox cult will live on).

    This remaining human fragment will determine that it was the decision of the organized Jewish community to focus so strongly on Israel that drove so many away from identifying as Jews.

    He/she will bemoan the opportunity price paid. While the Jewish community could have explored ways to develop a meaningful contemporary Judaism, it instead turned the entire community into the equivalent of a Ladies Auxiliary for Israel.

    Meanwhile, the Jews who were discomforted by Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians found nothing in their so-called spiritual community that spoke to them. They only heard Israel this, Israel that. So they left and never looked back.

  73. 73.

    chopper

    @dedc79:

    Yeah, i mean what was Herzl thinking?

    I think the line of thought was “we really need a place to live. theirs will do fine”.

  74. 74.

    BBA

    @Roger Moore: I mostly agree. But the only reason why the Jews succeeded in America where we failed elsewhere is that we could pass for white and reap the benefits of white supremacy.

    Somebody’s always going to be oppressed. Better not to be an oppressor.

    Which is all well and good to say, but that and $2.75 will get you a ride on the subway.

  75. 75.

    CDWard

    Israel:

    – is an oppressive, colonialist, expansionist and supremacist Jewish State;

    – has been stealing, occupying and colonizing Palestinian land and
    oppressing, torturing and killing Palestinians for over 60 years;

    – refuses to honor its obligations under international law;

    – refuses to accept responsibility and accountability for its past and on-going war crimes; and

    – refuses to enter into sincere negotiations for a just and mutually-beneficial peace.

  76. 76.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @dedc79:

    But casually suggesting that an entire country be dismantled and its people sent somewhere else is not ok.

    Why not? Basically that’s what Israel has told the Palestinians to do.

  77. 77.

    Chris T.

    @chopper

    :they don’t actually endorse a political party. they just try to influence them both as much as they can.

    still seems like there should be a different term for that. …

    Omnipartisan?

  78. 78.

    Chris T.

    @Roger Moore:

    I guess I’m also suspicious of Zionism as a way of protecting the Jewish people as a people because it looks dangerously like putting all one’s eggs in one basket; yes, it empowers Jews to defend themselves, but it also makes them a concentrated target for anyone who wants to commit genocide.

    For some, that last bit is the point.

  80. 80.

    James E Powell

    This is another one of those moments when I have wonder if Joe Biden wakes up every morning and kicks himself for not running.

  82. 82.

    Heliopause

    Interestingly, only one of major party candidates chose not to pander to the reactionary extremists of AIPAC.

  83. 83.

    germy

    The American Israel Public Affairs Committee apologized on Tuesday for remarks made by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump — and the reaction they received during their conference a day earlier, the Washington Post reported.

    “We say, unequivocally, that we do not countenance ad hominem attacks, and we take great offense against those that are levied against the president of the United States of America from our stage,” AIPAC President Lillian Pinkus said. “While we may have policy differences, we deeply respect the office of the United States and our president, Barack Obama.”

    http://www.rawstory.com/2016/03/aipac-apologizes-after-trumps-anti-obama-speech-gets-cheers/

  84. 84.

    geg6

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    This. I’ve lost all respect for Israel. I used to be a big champion of theirs, but I’ve been done with defending them for years now. They’ve become what they most feared.

  85. 85.

    Soylent Green

    Herzl’s Zionists should have taken a cue from the Americans and killed most of the people in Palestine, leaving too few to be a bother. Those of you non-native Americans bitching about Israel’s existence, pack your bags. You have no rightful claim to the land beneath your feet.

  89. 89.

    liberal

    @blueskies:

    Why should they have been the ones to take it on the chin? Because of some old fairy tales?

    IIRC, because the British said so.

  90. 90.

    liberal

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Everyone who works for AIPAC should have to register under the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA).

    I thought there’s some sneaky legalism that they use to get around that.

  91. 91.

    Miss Bianca

    @Adam L Silverman:

    “Additionally, whenever Wolf Blitzer covers a story at CNN about Israel and/or the Palestinians they should run a disclosure at the bottom of the screen that he was formerly a senior AIPAC official.”

    Wait, what?? Is this true? And here I thought he was just a horse’s ass with a funny name!

  92. 92.

    Soylent Green

    @liberal: I’m not moralizing. People take land from other people. In 1948, 700,000 Palestinians were driven from their homes. That year, the same number of Jews were expelled from Syria, Iraq, and Egypt, where they had lived for millennia. America’s claim to the land it occupies is not more moral or less heinous than Israel’s. It represents what people have always done to other people.

    Personally I want Israel to get the fuck out of the West Bank, and if unwilling to do that, then annex it and make all its residents full citizens.

  93. 93.

    Amir Khalid

    @Weaselone:
    Something I call the Charlie Watts principle applies here. Charlie says that when Mick is giving him dirty looks onstage, he’s playing too slow. When Keith is giving him dirty looks, he’s playing too fast. When they’re both giving him dirty looks, the tempo is perfect.

  96. 96.

    Sam Dobermann

    @? Martin:

    There’s no structured opposition to AIPACs position from the left, as much as we might wish it so, so why wouldn’t AIPAC see itself as bipartisan?

    There is J Street which is newer, smaller and building up. They don’t demand fealty from anyone. They are pro Israel and pro peace. They don’t seem to like Netanyahu at all.

  97. 97.

    Ohio Mom

    @Soylent Green: I agree with the one state solution. As a citizen of a country where theoretically there is no state religion, I’ve always had a problem with the idea of a nation based on religion. Israel has always prided itself that there are Arabs in elected government positions but I don’t see how anyone who is not Jewish can ever be equal under the present set up. But I say that knowing it is an awfully idealistic vision.

    As for the claim that the US stole its land so why why should we hold it against Israel that it displaced so many original inhabitants, I still hold to the idea that Judaism gave us the concept of historical time. Before that, time was seen as an endless cycle. And as we move through time, we are supposed to learn from the mistake of our forebears and not repeat them. Another reason why I am uncomfortable with the idea of a Jewish state, they inevitably distort what is best about my heritage.

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