U.S. Jews start cautiously to question Israeli policy
"For a while, American Jews became not a chosen people but a frozen people, unable to talk or dissent. I am glad we are getting thawed out."
So says Albert Vorspan, vice president of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, but his is not a popular view. Most American Jews are apprehensive, if not heartsick, about the anguished debate that has broken out inside their community on the actions of Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin's government. The war in Lebanon, and Begin's brusque rejection of President Reagan's peace plan for the Middle East, have shattered a tradition that was already fraying: namely, that in times of crisis American Jews should repress any qualms they might have about the policies of an Israeli government. More Jewish Americans are questioning those policies, and more publicly, than ever before.
The debate echoes far beyond the extended, and far from monolithic, family of 6 million American Jews. It is bound to have some impact on policymakers in Washington, and possibly on those in Jerusalem. The debate means that Begin, who has always been a more controversial figure to American Jews than his predecessors as Prime Minister, can no longer count on the united and vigorous pressure of U.S. Jews to bend the Administration away from any measures that Begin strongly opposes.
Even leaders of the national Jewish organizations that make up one of Washington's most effective lobbies are having difficulty coordinating their response to Reagan's peace plan. The international service organization B'nai B'rith last week praised one feature to which Begin most strongly objects. The Prime Minister had protested that Reagan's call for Palestinian self-government in the West Bank and Gaza Strip "in association with Jordan" might open the way to a Soviet-dominated state ruled by the hated Palestine Liberation Organization. B'nai B'rith acclaimed Reagan's plan specifically "because it asks Jordan to take responsibility for negotiating directly with Israel on the future of the West Bank and Gaza." Albert Spiegel, an unofficial adviser to Reagan on Jewish affairs, addressed a B'nai B'rith luncheon in Washington at which the pronouncement was discussed. He cannot recall any other statement by a major Jewish organization so strikingly at variance with the declared policy of an Israeli government.
Howard Squadron, president of the American Jewish Congress, sharply criticized Reagan's proposals but nonetheless said they could become "an important contribution to the advancement of peace in this area," and Thomas Dine, executive director of the 30,000-member American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the official lobby for American pro-Israeli groups, initially declared that he saw "a lot of value" in them. But after the Arab League at its summit meeting in Fez, Morocco, continued to insist on an independent Palestinian state, the A.I.P.A.C. issued a formal statement charging that Reagan's plan had fallen victim to "the classic pattern of Arab duplicity and American naiveté." The A.I.P.A.C. has nevertheless asserted that "there were positive points in the President's initiative."