Democrat Leadership Has Failed The Jewish Community
RJC Comments on Day Two of the Democratic National Convention
Washington, DC -- Tonight, Democrats will show the world how badly they have failed the Jewish people. Whether it is their decades of badly conceived and badly implemented foreign policies that put Jews in danger, or ignoring the growing anti-Semitism in their own party, Democrats are failing the Jewish community.
Former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State John Kerry are, along with Barack Obama and Joe Biden, the faces of successive disasters in foreign policy. Clinton’s Oslo Accords, while well-meaning, did not bring peace. Oslo failed in large part because unlike President Trump, who approaches Middle East negotiations as Israel’s ally, Clinton tried to be neutral when it came to Israel and the PLO. He didn’t stand up for Israel while Israel has proven, time and again, its commitment to making peace with its Arab neighbors. The failure of Oslo ultimately led to a wave of violence that saw hundreds of Jews, Israelis, and Americans murdered.
John Kerry was Biden and Obama’s point man on the Iran nuclear deal. When the Israelis pleaded with Democrats not to make a deal based on nothing more than trust in the Iranian regime, they chose to ignore the warnings. Biden actually boycotted Prime Minister Netanyahu’s 2015 speech to Congress, where he eloquently made the case for opposing the Iran deal. The Obama-Biden administration also chose to ignore decades of the Iranian regime promising to wipe Israel off the face of the Earth, calling the United States the ‘great Satan,’ and blatantly denying the Holocaust. The Obama-Biden Iran nuclear deal resulted in an Iran free to build nuclear weapons less than two decades after the start of the agreement, the Iranian regime receiving billions of dollars in hard currency from the US (money that should have gone to victims of Iranian terrorism who had fully adjudicated legal claims to that money), and sanctions relief that resulted in billions more for the Iranian economy. The agreement failed to secure any restrictions on Iran’s illegal ballistic missile program, basic recognition of our ally Israel’s right to exist, ending Iran’s funding of terrorism (Iran is the #1 state-sponsor of terrorism), or a permanent, or even an extended, arms embargo against Iran. In the end, Iran got the money it needed and gave up nothing; the UN now reports that Iran is in violation of every restriction in the deal. Iran has proven that it will attack Jews all over the world through its terrorist proxies, and the deal meant Iran had the money and weapons to do it more effectively.
Also speaking tonight are Senator Chuck Schumer and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. These two are among the biggest names in the Democrat Party, and both have done a lot of work this campaign season to bolster the candidacy of anti-Semites. Schumer supported Valerie Plame through his PAC, Senate Majority PAC. In recent years, Plame has frequently shared anti-Semitic material on social media, including articles that claim Jews are responsible for American wars and that Jews celebrated 9/11. Ocasio-Cortez has spent significant political capital endorsing and working to help anti-Semites Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib fight off primary challengers this year. In Ilhan Omar’s case, she was being primaried specifically because of her anti-Zionist and anti-Semitic views. Anti-Semitism is growing in the Democrat Party, and these two party leaders are doing nothing to stop it.
Tonight will be hard to watch for pro-Israel, pro-Jewish observers, but it will be a good reminder of exactly how Democrat leaders have failed our Jewish community. The Democrats will try to convince the world that they haven’t failed our community, but we won’t let them get away with it. Follow along with the RJC tonight and every night of the convention at @RJC.