Iran Deal: ’98 Hollywood Jews’ Back Obama

But long-standing concerns among the pro-Israel establishment raised by the generation gap in Jewish-American attitudes to Israel will have been amplified by the community’s split over the Iran deal, and by the willingness of Obama – the president elected by the millennials – to publicly castigate both Israel’s government and AIPAC for their efforts to reverse U.S. diplomacy. Some opponents have suggested that it could be rejected in favor a “better deal”.

Gen. Brent Scowcroft, the patriarch of Republican security experts, tells me that he supports the Iran deal in part because it exemplifies American leadership on a crucial global issue.

A group of Jewish Hollywood movers and shakers has thrown its hat into the ring of public debate and has come out in support of the Iran nuclear deal that has caused fissures in the American Jewish community. That’s tragic, for killing the deal would infuriate many allies, isolate America rather than Iran and ultimately increase the risk of ayatollahs with nuclear weapons.

This calculus is shared by a clear majority of American Jews.

But he said he was troubled by Iran’s continuing “heinous acts” in funding terrorism, and feared one of the results of the deal would be to pour even more money into such groups as Hamas and Hizbullah after economic sanctions against Iran are lifted. Contrary to age-old anti-Semitic propaganda, the wealthy are a small minority of all Jews, but among all Americans, this is a plutocratic age. It remains to be seen whether any of the wavering Congressional Democrats were listening and prepared to draw the only possible conclusions about the nuclear deal from what he said.

Democrats who support the deal will face claims of disappointment, at very least, and possibly backlash from the Jewish community, a source of votes and political donations that both parties turn to.

Of the 10 Jewish senators, Schumer is, at this writing, the only one to have formally voiced opposition to the deal.

Three – that if they don’t represent what most Jews think their views are of less significance. Only two years ago, the theocrats were in trouble with the country’s economy in ruins from sanctions and with seemingly no choice but to surrender their nuclear dreams.

Even in 2013, the organizationally affiliated were more likely to disapprove of President Obama’s handing of the Iran issue (42 percent as opposed to 33 percent).

These “Jews with no religion” (JNRs, in Pew’s lexicon) did not answer “Jewish” when asked their faith but did say they were Jewish when asked, “Aside from religion, do you consider yourself Jewish or partially Jewish, or not?”

Of course, the organizations would like to have as many members and friends as they can. The “community” refers to those who are organized and affiliated with various branches of Judaism and various NGOs. I have no quarrel whatsoever with Jewish individuals and organizations speaking out against the Iran deal if that is their position.

Not so understandably, surveys that purport to delineate American Jewish opinion frequently ignore what is perhaps the fastest growing “denomination” in American Judaism: Jewish with no religion.

So does the canard that their commitment to Israel or the views of its prime minister overwhelms their support for Obama and the Iran deal.

So does the notion that unrepresentative “leaders” speak for American Jews generally on the urgent matter of nuclear arms in the Middle East. In fact, the president has said that while those working to upend the JCPOA might not desire war, the rejection of the deal substantially increases the likelihood of armed conflict because our diplomatic options will have been exhausted.