Correction: As a reader pointed out, the report I linked to at Haaretz is from 2009. My mistake. The 66 percent American Jewish support for an Israeli attack on Iran comes from the 2009 Annual Survey of American Jewish Opinion conducted by the American Jewish Committee. The 2011 survey puts that level of support at 68 percent and this is in response to the question: If diplomacy and sanctions fail, would you support or oppose Israel taking military action against Iran to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons?
In a new University of Maryland poll of American public opinion, only 24 percent of those polled said they favor an Israeli strike against Iran’s nuclear program. A national poll of American Jews however, shows that 66 percent of them favor an Israeli attack on Iran.
In an indication that American Jews are out of sync with Israeli Jews, a poll conducted in Israel in November showed that only 43 percent favored an Israeli attack.
When it comes to American Jewish views on the creation of a Palestinian state, opinion is divided with 49 percent in favor and 41 percent against. However, 75 percent agree with the statement: “The goal of the Arabs is not the return of occupied territories but rather the destruction of Israel.”
Isn’t it always the goal of any people whose country has been invaded and the occupier systematically denigrates while stealing the very land that they resettled those same people on, to resist? Israel has been two faced since its beginning, getting away with the atrocities they do, by goading, baiting, assassinating, all the while playing the sympathy card. The fact that the Jewish Americans support Israel with money and power in Washington, is due to the way they control the MSM in this country. The Jewish Mafia might be a better name for what is going on.
This issue has caused resentment among some Israeli Jews — especially among young soldiers. They don’t like having to put their lives on the line so that diaspora Jews can cuddle up with their sentimental notions of Israel as their precious homeland. If the Jewish homeland is so important to diaspora Jews, they think, why can’t they make Aliyah and put their own lives and those of their children on the line for it?
This is just the latest phase of the uneasy relationship between Israel and the diaspora which began long before Israel was even a state. If you’ve seen *Defamation*, you will have noted the traditional Israeli opinion of those who chose not to immigrate, in the opening scene where Yoav Shamir interviews his old grandmother, whose opinion of American Jews is wildly antisemitic.
RE: “If you’ve seen *Defamation*, you will have noted the traditional Israeli opinion of those who chose not to immigrate” ~ delia ruhe
FILM REVIEW OF DEFAMATION BY GILAD ATZMON, 1/15/12 – http://www.gilad.co.uk/writings/defamation-must-be-seen-a-film-review-by-gilad-atzmon.html
• “Defamation” can be streamed from Netflix (91 minutes) – http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Defamation/70117001
• “Defamation” is also on YouTube (VIDEO 1:31:18) – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOUlJLrQ3sQ
If one were to put end to end the BIG LIES pressures foisted FIRST on American Jews and only SECOND on us supposed “dumb goyim,” one could understand the discrepancy in the poll. Yet, I cannot imagine how the statisticians could really separate out two populations in the same place. Be that as it may, the biggest victims of lies are OUR Jews because they are a captive audience for a foreign government’s propaganda machine sometimes passing itself off as a tax-exempt religious institution. I think we owe it to humanity never to lose sight of the deep dividing line between Diaspora Jews and the Zionists. Let me give an example: the now ambassador of Israel, in 2004, came as a scholar, to a State Dept conference on the 1967 Israeli attack of the USS Liberty. This man not only lied, but he insisted that anyone who deviates from his version “is an anti-Semite.” This is the kind of Stalinist polarization that American Jews are put to daily– except that Stalin slandered people as “class enemies” while the neocons slandered American Jews as “self-hating Jews.” You can imagine the sense of despair that causes to Jews already sensitized with guilt by their Holocaust silence. But recall that amongst OUR Jews is a brave Jewish scholar, son of Holocaust survivors, who was FIRST to debunk the BIG lie, no matter what the threat to him personally: Norman Finkelstein, lone truth seeker. Whatever pro-war on Iran Jews seem in that poll, I’m sure they wouldn’t ask their fellow Americans to do what they haven’t done, go fight Iran for Israel. A pollster is something else, where pressure and lack of anonymity could cause one to say the opposite of what he/she thinks. I venture the guess that ~50% of the 64% are as American as apple pie, ie. sick of American boys coming home in boxes or in pieces. The Jewish vote will stay with Obama, for the most part, if he refuses yet another war for Israel’s aggrandizement.
One minor point of clarification: The second link in your post refers to a poll that dates from 2009 while the other polls were reported this year. A more recent poll, taken in September, shows 68 percent of American Jews favor Israeli military action — but the question was conditional, premised on “if” Iran is developing a nuclear weapon.
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2012/0308/A-preemptive-attack-on-Iran-US-Jews-are-deeply-divided