The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, AIPAC, likes to pose as the leading lobby influencing American politicians to stand by Israel. Here are five examples showing that AIPAC should not be regarded in such a favorable light, and should not be trusted by pro-Israel Americans as a trustworthy advocate for the beleaguered Jewish state, which lives under constant threat.
- After Barack Obama appeared at the 2011 AIPAC conference and essentially suggested suicide for the Jewish state, bleating that Israel should retreat to the 1967 borders with “mutually agreed swaps,” AIPAC did not immediately condemn him. As The Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported: “There were two elephants in the room saying nothing at all: AIPAC, which will host both Obama and Netanyahu at its annual conference beginning Sunday, and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the umbrella foreign policy group. A former AIPAC director, Neal Sher, told JTA that the group’s leaders at least should be protesting Obama’s 1967 reference. “It would be unconscionable of the AIPAC leadership not to publicly express serious concerns about it,” he said.
- As The Washington Free Beacon reports, using data gleaned from video and sources who attended the platform committee meetings, in 2012 AIPAC cravenly tried to weaken the language of the GOP party platform regarding Israel. Why? Because AIPAC, which has many significant Democrat donors, wanted to disingenuously present support for Israel as a bipartisan phenomenon. AIPAC has denied the accusation. But evidence is readily available that the language of the 2012 platform was far less supportive of Israel than the 2008 version, which stated unequivocally, “We support Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel and moving the American embassy to that undivided capital of Israel.” In 2012, the platform read, “[W]e envision two democratic states—Israel with Jerusalem as its capital and Palestine—living in peace and security.” Further, video of the session obtained by the Free Beacon reveals that Sue Lynch, a close ally of AIPAC, proposed the alteration from 2008. Sources told the Free Beacon that Lynch was encouraged by AIPAC. Lynch admitted to the Free Beacon that she did not support alternative language that reiterated the GOP’s 2008 position. Randy Page, a delegate from South Carolina, tried to fight the AIPAC-approved platform; he said to the platform committee, “With all due respect, I believe that our present plank on Israel is way off base. Our present Israel platform is a nearly identical copy of the Democrat’s Israel platform. Check it out for yourself if you don’t believe me. Now let me ask: How many of you here today agree with President Obama’s policy of pressuring Israel? Because our platform sure seems to. That is not what’s in the heart of everyday Republicans who stand with Israel.” The final draft was written while delegates who supported the 2008 language were excluded. GOP delegate Alan Clemmons, who submitted an amendment for the 2016 platform that would restore the 2008 position, said, “The Obama years have proven a disastrous misery for anyone who cares about Israel. AIPAC’s only responding tactic has been to pull the Republicans leftward in order to manufacture the appearance of bipartisanship. This has significantly lowered the bar in the process of making policy, so much so that we may now have to live with a nuclear Iran for example.”
- As Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro has noted, AIPAC would not oppose Barack Obama’s Iran deal before the 2014 election, despite its being an existential threat to Israel. “That’s why [AIPAC] did nothing to push against Obama’s Iran agreement before the 2014 election, when they could have used the threat of that election in order to pressure Democrats to force Obama from the table,” wrote Shapiro. “Their leadership is rife with Democrats, including president Bob Cohen, who push the lie that support for anti-Israel Democrats remains a priority in order to keep the group ‘bipartisan.’ That’s why after the Iran deal, Bloomberg reported: ‘Last month, after Democratic senators protected President Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran from censure in the Senate, many in Washington wondered whether the lawmakers who supported the deal would pay a price with the pro-Israel lobby that fought so hard against it. The early signs from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, are that most of them won’t.’ As The Hill reported in 2014, AIPAC lives in fear of offending Democrats: “America’s main pro-Israel lobby came out against an immediate vote on Iran sanctions Thursday, just hours after 42 Republican senators demanded a vote.”
- As Caroline Glick reported last October, Democratic Senator Chris Coons from Delaware became a key vote supporting the disastrous Iran nuclear deal, which “was a turning point in the fight to kill the deal in Congress by securing enough Senate Democrats to oppose it. With “pro-Israel” Coons’ support in hand, the administration shifted its efforts from securing enough votes to uphold a presidential veto of a Congressional vote to oppose his Iran deal to securing enough senate votes to prevent a vote from even taking place.” Eli Lake commented, “Luncheons like those Coons attended… are one of the perks for pro-Israel lawmakers. The AIPAC members who attend these affairs have deep pockets and often contribute to both parties.”
- In 2016, after Donald Trump blasted Barack Obama for his non-support of Israel at the AIPAC conference, AIPAC’s president, Lillian Pinkus, apologized, mewling, “We are deeply disappointed that so many people applauded a sentiment that we neither agree with or condone.”