washington | Even as it publicly stakes out a hard-line position against Israeli settlement expansion, the Obama administration is avoiding serious criticism from most U.S. Jewish groups and pro-Israel Democratic lawmakers.
Key pro-Israel Jewish Democrats have backed the president on the importance of an Israeli settlement freeze while also suggesting there is room for a compromise between the Netanyahu government and the White House.
Meanwhile, the major Jewish centrist organizations — including the Anti-Defamation League, American Jewish Committee, Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and AIPAC — have refrained from issuing statements criticizing the Obama administration on the issue.
Some Jewish leaders said that while worries had been growing in recent days, the community wanted to wait until after President Barack Obama’s speech June 4 in Cairo to fully assess the situation.
Their concern spiked after what they saw as “stark” comments by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton last week in which she said that “with respect to settlements, the president was very clear when Prime Minister Netanyahu was here: He wants to see a stop to settlements — not some settlements, not outposts, not natural growth exceptions.”
In subsequent interviews, Obama has reiterated the call for a settlement freeze, but also stressed that “it’s still early in the conversation” and that “patience is needed.” The president also has stressed the White House’s continuing commitment to Israel’s security, isolating Hamas and fighting to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
While the Bush administration also called for a settlement freeze, observers said the Obama administration’s tone and seeming willingness to follow up marks a significant change from the previous White House. The key flashpoint surrounds the issue of “natural growth,” which often is understood to encompass any kind of building and construction to accommodate growing families — from building an extra room to a house to additional schools, community services and synagogues in growing neighborhoods.
Abraham Foxman, the ADL’s national director, said the organized Jewish community was still treading cautiously. “It’s a crisis in formation,” Foxman said, but not yet a crisis.
Alan Solow, the chairman of the Conference of Presidents, said, “I’m watching very carefully to see that the American leadership and the Israeli leadership have a candid exchange of views.”
Notably, Republican Jews who attacked Obama throughout the presidential campaign for his positions on Israel have been relatively quiet in recent days. Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, said his organization was waiting until after the Cairo speech to make a formal statement.
The Zionist Organization of America criticized the settlement freeze proposal immediately after last month’s Obama-Netanyahu meeting, saying “it simply penalizes Jews, because they are Jews, from living in the ancestral heartland of the Jewish people.”
The Orthodox Union weighed in this week with a letter to Obama, saying it was “deeply troubled” by his approach to settlements because his typical “nuanced approach” was “glaringly absent.”
“To the contrary, this policy has, to date, reflected a blunderbuss, one-size-fits-all attitude toward everything from building a new house on an empty lot in the midst of the city of Ma’ale Adumim, to erecting new houses on an empty hilltop in Samaria,” the letter said.