Jewish Groups to Political Parties: “Move Iowa Caucuses” - Planned Date Forces Jewish Voters to Choose Between Faith, Civic Duty


Posted September 18, 2009 by Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA)online at www.jewishpublicaffairs.org .

Through JCPA, 18 national Jewish organizations request that the Iowa Democratic and Republican parties reverse the "ill‐considered move" of scheduling the 2010 caucuses on a Saturday. JCPA letter supportive of JCRC/Des Moines Jewish Federation's position.

NEW YORK – Unless rescheduled, the planned 2010 Iowa Caucuses will disenfranchise Jewish voters, says a coalition of 18 Jewish organizations organized by The Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA).

The Republican and Democratic Iowa Caucuses are currently planned for Saturday, January 23, 2010. The Jewish community recognizes Saturday as its Sabbath - a day set aside for rest, prayer and reflection. The 2010 caucuses would be the first time the Iowa Caucuses would be held on the Sabbath.

The Jewish coalition opposed to holding the Iowa Caucuses on the Sabbath notes that the decision to move the Iowa political party caucuses to Saturday “effectively disenfranchises members of the Jewish community” because it would “force members of the Iowa Jewish community to choose between their faith and civic duties.” Additionally, the Jewish organizations point out that if the caucuses are held on the currently scheduled date, observant Jews “would be unable to work on caucus day to support their candidates of choice.”

Calling the decision “utterly inconsistent with the values of our pluralistic democracy,” the Jewish community’s statement, included in its entirety below, calls on Republican and Democratic Party Chairs in Iowa to “reverse this ill-considered move.”

“Dear Mr. Kiernan and Mr. Strawn:

“A central premise of American politics is the enfranchisement of every citizen. The Jewish community has actively campaigned for fair and equal representation for the voices of majority and minorities alike, the protection of civil rights of all people and unencumbered access for all to the processes that choose our elected leaders. Our nation has thrived because of the tremendous opportunities afforded to people from diverse racial, ethnic, religious and other backgrounds. For this reason, we are distressed to learn that the Democratic and Republican parties of Iowa have decided to hold their 2010 caucuses on a Saturday.

“The decision to move the Iowa political party caucuses to a Saturday effectively disenfranchises members of the Jewish community. Jews who observe the Sabbath could not work on caucus day to support their candidates of choice. Worse, since caucuses do not allow for absentee voting, there would be essentially no opportunity to participate in this important process. This is utterly inconsistent with the values of our pluralistic democracy.

“Voting and participation in the electoral process is a cornerstone of any democracy. It is the highest civic duty most people ever undertake. Saturday caucuses will force members of the Iowa Jewish community to choose between their faith and their civic duties.

“Given the important role Iowa has in our nation’s electoral contests and their leadership position in serving as a role model to other states, we respectfully ask and hope the Democratic and Republican parties to reverse this ill‐considered this move.”

The statement was endorsed by The Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA); American Jewish Committee; American Jewish Congress; Anti-Defamation League; B’nai B’rith International; Central Conference of American Rabbis; Hadassah: The Women’s Zionist Organization of America; Jewish Labor Committee; Jewish Reconstructionist Federation; Jewish War Veterans; National Council of Jewish Women; National Jewish Democratic Council; ORT America; Orthodox Union; Rabbinical Assembly; Republican Jewish Coalition; Union for Reform Judaism; and United Synagogues of Conservative Judaism.

The Jewish community coalition was organized by The JCPA, which unsuccessfully advocated to Nevada’s Democratic and Republican party leaders to reschedule its 2007 caucus meetings from the Sabbath.

JCPA is committed to ensuring Jewish and other minority voters across the country, regardless of their political affiliation, are given every opportunity to participate in the electoral process.

Source: http://engage.jewishpublicaffairs.org/t/1686/blog/comments.jsp?key=89&blog_entry_KEY=490&t=

Ahmadinejad: Confronting Israel is a national [and religious] duty
By The Associated Press and Reuters September 18, 2009


Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Friday the Holocaust was a "lie" and a pretext to create a Jewish state that Iranians had a religious duty to confront.

"The pretext (Holocaust) for the creation of the Zionist regime (Israel) is false ... It is a lie based on an unprovable and mythical claim," he told worshippers at Tehran University at the end of annual anti-Israel Quds Day rally.

"Confronting the Zionist regime is a national and religious duty," the Iranian president said.

What the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is really about (14)

" The real problem lies in the fact in the Arab and Islamic worlds there are
still too many people who have not come to terms with Israel’s existence in this part of the world. They continue to consider Israel an alien body or a cancer that needs to be removed for once and for all.

And that’s basically why there still isn’t peace in the Middle East."

Khaled Abu Toameh, September 15, 2009 Hudson New York


Who is Obstructing Middle East Peace?

The US Administration is in the final stages of preparing a new initiative that would, according to recent reports in the media, require Arabs and Muslims to embark on a process of normalization with Israel once the government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu freezes construction in West Bank settlements.

However, even if Netanyahu were to announce tomorrow morning that he is suspending all construction in the settlements, it is highly unlikely that the Arab and Islamic countries would rush to normalize relations with Israel.

Many Arab and Islamic countries have already made it crystal-clear that even if Israel would stop the construction, they would not take such a step.

Lebanon"s top Shiite cleric: Sharia prohibits normalizing relations w Israel

Lebanon's top Shiite cleric Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah on Sunday [ September 13, 2009] issued a fatwa, or religious ruling, banning the normalization of ties with Israel.

"Normalization with the Zionist enemy in any form is prohibited by Sharia (Islamic law)," Fadlallah said in [a] statement.

"We confirm that the fatwa against normalization applies to every Muslim," he stressed.

What the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is really about (13)

"Peace in the Middle East does not hinge on settlements. And in Israel, a country governed by democracy and rule of law, a country that has made and will still make sacrifices for peace, settlements are no obstacle to progress.

What the Palestinians need now is leadership that is brave enough to establish an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel, the nation-state of the Jewish people."

-- Asaf Shariv, Israeli consul general in New York. September 13, 2009

2 Katyusha rockets from Lebanon land near Nahariya

By AP AND JPOST.COM STAFF    September 11, 2009 

 

Large forces of police, firefighters and Magen David Adom paramedics were dispatched on Friday afternoon, as two Katyusha rockets fired from southern Lebanon landed in open areas in the western Galilee.

 No casualties or damage were reported in the incident, which marked the fourth such attack this year.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said that one of the rockets was located near Nahariya, and the IDF said that the rockets were apparently 122 millimeters in diameter.

A senior Lebanese military official said that the rockets were fired from the town of Qlaileh, near the Lebanese port city of Tyre.

Lebanese security officials said IDF troops promptly fired at least two rockets back, which landed near Qlaileh. Lebanon's state-run National News Agency reported that nine Israeli artillery shells fell near the town, but there were no reports of casualties or damage.

The IDF said it fired artillery at the source of rocket fire. The military "views this incident very severely and we hold the government of Lebanon responsible," a statement said.

No group took immediate responsibility for the cross-border attack, which came after recent exchanges of threats between Israel and Hizbullah, though the guerrilla group was not believed to have been involved in the incident.

Remembering 9-11-2001 -- accurately

Eight years ago, hijacked passenger jets destroyed the World Trade Center. -- A.G. Sulzberger, New York Times. 9-11-2009


Eight years ago, we were visited by the furies of Arab lands. -- Fouad Ajami, WSJ 9-11-2009

[There is indeed] a correct reading of the wellsprings of Islamist radicalism. Those ...who had struck American soil on 9/11 . . . were Arabs. Their terrorism came out of the pathologies of Arab political life. Their financiers were Arabs, and so were those crowds in Cairo and Nablus and Amman that had winked at the terror and had seen those attacks as America getting its comeuppance on that terrible day.

Ajami is a professor at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies and an adjunct fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution