Monday, October 04, 2010

Holidays over, catching up...

After a few years of lying, J Street has finally admitted to being funded by George Soros.
Jeremy Ben-Ami, the director of the dovish pro-Israel lobby, confirmed to JTA a report that first appeared in The Washington Times that it had received $245,000 from Soros and his children in 2008, and added that it had received another $500,000 in subsequent years -- altogether, about 7 percent of the $11 million that J Street says it has taken in since its 2008 founding.

Ben-Ami for years has given statements denying Soros had a role in founding the group and strongly implying that he continued to have no role.

In the "Myths and Facts" section of its website, J Street denied the "myth" that Soros "founded and is the primary funder of J Street" as follows: "George Soros did not found J Street. In fact, George Soros very publicly stated his decision not to be engaged in J Street when it was launched -- precisely out of fear that his involvement would be used against the organization. J Street's Executive Director has stated many times that he would in fact be very pleased to have funding from Mr. Soros and the offer remains open to him to be a funder should he wish to support the effort."
Of course, there is the fallout...

The ADL ripped Roger Waters.
ADL National Director Abraham Foxman in a statement called the juxtaposition "outrageous."

"While [Rogers] insists that his intent was to criticize Israel's West Bank security fence, the use of such imagery in a concert setting seems to leave the message open to interpretation, and the meaning could easily be misunderstood as a comment about Jews and money," Foxman said in the statement.

"Of course Waters has every right to express his political views about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through his music and stagecraft. However, the images he has chosen, when put together in the same sequence, cross a line into anti-Semitism."

Foxman added that "We wish that Waters had chosen some other way to convey his political views without playing into and dredging up the worst age-old anti-Semitic stereotype about Jews and their supposed obsession with making money."
Josh Block has left AIPAC to start up his own consulting group and join a centrist Democratic think tank.
Block and Lanny Davis, a counsel to the Clinton White House, will set up Davis-Block LLC, a firm that will "operate at the nexus of policy, politics and public affairs," Davis told Politico on Tuesday. "Josh and I will be able to offer clients unique strategic depth on public affairs, legal issues, legislative strategy, crisis management, and foreign policy."

Block, who is telling friends he will still play a prominent role in pro-Israel activism, also is joining the Progressive Policy Institute, a think tank for centrist Democrats.

A former Democratic activist, Block told Politico that he is re-entering the fray to counter what he said were the left wing's deleterious effects on the party.

"There are actually Democrats out there these days calling themselves 'progressives' who don't care about the debt we're laying on our children, who think it's a good idea to let Iran get nukes and no longer see America as the leader of the free world, and these guys are so out of touch with reality, they actually think those positions will help get folks elected," he said. "It's incumbent upon those of us who know better to stand up and be counted."

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