November 15, 2009

Broadcast Date: 
Nov 15 2009

J Street, the new liberal Jewish lobby, holds its first conference amid controversy; behind the Stupak-Pitts amendment, which used health care reform to gut abortion rights; plus activists mobilize against a fundraiser at Citi Field, home to the New York Mets, which will benefit Hebron settlers in the West Bank.

Episode segments
  • JStreet's Dilemma
    American Politics, Foreign Policy, National Politics, Middle East, Israel/Palestine, Jewish

    J. J. Goldberg was the editor-in-chief of The Forward, the national Jewish weekly, from 2000 to 2007.  Now a senior columnist at The Forward he writes a weekly column, Good Fences and blogs.  He is the author of Jewish Power: Inside the American Jewish Establishment (1996) 

    Sydney Levy is Director of Campaigns and Chapters for Jewish Voice for Peace.
    Esther Kaplan and Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark

    JStreet, the self-styled pro-Israel, pro-peace lobby, that many see as a progressive alternative to AIPAC, held its first national conference in Washington DC in late October.  By most accounts it was a great success: 1,000 were expected, some 1,500 turned up. JStreet, however, found itself on the defensive from critics to its right and its left.  And the nature of these criticisms and how JStreet negotiates them reveals much about the fissures within the American Jewish commuity and JStreet's prospects for influencing both it and U.S. policy.

  • Stupak-Pitts: The Worm Virus in the House's Healthcare Bill
    National Politics, Christian Right, Domestic Policy
    Jeff Sharlet is the author of The Family:The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power. He blogs at Killing the Buddha.
    Esther Kaplan and Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark

    We explore with Jeff Sharlet the implications of the draconian Stupak-Pitts anti-abortion amendment to the recently passed House version of health care reform, not only for women but for the prospects for health care reform itself and for the future of legislative and electoral politics. Behind it all, not just the U.S.Council of Bishops, but the hand of The Family.

  • Fundraiser for Hebron Settlers at Mets' Citi-Field
    New York Politics, Israel/Palestine, Occupation, Jewish
    Ethan Heitner is an activist with Adalah-NY: The Coalition for Justice in the Middle East.
    Esther Kaplan and Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark

    The NY Mets baseball team is allowing the Hebron Fund--which raises money for Israeli settlers in the West Bank city of Hebron-- to hold its annual fund raising dinner at Citi Field.  Some 700 Jewish settlers--considered among the most radical and violent-- live in Hebron, a predominantly Palestinian City of some 150,000, protected by Israeli soldiers and police.  (Learn more about Hebron from the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem, by clicking here.) Over a dozen organizations, American, Palestinian and Israeli, have petitioned the Mets to cancel the event, scheduled for November 21st.  So far to no avail.  But see how you can join the protests by clicking on "Tell the Mets to Cancel the Citi Field Fundraiser for the Hebron Settlers"  in our  Take Action window to your left.