PART 3:THEY DARE TO SPEAK OUT PEOPLE AND INSTITUTIONS CONFRONT ISRAEL'S LOBBY

THEY DARE TO SPEAK OUT
PEOPLE AND INSTITUTIONS 
CONFRONT ISRAEL'S LOBBY 
by Paul Findley
Chapter 3 

The Deliberative Body 

Fails to Deliberate 

Just off the second-floor corridor connecting the central part of the U.S. Capitol building with the Senate wing is the restored old Senate chamber where visitors can look around and imagine the room echoing with great debates of the past. Action there first gave the Senate its reputation as the "world's greatest deliberative body" where no topic was too controversial for open debate. 

In most respects, that reputation is deserved and honored. In fact, all five former Senators-John C. Calhoun, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, Robert LaFollette and Robert Taft-who are pictured in the ornate reception room near the large chamber now used by the Senate, were distinguished by their independence and courage, not their conformity. 

Today, on Middle East issues' at least, independence and courage are almost unknown, and the Senate deliberates not at all. This phenomenon was the topic of discussion during a breakfast meeting in 1982 between Crown Prince Hassan of Jordan and Senator Claiborne Pell of Rhode Island, the senior Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Pell explained with candor his own record of consistent support for Israel and his failure to recognize Arab interests when he told the Jordanian leader, "I can be honest with you, but I can't be fair." Pell's record is typical of his colleagues. 

Since the establishment of modern Israel in 1948, only a handful of Senators have said or done anything in opposition to the policies of the government of Israel. Those who break ranks find themselves in difficulty. The trouble can arise from a speech, an amendment, a vote, a published statement, or a combination of these. It may take the form of a challenge in the next primary or general election. Or the trouble may not surface until later,after service in the Senate has ended. Such was the destiny of a Senator from Illinois. 

"Adlai, You Are Right, But-" 

The cover of the October 1982 edition of the monthly magazine Jewish Chicago featured a portrait of Adlai E. Stevenson III, Democratic candidate for governor of Illinois. In the background, over the right shoulder of a smiling Stevenson, an Arab, rifle slung over his shoulder, glared ominously through a kaffiyeh that covered his head and most of his face. The headline announcing the issue's feature article read, "Looking at Adlai Through Jewish Eyes." 

The illustration and article were part of an anti-Stevenson campaign conducted by some of the quarter-million people in Chicago's Jewish community who wanted Stevenson to fail in his challenge to Governor James R. Thompson, Jr. 

Thompson, a Republican, was attempting a feat sometimes tried but never before accomplished in Illinois history: election to a third term as governor. Normally, a Republican in Illinois can expect only minimal Jewish support at the polls. 

A crucial part of the anti-Stevenson campaign was a caricature of his Middle East record while he was a member of the United States Senate. Stevenson was presented as an enemy of Israel and an ally of the P.L.O. 

Stevenson was attempting a political comeback after serving ten years in the Senate, where he had quickly established himself as an independent. During the oil shortage of the mid-1970's he alarmed corporate interests by suggesting the establishment of a government corporation to handle the marketing of all crude oil. He warned of the "seeds of destruction" inherent in nuclear proliferation and called for international safeguards to restrain other nations from using nuclear technology to manufacture weapons. Concerned about the country's weakening position in the international marketplace, he called for government-directed national economic strategies to meet the challenge of foreign competition. 

Stevenson lacks the flamboyant extroverted character of many politicians. Time magazine described him as "a reflective man who seems a bit out of place in the political arena." Effective in committee, where most legislation is hammered out, he did not feel comfortable lining up votes. "I'm not a back slapper or log roller," he said. "I don't feel effective running about buttonholing Senators." 

Chicago Daily News columnist Mike Royko wrote of Stevenson's lack of charisma in a tone of affectionate teasing: 

The most dangerous element in politics is charisma. It makes people get glassy eyed and jump and scream and clap without a thought in their heads. Adlai Stevenson never does that. He makes people drowsy. His hair is thinning. He has all the oratorical fire of an algebra teacher. His clothes look like something he bought from the coroner's office. When he feels good, he looks like he has a virus. We need more politicians who make our blood run tepid. 

Royko could have added that Stevenson also has none of the self righteousness often found on Capitol Hill. Although a "blue-blood," as close to aristocracy as an American can be, he displayed little interest in the cocktail circuit or the show business of politics. On a Congressional tour of China in 1975 he didn't seem to mind when the other three Senators received lace-curtained limousines and he and his wife, Nancy, were assigned a less showy sedan. 

During his second Senate term, he became disillusioned with the Carter administration. He saw it as "embarrassingly weak" and more concerned with retaining its power than with exercising it effectively. In 1979, he announced he would not seek re-election to the Senate, but he mentioned a new interest: the presidency. He might run for the White House the next year. "I'm going to talk about ideas and see if an idea can still triumph, or even make a dent," he said. It didn't. Stevenson ultimately decided not to run. With Senator Edward Kennedy in the race, he felt he would get little media attention. By the time Kennedy pulled out Stevenson concluded it was too late to get organized. 

After a year's breather, in 1981 he announced his interest in running for the governorship of Illinois. This time he followed through. 

The make-up of his campaign organization, the character of his campaign, and the support he had received in the past in Jewish neighborhoods provided little hint of trouble ahead from pro-Israeli quarters. 

Several of the most important members of his campaign team were Jewish: Philip Klutznick, president emeritus of B'nai B'rith and an organizer of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, who agreed to organize Stevenson's main campaign dinner; Milton Fisher, prominent attorney and chairman of his finance committee; Rick Jasculca, a public relations executive who became Stevenson's full time press secretary. 

Stevenson chose Grace Mary Stern as his running mate for the position of lieutenant governor. Her husband was prominent in Chicago Jewish affairs. 

Stevenson himself had received several honors from Jewish groups in preceding years. He had been selected by the Chicago Jewish community as 1974 Israel Bond "Man of the Year," commended by the American Jewish Committee for his legislative work against the Arab boycott bf Israel in 1977, and honored by the government of Israel-which established the Adlai E. Stevenson III Chair at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot. Stevenson had every reason to expect that organized Illinois Jewry would overlook his occasional mild position critical of Israeli policy.

But trouble developed. A segment of the Jewish community quietly launched an attack that would cost him heavily. Stevenson's detractors were determined to defeat him in the governor's race and thus discourage a future Stevenson bid for the presidency. Their basic tool was a document provided by the A.I.P.A.C in Washington. It was presented as a summary of Stevenson's Senate actions on Middle East issues-though it made no mention of his almost unblemished record of support for Israel and the tributes the Jewish community had presented to him in testimony of this support. Like most A.I.P.A.C documents, it would win no prizes for balance and objectivity.

For example, A.I.P.A.C pulled from a 21-page report Stevenson prepared after a 1976 trip to the Middle East just this lonely phrase: "There is no organization other than the PLO with a broadly recognized claim to represent the Palestinians." This was a simple statement of fact. But the writer of the Jewish Chicago article, citing the A.I.P.A.C "summary," asserted that these words had helped to give Stevenson "a reputation as one of the harshest critics of both Israel policy and of U.S. support for the Jewish state." Stevenson's assessment of the PLO's standing in the Palestinian community was interpreted as an

assault on Israel.

In fact, the full paragraph in the Stevenson report from which A.I.P.A.C took its brief excerpt is studied and reasonable:

The Palestinians are by general agreement the nub of the problem. Although badly divided, they have steadily increased in numbers, economic and military strength, and seriousness of purpose. They cannot be left out of any Middle East settlement. Their lack of unity is reflected in the lack of unity within the top ranks of the PLO, but there is no organization other than the PLO with a broadly recognized claim to represent the Palestinians.

The Stevenson report was critical of certain Israeli policies but hardly hostile to Israel. "The PLO," he wrote, "may be distrusted, disowned and despised, but it is a reality, if for no other reason than that it has no rival organization among Palestinians."

Stevenson went on to issue a challenge to the political leaders of America:

A new order of statesmanship is required from both the Executive and the Legislative Branches. For too long Congress has muddled or gone along without any real understanding of Middle Eastern politics. Neither the United  States, nor Israel, nor any of the Arab states will be served by continued ignorance or the expediencies of election year politics. 

None of this positive comment found its way into the A.I.P.A.C report or into the Jewish Chicago article or into any of the anti-Stevenson literature which was distributed within the Jewish community during the 1982 campaign. 

The anti-Stevenson activists noted with alarm that in 1980 Stevenson had sponsored an amendment to reduce aid to Israel and the year before had supported a similar amendment offered by Senator Mark O. Hatfield, Republican of Oregon. The Hatfield amendment proposed to cut by 10 per cent the amount of funds available to Israel for military credits. 

Stevenson's amendment had focused on Israeli settlements in occupied territories, which President Carter and earlier administrations characterized as both illegal and an obstacle to peace but did nothing to discourage beyond occasional expressions of regret. Stevenson proposed withholding $150 million in aid until Israel halted both the building and planning of additional settlements. The amendment did not cut funds; it simply withheld a fraction of the $2.18 billion total aid authorized for Israel that year. In speaking for the amendment, Stevenson noted that the outlay for Israel amounted to 43 percent of all U.S. funds allocated for such purposes worldwide: 

This preference for Israel diverts funds from the support of human life and vital American interests elsewhere in an interdependent and unstable world.If it could produce stability in the Middle East or enhance Israel's security, it could be justified. But it reflects continued U.S. acquiescence in an Israeli policy which threatens more Middle East instability, more Israeli insecurity, and a continued decline of U.S. authority in the world. Our support for Israel is not the issue here. Israel's support for the ideals of peace and justice which gave it birth are at issue. It is, I submit, for the Israel government to recognize again that Israel's interests are in harmony with our own and, for that to happen, it is important that we do not undermine the voices for peace in Israel or justify those, like Mr. Begin, who claim U.S. assistance from the Congress can be taken for granted. 

The amendment, like Hatfield's, was overwhelmingly defeated. 

After the vote on his amendment, Stevenson recalls, he received apologetic comments. "Several Senators came up and said, 'Adlai, you are right, but you understand why I had to vote against you. Maybe next time.'" Stevenson did understand why: lobby intimidation produced the negative votes. He found intimidation at work on another front too, the news media. He offered the amendment, he explained,"because I thought the public was entitled to a debate on this critical issue," but news services gave it no attention.[And none of them do today either 38 BILLION over 10 years...disgrace DC] 

That's another aspect of this problem. It's not only the intimidation of the American politician, it's also the intimidation of some American journalists. If it's not the journalists, then it's the editors and perhaps more so the publishers. 

Anti-Stevenson campaigners also found it expedient to portray him as a supporter of Arab economic blackmail, despite his widely hailed legislative record to the contrary. Stevenson was actually the principal author of the 1977 legislation to prohibit American firms from cooperating with the Arab boycott of Israel. But in the smear campaign conducted against him in his gubernatorial bid his legislative history was rewritten. He was actually accused of trying to undermine the anti-boycott effort. 

In fact, Stevenson, in a lonely and frustrating effort, saved the legislation from disaster. For this achievement, he received a plaque and praise from the American Jewish Committee. The chairman of the National Jewish Community Relations Council, Theodore R. Mann, wrote to Stevenson, expressing the organization's "deep appreciation for your invaluable contribution to the adoption of that landmark legislation. " He added that the legislation "not only reassures the American Jewish community as to the commitment of America to fairness and nondiscrimination in international trade but, more fundamentally, stands as a reaffirmation of our nation's profound regard for principle and morality." 

Jewish Chicago, making no mention of Stevenson's success in the anti-boycott effort or the unstinting praise he received from Jewish leaders, reported that he encountered "major conflicts" with "the American Jewish leadership" over the boycott legislation. 

A flyer distributed by an unidentified "Informed Citizens Against Stevenson Committee," made the same charge. Captioned, "The Truth About Adlai Stevenson," it used half-truths to brand Stevenson as anti Israel during his Senate years and concluded: "It is vitally important that Jewish voters be fully informed about Stevenson's record. Still dazzled by the Stevenson name, many Jews are totally unaware of his antagonism to Jewish interests." The "committee" provided no names or addresses of sponsoring individuals. Shirley Friedman, a free-lance writer in Chicago, later identified the flyer as her own. The message on the flyer concluded: 

"Don't forget: It is well-known that Stevenson considers the governor's chair as a stepping-stone to the presidency. Spread the word Let the truth be told!"

The word was indeed spread in the Chicago Jewish community throughout the summer and fall of 1982. The political editor of the Chicago Sun-Times reported in June that some activists for Thompson had been "working quietly for months to assemble a group to mobilize Jewish voters" against Stevenson. 

The result of their efforts was "The Coalition for the Re-election of Jim Thompson" which included Jewish Democrats who had not backed Thompson previously. When Republican Senator Rudy Boschwitz of Minnesota, a strong supporter of Israel, came to Chicago in October to address a breakfast gathering sponsored by the Coalition, he declared that, as Senator, Stevenson was "a very steadfast foe of aid to Israel." 

"Smear and Innuendo" 

A major problem was the unprinted but widely whispered charge of Antisemitism against Stevenson-a man, who, like his father, had spent his life championing civil rights for all Americans. "I learned after election day there was that intimation throughout the campaign," recalls Stevenson. 

Phil Klutznick's daughter, Mrs. Bettylu Saltzman, who worked on Stevenson's campaign staff, remembers, "There was plenty of stuff going around about him being anti-Semitic. It got worse and worse. It was a much more difficult problem than anyone imagined." 

Stevenson's running-mate, Grace Mary Stern, recalls: "There was a very vigorous [anti-Stevenson] telephone campaign in the Jewish community." She says leaflets charging Stevenson with being anti Israel were distributed widely at local Jewish temples, and adds there was much discussion of the Antisemitism accusation: "There was a very vigorous campaign, man to man, friend to friend, locker room to locker room. We never really came to grips with the problem." 

Campaign fund raising suffered accordingly. The Jewish community had supported Stevenson strongly in both of his campaigns for the Senate. After his remarks in the last years of his Senate career, some of the Jewish support dried up. "Many of my most generous Jewish contributors stayed with me, but the organization types, the professionals did not," Stevenson recalls. He believes the withdrawal of organized Jewish support also cut into funds from out-of-state he otherwise would have received. In the end, Thompson was able to outspend Stevenson by better than two to one. 

Fed up by early September with unfounded charges of antisemitism, Stevenson finally responded, charging that a "subterranean campaign of smear and innuendo" was being waged by supporters of Thompson. His press secretary, Rick Jasculca, complained that the material distributed by the Coalition for the Re-election of Jim Thompson "tries to give the impression that Adlai is unquestionably anti Israel." Thompson's political director, Philip O'Connor, denied there was a smear campaign and disavowed the Friedman flyer. 

Thompson himself said of Stevenson, "I don't think he is an anti-Semite, but he is no particular friend of Israel." The Chicago SunTimes published an editorial rebuke for this remark: "That's like saying, no, I don't think Stevenson beats his wife, but she did have a black eye last week." The editorial continued: 

Far more important, the statement is not true; Stevenson as a Senator may have occasionally departed from positions advocated by the Israeli government, but out of well-reasoned motives and a genuine desire to secure a lasting peace for the area. Thompson's coy phrasing was a reprehensible appeal to the voter who measures a candidate's worth by a single, rubbery standard. 

The only Jews who tried to counter the attack were those close to Stevenson. Philip Klutznick, prominent in Jewish affairs and chairman of the Stevenson Dinner Committee, said, "It is beneath the dignity of the Jewish community to introduce these issues into a gubernatorial campaign." Stevenson campaign treasurer Milton Fisher said: "Adlai's views are probably consistent with 40 percent of the Knesset [Israeli parliament]. " 

Stevenson was ultimately defeated in the closest gubernatorial election in the state's history. The margin was 5,074 votes-one seventh of one percent of the total 3.5 million votes cast. 

The election was marred by a series of mysterious irregularities which Time magazine described as "so improbable, so coincidental, so questionable that it could have happened only in Wonderland, or the Windy City." On election night ballot boxes from fifteen Chicago precincts inexplicably disappeared, and others turned up in the homes or  cars of poll workers. Stevenson asked for a recount-past recounts had resulted in shifts of 5,000 to 7,000 votes-but the Illinois Supreme Court, by a 4-to-3 vote, denied his petition. Judge Seymour Simon, a Democrat, joined the three Republicans on the court in voting against Stevenson's request. 

A post-election editorial in a suburban Chicago newspaper acknowledged the impact of the concerted smear campaign on the election outcome: 

An intense last-minute effort among Chicago-area Jews to thwart Adlai Stevenson's attempt to unseat Illinois Gov. James Thompson in last Tuesday's election may have succeeded. The weekend before the election many Chicago and suburban rabbis spoke out against Stevenson and there were thousands of pamphlets and leaflets distributed in Jewish areas ... all attacking the former Senator. 

After describing the attack, the editorial concluded, 

The concentrated anti-Stevenson campaign, particularly since it went largely unanswered, almost surely cost him thousands of votes among the 248,000 Chicago-area Jews-266,000 throughout the state-who traditionally have leaned in his direction politically.

Campaign manager Joseph Novak agrees: "If that effort hadn't happened, Stevenson would be governor today." In the predominantly Jewish suburban Chicago precincts of Highland Park and Lake County "We just got killed, just absolutely devastated." Press secretary Rick Jasculca adds, "What bothers me is that hardly any rabbis, or Jewish leaders beyond Phil Klutznick were willing to speak up, and say this is nonsense to call Adlai anti-Israel." 

Thomas A. Dine, executive director of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, gloated, "The memory of Adlai Stevenson's hostility toward Israel during his Senate tenure lost him the Jewish vote in Illinois-and that cost him the gubernatorial election." 

Stevenson too believes the effort to discredit him among Jews played a major role in his defeat: "In a race that close, it was more than enough to make the difference." 

Asked about the impact of the Israeli lobby on the U.S. political scene, he responded without hesitation: 

There is an intimidating, activist minority of American Jews that supports the decisions of the Israeli government, right or wrong. They do so very vocally and very aggressively in ways that intimidate others so that it's their voice even though it's a minority-that is heard and felt in American politics. But it still is much louder in the United States than in Israel. In other words, you have a much stronger, more vocal dissent in Israel than within the Jewish community in the United States. The prime minister of Israel has far more influence over American foreign policy in the Middle East than over the policies of his own government generally. 

The former Senator reports a profound change within the Jewish community in recent years: 

The old passionate commitment of Jewish leaders to civil liberties, social welfare, in short, to liberalism has to a large extent dissipated. The issue now is much more Israel itself. If given a choice between the traditional liberal commitment and the imagined Israeli commitment, they'll opt now for the Israeli commitment.

Reflecting on his career and the price he has paid for challenging Israeli policies, Stevenson concluded: 

I will have no hesitation about continuing. I wish I had started earlier and been more effective. I really don't understand the worth of public office if you can't serve the public. It's better to lose. It's better not to serve than to be mortgaged or compromised. 

Stevenson followed the tradition of a colleague, a famous Senator from Arkansas who eloquently criticized Israeli policy and American foreign policy over a period of many years. 

The Dissenter 

"When all of us are dead, the only one they'll remember is Bill Fulbright." The tribute by Idaho Senator Frank Church, a fellow Democrat, was amply justified. As much as any man of his time, J. William Fulbright shaped this nation's attitudes on the proper exercise of its power in a world made acutely dangerous by nuclear weapons. Dissent was a hallmark of his career, but it was dissent with distinction. The fact was, Fulbright was usually right. 

Fulbright first gained national attention by condemning the "swinish blight" of McCarthyism. In 1954 while many Americans cheered the crusade of the Wisconsin Senator's Permanent Investigations Subcommittee, Fulbright cast the lone vote against a measure to continue the subcommittee's funding. Because of this vote he was accused of being "a Communist, a fellow traveler, an atheist, and a man beneath contempt. " 

Fulbright opposed U.S. intervention in Cuba in 1961 and in the Dominican Republic four years later, and was ahead of his time in calling for detente with the Soviet Union and a diplomatic opening with China. When he proposed a different system for selecting presidents, Harry Truman was offended and called him "that over-educated Oxford s.o.b." Twenty-five years later, in 1974, the New York Times recognized him as "the most outspoken critic of American foreign policy of this generation." 

His deepest and most abiding interest is the advancement of international understanding through education, and thousands of young people have broadened their vision through the scholarships that bear his name. But Fulbright also became well known for his outspoken opposition to the Vietnam War as "an endless, futile war, debilitating and indecent"-a stand which put him at odds with a former colleague and close friend, President Lyndon B. Johnson. President  Johnson believed that America was embarked on a noble mission in Southeast Asia against an international Communist conspiracy. Fulbright put no stock in the conspiracy theory, feared the war might broaden into a showdown with China, and saw it as an exercise in "the arrogance of power." 

In 1963 Fulbright chaired an investigation that brought to public attention the exceptional tax treatment of contributions to Israel and aroused the ire of the Jewish community. The investigation was managed by Walter Pincus, a journalist Fulbright hired after reading a Pincus study of lobbying. Pincus recalls that Fulbright gave him a free hand, letting him choose the ten prime lobbying activities to be examined and backing him throughout the controversial investigation. One of the groups chosen by Pincus, himself Jewish, was the Jewish Telegraph Agency,at that time a principal instrument of the Israeli  lobby. Both Fulbright and Pincus were accused of trying to destroy the Jewish Telegraph Agency and of being anti-Semitic. 

Pincus remembers, "Several Senators urged that the inquiry into the Jewish operation be dropped. Senators Hubert Humphrey and Bourke Hickenlooper senior Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee were among them. Fulbright refused." 

The Fulbright hearings also exposed the massive funding illegally channeled into the American Zionist Council by Israel. More than five million dollars had been secretly poured into the Council for spending on public relations firms and pro-Israel propaganda before Fulbright's committee closed down the operation. 

Despite his concern over the pro-Israeli lobby, Fulbright took the exceptional step of recommending that the United States guarantee Israeli's borders. In a major address in 1970 he proposed an American Israeli treaty under which the United States would commit itself to intervene militarily if necessary to "guarantee the territory and independence of Israel" within the lands it held before the 1967 war. The treaty, he said, should be a supplement to a peace settlement arranged by the United Nations. The purpose of his proposal was to destroy the arguments of those who maintained that Israel needed the captured territory for its security. 

Fulbright saw Israeli withdrawal from the Arab lands it occupied in the 1967 war as the key to peace: Israel could not occupy Arab territory and have peace too. He said Israeli policy in establishing settlements on the territories "has been characterized by lack of flexibility and foresight." Discounting early threats by some Arab leaders to destroy the state of Israel, Fulbright noted that both President Nasser of the United Arab Republic and King Hussein of Jordan had in effect repudiated such Draconian threats, "but the Israelis seem not to have noticed the disavowals." 

During the 1970's Fulbright repeatedly took exception to the contention that the Middle East crisis was a test of American resolve against Soviet interventionism. In 1971, he accused Israel of "Communist-baiting humbuggery" and argued that continuing Middle East tension, in fact, only benefited Soviet interests. 

Appearing on CBS television's "Face the Nation" in 1973, Fulbright declared that the Senate was "subservient" to Israeli policies which were inimical to American interests. He said the United States bears "a very great share of the responsibility" for the continuation of Middle East violence. "It's quite obvious that without the all-out support by the United States in money and weapons and so on, the Israelis couldn't do what they've been doing." 

Fulbright said the United States failed to pressure Israel for a negotiated settlement, because 

The great majority of the Senate of the United States-somewhere around 80 percent-are completely in support of Israel, anything Israel wants. This has been demonstrated time and time again, and this has made it difficult for our government. 

The Senator claimed that "Israel controls the Senate" and warned, "We should be more concerned about the United States' interests." Six weeks after his "Face the Nation" appearance, Fulbright again expressed alarm over Israeli occupation of Arab territories. He charged that the U.S. had given Israel "unlimited support for unlimited expansion. " 

His criticism of Israeli policy caused stirrings back home. Jews who had supported him in the past became restless. After years of easy election victories trouble loomed for Fulbright in 1974. Encouraged, in part, by the growing Jewish disenchantment with Fulbright, on the eve of the deadline for filing petitions of candidacy in the Democratic primary Governor Dale Bumpers surprised the political world by becoming a challenger for Fulbright's Senate seat. Fulbright hadn't expected Bumpers to run, but recognized immediately that the popular young governor posed a serious challenge: "He had lots of hair in contrast to Fulbright, he looked good on television and he'd never done anything to offend anyone." 

There were other factors. Walter Pincus, who later became a Washington Post reporter, believed Fulbright's decision to take a golfing holiday in Bermuda just before the primary deadline may have helped to convince Bumpers that Fulbright would not work hard for the nomination. It was also the year of Watergate-a bad year for incumbents. In his campaign, Bumpers pointed with alarm to the "mess in Washington" and called for a change. The New York Times reported that he "skillfully exploited an old feeling that Mr. Fulbright  spent all his time dining with Henry Kissinger and fretting over the Middle East." 

The attitude of Jewish voters, both inside Arkansas and beyond, was also a significant factor. "I don't think Bumpers would have run without that encouragement," says Fulbright. Following the election, a national Jewish organization actually claimed credit for the young governor's stunning upset victory. Fulbright has a copy of a memorandum circulated in May 1974 to the national board of directors of B'nai B'rith. Marked "confidential," the memo from Secretary-General Herman Edelsberg, announced that "all of the indications suggest that our actions in support of Governor Bumpers will result in the ousting of Mr. Fulbright from his key position in the Senate." Edelsberg later rejected the memorandum as "phony." 

Since his defeat, Fulbright has continued to speak out, decrying Israeli stubbornness and warning of the Israeli lobby. In a speech just before the end of his Senate term, Fulbright warned, "Endlessly pressing the United States for money and arms-and invariably getting all and more than she asks-Israel makes bad use of a good friend." His central concern was that the Middle East conflict might flare into nuclear war. He warned somberly that "Israel's supporters in the United States by underwriting intransigence, are encouraging a course which must lead toward her destruction-and just possibly ours as well." 

Pondering the future from his office three blocks north of the White House, Fulbright sees little hope that Capitol Hill will effectively challenge the Israeli lobby: 

It's suicide for politicians to oppose them. The only possibility would be someone like Eisenhower who already feels secure. Eisenhower had already made his reputation. He was already a great man in the eyes of the country, and he wasn't afraid of anybody. He said what he believed. 

Then he adds a somewhat more optimistic note: "I believe a president could do this. He wouldn't have to be named Eisenhower." Fulbright cites a missed opportunity: 

I went to Jerry Ford after he took office in 1975. I was out of office then. I had been to the Middle East and visited with some of the leading figures. I came back and told the president, 'Look, I think these Arab leaders are willing to accept Israel, but the Israelis have got to go back to the 1967 borders. The problem can be solved if you are willing to take a position on it.

Fulbright predicted that the American people would back Ford if he demanded that Israel cooperate. He reminded him that Eisenhower was re-elected by a large margin immediately after he forced Israel to withdraw after invading Egypt: Taking a stand against Israel didn't hurt Eisenhower. He carried New York with its big Jewish population. 

I told Ford I didn't think he would be defeated if he put it the right way. He should say Israel had to go back to the 1967 borders; if it didn't, no more arms or money. That's just the way Eisenhower did it. And Israel would have to cooperate. And politically, in the coming campaign, I told him he should say he was for Israel, but he was for America first. 

Ford, Fulbright recalls, listened courteously but was noncommittal: "Of course he didn't take my advice." 

Yet the determination in the face of such disappointment echoes through one of his last statements as a U.S. Senator: 

History casts no doubt at all on the ability of human beings to deal rationally with their problems, but the greatest doubt on their will to do so. The signals of the past are thus clouded and ambiguous, suggesting hope but not confidence in the triumph of reason. With nothing to lose in any event, it seems well worth a try. 

Warning Against "Absolutism" 

James G. Abourezk of South Dakota came to the Senate in 1973 after serving two years in the House of Representatives. The son of Lebanese immigrants-the first person of Arab ancestry elected to the Senate-he spoke up for Arab interests and quickly became a center of controversy. 

Soon after he took office, Abourezk accepted an invitation to speak at Yeshiva University in New York, but anxious school officials called almost immediately to tell him of rising student protests against his appearance. A few days later, the chairman of the dinner committee asked Abourezk to make a public statement calling for face-to-face negotiations between Israel and its Arab neighbors, assuring Abourezk that this proposal, identical to the one being made by Israel's prime minister, Golda Meir, would ease student objections and end the protest. Although Abourezk favored such negotiations, he refused to make the requested statement. He explained, "I do not wish to be in the position of placating agitators." Rabbi Israel Miller, vice-president of the school, came to Washington to urge Abourezk to reconsider. When Abourezk again refused, the dinner chairman telephoned again, this time to report that students were beginning to picket. Sensing that school officials wanted the event cancelled, Abourezk offered to withdraw from the obligation. His offer was hastily accepted. 

Soon after, Abourezk was announced as the principal speaker at a rally to be held in Rochester, New York, to raise money for victims of the Lebanese civil war. The rally's organizing committee was immediately showered with telephoned bomb threats. In all, 23 calls warned that the building would be blown up if Abourezk appeared on the program. With the help of the FBI, local police swept the building for bombs and, finding none, opened it for the program. A capacity crowd, unaware of the threats, heard the event proceed without incident. 

After making a tour of Arab states in December 1973, Abourezk sympathized with Arab refugees in a speech at the National Press Club in Washington. Covering his speech for the A.I.P.A.C newsletter, Near East Report, Wolf Blitzer wrote, "If Abourezk's position were to prevail, Israel's life would be jeopardized." Blitzer's report was sent to Jews who had contributed to Abourezk's campaign, accompanied by a letter in which I. L. Kenen, A.I.P.A.C director, warned that Abourezk was "going to great lengths" to "undermine American friendship for Israel." The mailing, Abourezk recalls, began an "adversary relationship" with AIPAC. He adds, "I doubt that I would have spent so much time on the Middle East had it not been for that particular unfair personal attack." (In 1980, after retiring from the Senate, Abourezk founded the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, which now has 20,000 members and whose purpose, he says, "is to provide a countervailing force to the Israeli lobby. ") 

On one occasion in the Senate, Abourezk turned lobby pressure to his advantage. Wishing to be appointed in 1974 to fill a vacancy on the Senate Judiciary Committee, he warned David Brody, lobbyist for the B'nai B'rith's Anti-Defamation League, that if he did not secure the appointment he would seek a seat on the Foreign Relations Committee. He recalls, with a chuckle, "This warning had the desired effect. The last thing Brody wanted was to see me on Foreign Relations where aid to Israel is decided. Thanks to the help of the lobby I received the appointment to Judiciary, even though James Allen, a Senator with more seniority, also wanted the position." The appointment enabled Abourezk to chair hearings in 1977 on the legality of Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. "They were the first-and last hearings-on this subject," Abourezk recalls. "And not one of my colleagues attended. I was there alone." 

In 1975, Ahourezk invited the head of the PLO's Beirut office, Shafiq al-Hout, to lunch in the Senate and learned that PLO-related secrets are hard to keep. On Abourezk's assurance that the event would be kept entirely private, eleven other Senators, including Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut, who is Jewish, attended and heard al Hout relate the PLO side of Middle East issues. Within an hour after the event was concluded, Spencer Rich of the Washington Post telephoned Abourezk for comment. He had already learned the identity of all Senators who attended. The next day Israel's leading English language daily newspaper, the Jerusalem Post, reported that Ribicoff and the others had had lunch with "murderer" al-Hout. 

A major storm erupted in 1977 when Abourezk agreed on short notice to fill in for Vice-President Walter Mondale as the principal speaker at the annual Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner sponsored in Denver by the Colorado Democratic Party. Jewish leaders protested his appearance, and John Mrozek, a labor leader in Denver, attacked Abourezk as "pro-Arab and anti-Israel." Betty Crist, a member of the dinner committee, moved that the invitation be withdrawn. When the Crist motion was narrowly rejected, the committee tried to find a pro Israeli speaker to debate Abourezk, with the intention of cancelling the event if a debate could not be arranged. This gave the proceedings a comic twist, as Abourezk at no point had intended to mention the Middle East in his remarks. Unable to find someone to debate their guest, the committee reconsidered and let the invitation to Abourezk stand in its original form. 

Arriving at the Denver airport, Abourezk told reporters, "As a United States Senator, I have sworn to uphold the government of the United States, but I never dreamed that I would be required to swear allegiance to any other government." In his remarks to the dinner audience of 700, he warned of the "extraordinary influence of the Zionist lobby." He said the United States "is likely to become, if it has not already, a captive of its client state." 

He said, "The point of the controversy surrounding this dinner has been my refusal to take an absolutist position for Israel. There is extreme danger to all of us in this kind of absolutism. It implies that only one position-that of being unquestionably pro-Israel-is the only position." 

The Rocky Mountain News reported that his speech received a standing ovation, "although there were pockets of people who sat on their hands." The Denver newspaper editorialized, "James Abourezk is not a fanatic screaming for the blood of Israel. Colorado Democratic leaders should be proud to have him as their speaker. He is better than they deserve." 

"Sins of Omission" 

The Israeli lobby's long string of Capitol Hill victories has been broken only twice during the past twenty-five years. Both setbacks occurred in the Senate and involved military sales to Saudi Arabia. In 1978 the Senate approved the sale of F-15 fighter planes by a vote of 54 to 44, and in 1981 the sale of AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) intelligence-gathering planes and special equipment for the F-15's by a vote of 52 to 48. Curiously, both controversies entangled the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in the politics of the state of Maine. 

This involvement began on the Senate floor one afternoon in the spring of 1978 when Senator Edward "Ted" Kennedy received a whispered message which brought an angry flush to his face. A.I.P.A.C had forsaken a Senate Democrat with a consistently pro-Israeli record. Senator William Hathaway of Maine, who had, without exception, cast his vote in behalf of Israel's interests, was being "dropped" by the lobby in favor of William S. Cohen, his Republican challenger. Kennedy strode to the adjoining cloakroom and reached for a telephone. 

Kennedy demanded an explanation from Morris J. Amitay, then executive director of A.I.P.A.C. Flustered, Amitay denied that A.I.P.A.C had taken a position against Hathaway. The organization, he insisted, provides information on candidates but makes no endorsements. Pressed by Kennedy, Amitay promised to issue a letter to Hathaway complimenting him on his support of Israel. 

The letter was sent, but the damage had already been done. Though Amitay was technically correct-A.I.P.A.C does not formally endorse candidates for the House or Senate-the lobby has effective ways to show its colors, raise money and influence votes. In the Maine race, it was making calls for Cohen and against Hathaway. The shift, so astounding and unsettling to Kennedy, arose from a single "failing" on Hathaway's part. It was a sin of omission, but a cardinal sin nonetheless. 

Over the years, Hathaway had sometimes refused to sign letters and resolutions which A.I.P.A.C sponsored. The resolutions were usually statements of opinion by the Senate-called "sense of the Senate" resolutions-and had no legislative effect. The letters were directed to the president or a cabinet officer, urging him to support Israel. In refusing to sign, Hathaway did not single out A.I.P.A.C projects; he often rejected such requests from other interest groups as well, preferring to write his own letters and introduce his own resolutions. Nor did he always refuse A.I.P.A.C. Sometimes, as a favor, he would set aside his usual reservations and sign. 

Hathaway cooperated in 1975 when A.I.P.A.C sponsored its famous "spirit of 76" letter. It bore Hathaway's name and those of 75 of his colleagues and carried this message to President Gerald R. Ford: "We urge that you reiterate our nation's long-standing commitment to Israel's security by a policy of continued military supplies, and diplomatic and economic support." At another moment, this expression would cause no ripples. Since the administration of John F. Kennedy, the U.S. government had been following a policy of "continued military supplies." But when this letter was made public in January 1975, it shook the executive branch as have few Senate letters in history. 

Ford, dissatisfied with Israeli behavior, had just issued a statement calling for a "reappraisal" of U.S. policies in the Middle East. His statement did not mention Israel by name as the offending party, but his message was clear: Ford wanted better cooperation in reaching a compromise with Arab interests, and "reappraisal" meant suspension of U.S. aid until Israel improved its behavior. It was a historic proposal, the first time since Eisenhower that a United States president even hinted publicly that he might suspend aid to Israel. 

Israel's response came, not from its own capital, but from the United States Senate. Instead of relying on a direct protest to the White House, Jerusalem activated its lobby in the United States, which, in turn, signed up as supporters of Israel's position more than three-fourths of the members of the United States Senate. 

A more devastating-and intimidating-response could scarcely be conceived. The seventy-six signatures effectively told Ford he could not carry out his threatened "reappraisal." Israel's loyalists in the Senate-Democrats and Republicans alike-were sufficient in number to reject any legislative proposal hostile to Israel that Ford might make, and perhaps even enact a pro-Israeli piece of legislation over a presidential veto. 

The letter was a demonstration of impressive clout. Crafted and circulated by A.I.P.A.C, it had been endorsed overnight by a majority of the Senate membership. Several Senators who at first had said "No" quickly changed their positions. Senator John Culver admitted candidly, "The pressure was too great. I caved." So did President Ford. He backed down and never again challenged the lobby. 

This wasn't the only time Hathaway answered A.I.P.A.C's call to oppose the White House on a major issue. Three years later, Ford's successor, Jimmy Carter, fought a similar battle with the Israeli lobby. At issue this time was a resolution to disapprove President Carter's proposal to sell F-15 fighters to Saudi Arabia. The White House needed the support of only one chamber to defeat the resolution. White House strategists felt that the House of Representatives would overwhelmingly vote to defeat the sale, so they decided to put all their resources into the Senate. 

Lobbying on both sides was highly visible and aggressive. Frederick Dutton, chief lobbyist for Saudi Arabia, orchestrated the pro sale forces on Capitol Hill. The Washington Post reported, "Almost every morning these days, the black limousines pull up to Washington's Madison Hotel to collect their Saudi Arabian passengers. Their destination, very often, is Capitol Hill, where the battle of the F-15's unfolds." 

The Israeli lobby pulled out all the stops. It coordinated a nationwide public relations campaign which revived, as never before, memories of the genocidal Nazi campaign against European Jews during World War II. In the wake of the highly publicized television series, "Holocaust," Capitol Hill was flooded with complimentary copies of the novel on which the TV series was based. The books were accompanied by a letter from A.I.P.A.C saying, "This chilling account of the extermination of six million Jews underscores Israel's concerns during the current negotiations for security without reliance on outside guarantees." Concerning the book distribution, A.I.P.A.C's Aaron Rosenbaum told the Washington Post: "We think, frankly, that it will affect a few votes here and there, and simplify lobbying." 

Senator Wendell Anderson of Minnesota at first agreed to support the proposed sale. He told an administration official: "Sure, I'll go for it. It sounds reasonable." But a few days before the vote he called back: "I can't vote for it. I'm up for election, and my Jewish co-chairman refuses to go forward if I vote for the F-15's." Furthermore, he said, a Jewish group had met with him and showed him that 70 percent of the contributions to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee the previous year came from Jewish sources. 

The pressure was sustained and heavy. Major personalities in the Jewish community warned the fighter aircraft would constitute a serious threat to Israel. Nevertheless a prominent Jewish Senator, Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut, lined up with Carter. This was a hard blow to Amitay, who had previously worked on Ribicoff's staff. Earlier in the year Ribicoff, while keeping his own counsel on the Saudi arms question, took the uncharacteristic step of criticizing sharply Israeli policies as well as the tactics of A.I.P.A.C. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Ribicoff described Israel's retention of occupied territory as "wrong" and unworthy of U.S. support. He said A.I.P.A.C does "a great disservice to the U.S., to Israel and to the Jewish community." He did not seek re-election in 1980. 

The Senate approved the sale, 52 to 48, but in the process Carter was so bruised that he never again forced a showdown vote in Congress over Middle East policy. 

Hathaway was one of the forty-four who stuck with A.I.P.A.C. but this was not sufficient when election time rolled around. A.I.P.A.C wanted a Senator whose signature-and vote-it could always count on. Searching for unswerving loyalty, the lobby switched to Cohen. Its decision came at the very time Hathaway was resisting pressures on the Saudi issue. The staff at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee was outraged. One of them declared to a visitor: "A.I.P.A.C demands 100 percent. If a fine Senator like Hathaway fails to cooperate just once, they are ready to trade in his career." A staff member of a Senate committee declared: "To please A.I.P.A.C, you have to be more pure than Ivory soap-99.44 percent purity is not good enough." Lacking the purity A.I.P.A.C demanded, Hathaway was defeated in 1978. 

Caught in the AWACS Dilemma 

William S. Cohen was elected to the Senate but soon found himself in a storm similar to the one Hathaway, his predecessor, had encountered. Once again a proposal to sell military equipment to Saudi Arabia raised concerns among pro-Israeli forces about a Senator from Maine. It occurred soon after Ronald Reagan's inauguration, when the new president decided to approve the same request that the Carter administration had put off the year before. Saudi Arabia would be allowed to purchase its own AWACS planes, along with extra equipment to give Saudi F-15 fighters greater range and firepower. Israeli officials opposed the sale, because, they said, this technology would give Saudi Arabia the capacity to monitor Israeli air force operations. 

As in 1978, the Senate became the main battleground, but the White House was slow to organize. Convinced that Jimmy Carter the year before had taken on too many diverse issues at once, the Reagan forces decided to concentrate on tax and budget questions in the early months of the new administration. This left a vacuum in the foreign policy realm which A.I.P.A.C filled skillfully. New director Thomas A. Dine orchestrated a bipartisan counter-attack against arms transfers to Saudi Arabia. Even before Reagan sent the AWACS proposal to Capitol Hill for consideration, the Associated Press reported that the Israeli lobby had lined up "veto-strength majorities." 

A.I.P.A.C's campaign against AWACS began in the House of Representatives through a public letter attacking the sale sponsored by Republican Norman Lent in New York and Democrat Clarence Long of Maryland. Ultimately, in October, the House rejected the proposed sale by a vote of 301 to 111, but the real battleground was the Senate. Earlier in the year, before the Senate took up the question, Senator Bob Packwood of Oregon, always a dependable supporter of Israel, announced that fifty-four Senators, a majority, had signed a request that Reagan drop the idea. Needing time to persuade the Senators to change, the White House put off the showdown. By September, fifty Senators had signed a resolution to veto the sale and six more promised to sign if needed. Once more, the White House had no choice but to delay. 

This time the Saudis were testing their relationship with the new president and left more of the lobbying to the White House than was true in 1978. Their case relied heavily on personal efforts of Republican Senate leader Howard Baker, Senator John Tower, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, and Senator Charles Percy, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. Lobbyist Frederick Dutton was instructed to keep in the background, though David Sadd, executive director of the National Association of Arab Americans, helped organize the support of U.S. industries with a stake in the sale. 

Meanwhile, Dine's team roamed the Senate corridors while A.I.P.A.C's grassroots contacts brought direct pressure from constituents. The Post reported that ''A.I.P.A.C's fountain of research materials reaches a readership estimated at 200,000 people." Senator John Glenn of Ohio, said: "I've been getting calls from every Jewish organization in the country. They didn't want to talk about the issues. The big push was to get me to sign this letter and resolution." Glenn did not sign, largely because he hoped to broker a deal with the White House. 

Syndicated columnist Carl T. Rowan wrote "there is strong evidence" that the A.W.A.C.S struggle increased "public resentment against the 'Jewish lobby.'"  

The issue was portrayed by some as a choice between President Reagan and Prime Minister Begin. Bumper stickers appeared around Washington which read, "Reagan or Begin?" When the Senate finally voted, Cohen, although announced in opposition, switched and provided one of the critical votes supporting the AWACS sale. He explained his reversal by declaring that Israel would have been branded the scapegoat for failure of the Middle East peace process if the proposal were defeated. 

Aside from this "sin," one of "commission" in the eyes of A.I.P.A.C, his behavior was exemplary. Never once did he stray from the fold, and in 1984 A.I.P.A.C did not challenge his bid for re-election. 

Standing Up for Civility

 

One of the most popular members of the Senate, Charles "Mac" Mathias of Maryland is something of a maverick,a role probably necessary for his political survival. He is a Republican in a state where Democrats outnumber Republicans by three to one. 

During the Nixon administration especially, he frequently dissented from the Republican party line. His opposition to the war in Vietnam and his staunch advocacy of civil rights and welfare initiatives earned him a place on the Nixon administration's "enemies list" of political opponents. In a December 1971 speech, before the Watergate break-in at Democratic headquarters that led to Nixon's downfall, and while the country was angrily divided by domestic tensions and the war in Vietnam, Mathias advised Nixon to work to "bind the nation's wounds." He urged the president to "take the high road" in the 1972 campaign and to disavow a campaign strategy "which now seems destined, unnecessarily, to polarize the country even more." In the same message Mathias criticized Nixon's advisers for "divisive exploitation of the so-called social issues through,  the use of hard-line rhetoric on crime, civil rights, civil liberties and student unrest." Mathias was alarmed at what he saw as the Republican drift to the right. 

In 1975 and 1976 he even considered running for president as an independent "third force" candidate in an effort to forge a "coalition of the center." The late Clarence Mitchell, director of the Washington office of the N.A.A.C.P, said: "He's always arrived at his position in a reasoned way." In fact, early in his career he marked himself as a progressive and a champion of civil rights, and his constituency takes his liberalism on social issues in stride. A resident of Frederick, Mathias's home town, told the Washington Post, "Why, a lot of people around here think he's too liberal. But they seem to vote for him. The thing is, he's decent. He's got class." 

He also has flashes of daring. In the spring of 1981, he wrote an article in the quarterly Foreign Affairs that he knew would put him in hot water with some of his Jewish constituents, criticizing the role played by ethnic lobbies-particularly the Israeli lobby-in the formation of U.S. foreign policy. The controversial article upset Maryland's influential Jewish community, which had consistently supported Mathias's campaigns for office. Mathias had voted to sell fighter planes to the Saudis in 1978 and his vote helped President Reagan get Senate clearance for the AWACS sale in 1981. 

The same year the controversial article appeared, just after voters elected him to his third term in the Senate, Mathias took another step which appeared so politically inexpedient that many people assumed he had decided to retire from Congress in 1986. At the urging of Senators Howard Baker and Charles Percy, who wanted another moderate Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee, Mathias gave up a senior position on the Appropriations Committee in order to take the foreign policy committee assignment. 

His committee decision shook the leadership of Baltimore, the largest city in the state and a competitor for federal grant assistance. As the Baltimore Sun noted in an article critical of the move, "Had He remained on the Appropriations Committee, Mr. Mathias almost certainly would have become chairman of the subcommittee that holds the purse strings for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, an agency of great importance to the 'renaissance' of Baltimore." 

Contrary to the assumptions of Maryland political observers, Mathias was not planning to retire. Although he left a committee important to his constituents, the Senator welcomed the opportunity to help shape the issues that come before the Foreign Relations Committee. He was exhibiting a political philosophy admired by former Senator Mike Mansfield, who once called Mathias "the conscience of the Senate," and by former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who recognized Mathias as "one of the few statesmen I met in Washington." 

These qualities led Mathias to write his controversial Foreign Affairs article calling for "the re-introduction of civility" into the discussion of "ethnic advocacy" in Congress. He acknowledged that ethnic groups have the right to lobby for legislation, but he warned, "The affirmation of a right, and of the dangers of suppressing it, does not, assure that the right will be exercised responsibly and for the general good." 

Mathias cited the Israeli lobby as the most powerful ethnic pressure group, noting that it differs from others in that it focuses on vital national security interests and exerts "more constant pressure." Other lobbying groups "show up in a crisis and then disappear" and tend to deal with domestic matters. Mathias continued: 

With the exception of the Eisenhower administration, which virtually compelled Israel's withdrawal from the Sinai after the 1956 war, American presidents, and to an even greater degree Senators and Representatives, have been subjected to recurrent pressures from what has come to be known as the Israel lobby. 

He added an indictment of his colleagues: "For the most part they have been responsive ,to pro-Israeli lobbying pressure, and for reasons not always related either to personal conviction or careful reflection on the national interest." 

Mathias illustrated his concern by reviewing the "spectacular" success of A.I.P.A.C in 1975 when it promoted the "spirit of 76" letter: "Seventy-six of us promptly affixed our signatures although no hearings had been held, no debate conducted, nor had the administration been invited to present its views." [That is fucking sad D.C]

The Maryland Republican felt the independence of Congress was compromised by the intimidating effect of A.I.P.A.C's lobbying. He wrote that "Congressional conviction" in favor of Israel "has been immeasurably reinforced by the knowledge that political sanctions will be applied to any who fail to deliver" on votes to support high levels of economic and military aid to Israel. 

Although he signed the 1975 A.I.P.A.C letter to President Ford, Mathias resisted A.l.P.A.C's 1978 lobbying against the Carter administration's proposal to sell 60 F-15 fighter planes to Saudi Arabia. In the Senate debate before the vote he said that both Israel and Saudi Arabia were important friends of the United States and that "both need our support." 

Despite this attempt to balance American interests with Israel and the Saudi Arabia, Mathias said an "emotional, judgmental atmosphere" surrounded the arms sale issue. He quoted from a letter written to a Jewish newspaper in New York condemning his vote: 

Mr. Mathias values the importance of oil over the well-being of Jews and the state of Israel. ... The Jewish people cannot be fooled by such a person, no matter what he said, because his act proved who he was. 

Yet Mathias had already responded to such criticism in his Foreign Affairs article: 

Resistance to the pressures of a particular group in itself signals neither a sellout nor even a lack of sympathy with a foreign country or cause, but rather a sincere conviction about the national interest of the United States. 

He appealed to both the president and the Congress to "help to reduce the fractiousness and strengthen our sense of common American purpose." The president's national constituency afford him a unique opportunity to work toward this end, but Congress, "although more vulnerable to group pressures," must also be active, he wrote. 

Mathias asserted that it is not enough simply to follow public opinion: "An elected representative has other duties as well-to formulate and explain to the best of his or her ability the general interest, and to be prepared to accept the political consequences of having done so." He warned that ethnic advocacy tends to excessiveness and can thwart the higher good of national interests.[He is spot on in every thing he is saying,D.C] 

The Baltimore Jewish Times reported that Jewish leaders faced "a delicate dilemma" as they considered how to respond to the article: 

Basically, they're damned if they do and damned if they don't. If they keep a low profile and do not challenge Mathias's assertions, they feel they will be shirking their duty and giving in. Yet if they "go after" the Senator, they will be falling into a trap by proving his point about excessive pressure. 

Some Jews decided to take the latter course. Arnold Blumberg, a history professor at Towson State University, charged that Mathias "is in the mainstream of a tradition which urged Americans to pursue trade with Japan and Nazi Germany right up to the moment when scrap metal rained on the heads of American G.I's from German and Japanese planes." A prominent Jewish community official charged that the article was "malicious" and expressed hurt that Mathias had the "poison in him to express these views." Congressman Benjamin S. Rosenthal, a Democrat from New York and a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs committee, charged that Mathias was "standing on the threshold of bigotry" and denying "to the ethnic lobbies alone the right to participate in shaping the American consensus on foreign policy." Other critics expressed the fear that the article would encourage antisemitism. 

A spokesperson for the Maryland Jewish War Veterans organization said Mathias had "sold" himself "to the cause of the Saudis," while a letter to the Baltimore Sun chided, "I wish that [Mathias] had had the integrity to express those views one year prior to his re-election rather than one year after." [LOL! Interesting,the beauty of hindsight.....Mathias had "sold" himself "to the cause of the Saudis,"....flash forward to 2017,the latest scuttlebutt out of the Middle East? Israel and Saudi Arabia making secret agreements and warring on their neighbors! DC]

One critic, identified as "a former lobbyist," told the Jewish Times of Baltimore, 

Mathias is a bright, well-respected legislator who's been effective on Soviet Jewry, but when it comes to Israel he was always the last to come on board. He was always reluctant, and was pressured by Jewish groups, and he resented the pressure. He sees himself as a statesman above the fray. Now he obviously feels he's in a position to say what he really believes. 

The Jewish Community Relations Council in San Francisco criticized Mathias in its August 3, 1981, "Backgrounder" issue for raising the issue of "dual loyalty" within the "Jewish lobby." Mathias dismissed the charge as a false issue. In Maryland, the article was denounced by some rabbis, though Rabbi Jacob Angus of Baltimore publicly defended Mathias. 

Two journalist friends, Frank Mankiewicz and William Saflre, warned Mathias at the time that his article would "cause trouble." Two years later Mankiewicz assessed the Senator's future and said he felt the article had created serious problems. 

Ethnic lobbying still worries Mathias. Pondering each word over a cup of tea one afternoon in the fall of 1983, he told me, 

Ethnic ties enrich American life, but it must be understood they can't become so important that they obscure the primary duty to be an American citizen. Sometimes the very volume of this kind of activity can amount to an excessive zeal. 

Some of his critics had not read his article, Mathias recalls with a smile. "In a way, they were saying, I haven't read it, but it's outrageous." At breakfasts sponsored by Jewish groups, Mathias was regularly challenged. "When this happened, I would ask how many had actually read my article. In a crowd of 200, maybe two hands would be raised." 

Did the article close off communication with Jewish constituents? "I can't say it closed off access, but I have noticed that invitations have fallen off in the past two years." Mathias did not seek a fourth term in the Senate. He told a friend that controversy in the Jewish community was a factor in his decision. 

$3.1 Million from Pro-Israel Sources

 

Boy wonder of industry, self-made millionaire, tireless Republican campaigner for progressive causes, Charles H. Percy was a bright prospect for the presidency for a time in the late sixties. He skyrocketed to prominence during his first term in the Senate, which began in 1967 after he won an upset victory over Paul Douglas, the popular but aging liberal Democrat. 

In his first election 60 percent of Jewish votes,Illinois has the nation's fourth largest Jewish population-went to Douglas. But in the next six years Percy supported aid for Israel, urged the Soviet Union to permit emigration of Jews, criticized PLO terrorism, and supported social causes so forcefully that Jews rallied strongly to his side when he ran for re-election. In 1972 Percy accomplished something never before achieved by carrying every county in the state and, even more remarkable for an Illinois Protestant Republican, received 70 percent of the Jewish vote. 

His honeymoon with Jews was interrupted in 1975 when he returned from a trip to the Middle East to declare, "Israel and its leadership, for whom I have a high regard, cannot count on the United States in the future just to write a blank check." He said Israel had missed some opportunities to negotiate and he described PLO leader Yasser Arafat as "more moderate, relatively speaking, than other extremists such as George Habash." He urged Israel to talk to the PLO if the organization would renounce terrorism and recognize Israel's right to exist behind secure defensible borders, noting that David Ben Gurion, Israel's first prime minister, had said that Israel must be willing to swap real estate for peace. 

A week later Percy received this memorandum from his staff: "We have received 2,200 telegrams and 4,000 letters in response to your Mideast statements They run 95 percent against. As you might imagine, the majority of hostile mail comes from the Jewish community in Chicago. They threaten to withhold their votes and support for any future endeavors".

That same year Percy offended pro-Israel activists when he did not sign the famous "spirit of 76" letter through which seventy-six of his Senate colleagues effectively blocked President Gerald R. Ford's intended "reappraisal" of Middle East policy. This brought another flood of protest mail. 

Despite these rumblings, the pro-Israel activists did not mount a serious campaign against Percy in 1978. With the Senator's unprecedented 1972 sweep of the state fresh in mind, they did not seek out a credible opponent either in the primary or the general election. In fact, when the Democratic nomination went largely by default to an unknown lawyer, Alex Seith, Jews took little interest. Even Percy's vote to approve the sale of F-15 planes to Saudi Arabia during the campaign year caused him no serious problem at that time. 

In fact, only about one hundred Chicago Jews, few of them prominent, openly supported Seith. Seith's scheduler, who is Jewish, called every synagogue and every Jewish men's and women's organization in the state, but only one agreed to let the candidate speak. His campaign manager, Gary Ratner, concludes, "It was a ghetto mentality. Most Jews felt there was no way Percy would lose, so why get him mad at us." Of the $1 million Seith spent, less than $20,000 came from Jews. Encouraged by Philip Klutznick, a prominent Chicago Jewish leader, Illinois Jews contributed several times that amount to Percy. Of 70 Jewish leaders asked to sign an advertisement supporting the Senator, 65 gave their approval. On election day, Jewish support figured heavily in Percy's victory. He received only 53 percent of the statewide total but an impressive 61 percent of the Jewish vote. 

The 1984 campaign was dramatically different. Pro-Israel forces targeted him for defeat early and never let up. Percy upset Jews by voting to support the Reagan administration sale of AWACS radar planes to Saudi Arabia (a sale also supported by the Carter administration). These developments provided new ammunition for the attack already underway against Percy. Percy's decision was made after staff members who had visited Israel said they had been told by an Israeli military official that the strategic military balance would not be affected, but that they did not want the symbolism of the United States doing business with Saudi Arabia. 

Early in 1984, A.I.P.A.C decided to mobilize the full national resources of the pro-Israel campaign against Percy. In the March primary, it encouraged the candidacy of Congressman Tom Corcoran, Percy's challenger for the nomination. One of Corcoran's chief advisers and fundraisers was Morris Amitay, former executive director of A.I.P.A.C. Corcoran's high-decibel attacks portrayed the Senator as anti Israel. His fund-raising appeals to Jews cited Percy as "Israel's worst adversary in Congress." A full-page newspaper advertisement, sponsored by the Corcoran campaign, featured a picture of Arafat and headlined, "Chuck Percy says this man is a moderate." A letter to Jewish voters defending Percy and signed by fifty-eight leading Illinois Jews made almost no impact. 

Although Percy overcame the primary challenge, Corcoran's attacks damaged his position with Jewish voters and provided a strong base for A.I.P.A.C's continuing assault. Thomas A. Dine, executive director of A.I.P.A.C, set the tone early in the summer by attacking Percy's record at a campaign workshop in Chicago. A.I.P.A.C encouraged fundraising for Paul Simon  and mobilized its political resources heavily against Percy. It assigned several student interns full time to the task of anti-Percy research and brought more than one hundred university students from out-of-state to campaign for Simon. 

Midway in the campaign, A.I.P.A.C took a devious step to make Percy look bad. The key votes selected by A.I.P.A.C and used to rate all Senators showed Percy supporting Israel 89 percent of the time during his career. This put him only a few points below Simon's 99 percent rating in the House of Representatives and was hardly the contrast A.I.P.A.C wanted to cite in its anti-Percy campaign. The lobby solved the problem by changing its own rule book in the middle of the game. It added to the selected list a number of obscure votes Percy had cast in the subcommittee and letters and resolutions that Percy had not signed. The expanded list dropped the Senator's rating to only 51 percent, a mark useful to Simon when he addressed Jewish audiences. 

While most financial support from pro-Israel activists came to Simon from individuals, political action committees figured heavily. By mid-August these committees had contributed $145,870 to Simon, more than to any other Senate candidate. By election day, the total had risen to $235,000, with fifty-five committees participating. 

In addition, a California Jewish activist, Michael Goland, using a loophole in federal law, spent $1.6 million for billboard, radio and television advertising which urged Illinoisans to "dump Percy" and called him a "chameleon." 

Percy undertook vigorous countermeasures. Former Senator Jacob Javits of New York, one of the nation's most prominent and respected Jews, and Senator Rudy Boschwitz, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee subcommittee concerning the Middle East, made personal appearances for Percy in Chicago, and one hundred Illinois Jews led by former Attorney General Edward H. Levi sponsored a full-page advertisement which declared that Percy "has delivered for Illinois, delivered for America and,delivered for Israel." The advertisement, in an unstated reference to Goland's attacks,warned, "Don't let our U.S. Senate race be bought by a Californian." 

Except for charging in one news conference that Simon proclaimed that he had a 100 percent voting record for the pro-Israel lobby, Percy tried to avoid the Israel-Jewish controversy in the campaign. 

These precautions proved futile, as did his strong legislative endeavors. His initiatives as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee brought Israel $425 million more in grant aid than Reagan had requested in 1983 and $325 million more in 1984, but these successes for Israel seemed to make no difference. A poll taken a month before the election showed a large majority of Jews supporting Simon. The Percy campaign found no way to stem the tide. 

When the votes were counted, Percy had lost statewide by 89,000 votes. One exit poll indicated that Percy won 35 percent of the Jewish vote. In the same balloting Illinois Jews cast only 30 percent of their votes for the re-election of President Ronald Reagan, despite their unhappiness with the chief executive's views on the separation of church and state, abortion, and other social issues,not to mention his insistence on selling AWACS planes to Saudi Arabia. [But Saudi Arabia is no longer an issue given current Zionist activity around the Middle East D.C]

In an election decided by so few votes, any major influence could be cited as crucial. Although broadly supportive of Reagan's program, Percy was remembered by many voters mainly as a moderate, progressive, Republican. Some conservative Republicans rejoiced at his defeat. The "new right," symbolized by the National Conservative Political Action Committee, withheld its support from Percy and early in the campaign indicated its preference for Simon, despite the latter's extremely liberal record in Congress. 

Yet the Middle East controversy alone may have been sufficient to cost Percy his Senate seat. Thousands of Jews who had voted for Percy in 1978 left him for the Democratic candidate six years later. And these votes fled to Simon mainly because Israel's lobby worked effectively throughout the campaign year to portray the Senator as basically anti Israel. Percy's long record of support for Israel's needs amounted to a repudiation of the accusation, but too few Jews spoke up publicly in his defense. The Senator found that once a candidate is labeled anti-Israel the poison sinks so swiftly and deeply it is almost impossible to remove. 

The Middle East figured heavily in campaign financing as well as voting. Simon's outlay for the year was $5.3 million and Percy's about $6 million. With Goland spending $1.6 million in his own independent attack on Percy, total expenditures in behalf of the Simon candidacy came to $6.9 million.

Forty percent, $3.1 million-came from Jews disgruntled over Percy's position on Arab-Israel relations. Indeed, Simon was promised half this sum before he became a candidate. While he was still pondering whether to vacate his safe seat in the House of Representatives in order to make the race,he was assured $1.5 million from Jewish sources. The promise came from Robert Schrayer Chicago area businessman and leader in the Jewish community, whose daughter, Elizabeth, was helping to organize anti-Percy forces in her job as assistant director of political affairs for A.I.P.A.C. 

Reviewing the impact of the Middle East controversy on his defeat, Percy says, "Did it make the difference? I don't know. But this I believe: I believe Paul Simon would not have run had he not been assured by Bob Schrayer that he would receive the $1.5 million." Simon acknowledges, "This assurance was a factor in my decision." 

A.I.P.A.C's Dine told a Canadian audience: "All the Jews in America, from coast to coast, gathered to oust Percy. And American politicians-those who hold public positions now, and those who aspire got the message." 


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The Lobby and the Oval Office