Israeli Diplomat Warns American Jews Split on Iran Deal in Secret Cable
Image by Getty Images
A top Israeli diplomat in the United States wrote his superiors to warn that they cannot count on the U.S. Jewish community to oppose the Iran nuclear deal.
“At this crucial point of the Iranian issue – which for years has been at the core of Israeli foreign policy and was described countless times by the Israeli leadership as an existential threat – the Jewish community in the United States is not standing as a united front behind Israel and important parts of it are on the fence,” Yaron Sideman, the consul general in Philadelphia, wrote in a memo to Israel’s Foreign Ministry obtained by Haaretz on Thursday.
Sideman quoted a federation CEO as saying that campaigning against the deal could alienate the White House and Democrats, which could inhibit Jewish organizational influence.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee and at least eight regional federations oppose the July 14 sanctions relief for nuclear restrictions deal, heeding Israel’s government, which says the deal endangers Israel.
However, a broad number of national groups have yet to pronounce on the deal one way or the other, although there is pressure to do so while Congress has until mid-to-late September to decide whether to stop or accept the deal.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
