J Street’s Deceit
Beneath an artfully crafted facade of reasonableness, J Street is a lobbyist for anti-Israel and anti-peace causes. Its founder, Jeremy Ben-Ami has weaponized his Jewish identity to promote an agenda harmful to Israel’s future.
When I heard J Street founder Jeremy Ben-Ami speak at my synagogue in Lexington, Mass., on Oct. 22, his tone was disarming – humorous, articulate, and seemingly devoted to peace. Yet the organization’s record tells a different story: one of persistent opposition to Israel’s elected government, its security needs, and even its right to defend itself.
J Street has consistently lobbied for positions that are not in Israel’s best interest. In 2015, it supported the 2015 JCPOA nuclear agreement with Iran, and in 2017 it opposed moving the Israeli capital to Jerusalem. More recently it applauded the recognition of Palestinian statehood by France and England, opposed sanctions on the ICC judges who indicted Israeli politicians, called for a ceasefire in Gaza as early as January 2024, condemned the Israeli and U.S. attacks on the Iranian nuclear sites, criticized humanitarian efforts by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, opposed attacking Rafah to control the Philadelphi corridor, opposed the nomination of Mike Huckabee as Israeli ambassador, and criticized the pager attack that targeted Hezbollah terrorists.
But the most significant divergence between J Street’s positions and what is supported by Israelis and the Israel government is on the funding of military aid. J Street has sought to limit the sale of arms to Israel, most recently through the “Block the Bombs” legislation in the House and companion bills introduced by Bernie Sanders in the Senate. This legislation would have limited the IDF’s ability to fight terrorists and use the most precise munitions possible. The Senate version was opposed by 27 senators, all of whom were endorsed by J Street or received funding from it.
J Street claims it supports arms sales to Israel, but has taken the position that those sales should be subject to, among other things, international law, which means scrutiny by the U.N. Both Israel and the U.S. have worked to limit or eliminate U.N. oversight because of the pervasive bias that institution has against Israel.
The clearest statement of J Street’s intent came from Delia Ramirez, a Democrat from Illinois, who introduced the Block the Bombs legislation. In an interview on October 22, she said that those who are “anti-Israel” should “pick up the phone and sponsor my bill.”
Ramirez could not have been clearer. The J Street-sponsored legislation is a litmus test for opposition to Israel.
None of J Street’s positions are supported by Israelis, the leading Israeli press, Netanyahu or the Israeli political leadership. Nor would they be supported by any other foreseeable Israeli government. Each J Street position runs counter to Israeli interests.
Don’t think of J Street as an advocate for Israel. It is speaking about the country, but not for it. Its advocacy merely reflects its interpretation of what Israel should do.
But J Street is not merely anti-Israel; it is anti-peace.
J Street has been far more critical of Israel than its enemies. For example, since October 7, it has consistently blamed Israel for the failure to end the war. Among the press releases on its site, 18 placed the burden on Israel to take steps to end the conflict, versus six for Hamas. (There were another four that placed the burden on both and eight that were ambiguous.)
This reflects J Street’s anti-Israel bias and ignores the fact that the Israeli position has always been that the war would end if all the hostages were released. In retrospect, it was not until Hamas agreed to that condition that peace was achieved. If J Street was sincere in its desire to end the war, it would have placed the burden on Hamas to release the hostages, rather than criticizing Israel for alleged failures to protect civilians or to adhere to international law.
J Street has made peace more difficult by making the Israel-U.S. relationship a partisan issue. It supports only Democrats and, among them some of the most strident critics of Israel. It endorses and does fundraising for current Squad member Summer Lee (D-PA). It supports officeholders who have accused Israel of genocide, including Lee, Bernie Sanders (D-VT), Pramila Jaypal (D-WA), Becca Balint (D-VT), Katherine Clark (D-MA), Delia Ramirez (D-IL), Greg Casar (D-TX) and Veronica Escobar (D-TX).
J Street’s support of Israel’s critics makes it harder to build a coalition to advance peace efforts. The best chance for peace and cooperation with the Palestinians is through a close bond between the U.S. and Israel, which will lead to policies and pathways that have broad support in both countries. J Street’s one-sided and divisive advocacy makes this less likely.
J Street’s deceit doesn’t end with its anti-Israel and anti-peace positions. Ben-Ami also has a problem with Holocaust denial and antisemitism.
Ben-Ami has written that he concurs with a Holocaust “scholar” who claims that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, although he won’t use the word “genocide” himself. This is a facile way of accusing Israel of genocide.
No reputable scholar believes Israel has committed genocide. Indeed, more than 500 Holocaust scholars have signed a letter asserting that Israel is not guilty of genocide. The scholar cited by Ben-Ami, Omer Bartov, is a professor at Brown University. His work has been criticized for, among other things, comparing the IDF to Nazi soldiers, which meets the definition of antisemitism.
Genocide, as defined in 1948, requires intent – the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethical, racial or religious group. There is no evidence that Israel has ever intentionally targeted civilians. The opposite is true. Israel has taken extensive measures to evacuate civilians from military targets, warning them with phone calls, leaflets, and non-explosive devices dropped on top of buildings. Even accepting Hamas’ casualty statistics, Israel killed two civilians for every combatant, the lowest such ratio in the history of modern warfare. Hamas itself reports that the Gaza population has increased during the war.
By inverting the definition of genocide, the central crime of the Holocaust, Ben-Ami has trivialized the crimes against humanity committed by the Nazis against the Jewish people. He is engaging in a form of Holocaust denial.
Hamas committed genocide. Its intent is clear: Its 1988 charter documents its intent to annihilate Israel and its 2017 policy document reasserted its goals to destroy the “Zionist project.” Yahya Sinwar was the architect of October 7, and he ordered Hamas to “kill as many people and take as many hostages as possible.”
But Ben-Ami has never accused Hamas of genocide. Holding Israel to a double standard (accusing it of genocide and not Hamas) is a basic criterion for antisemitism, whether one uses the IHRA definition or (as Ben-Ami prefers) the more limited Nexus definition. Ben-Ami’s rhetoric is antisemitic.
Antisemitism on the left – in the Democratic Party – is a real phenomenon. But anyone is welcome in Ben-Ami’s “tent” – if they are a Democrat and will cast votes against Israel. J Street has never accused a Democrat of antisemitism. It has withdrawn or declined to support some Democrats – e.g., Jamaal Bowman, Ihan Omar, Rashida Tlaib – but has not accused them of antisemitism, despite their support of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement and other offensive comments they have made. J Street has accused Republicans of antisemitism.
For Ben-Ami, antisemitism is at best a partisan issue, and at worst a fault he fails to see in himself.
Those who attended Ben-Ami’s presentation at our synagogue would have learned nothing about J Street’s deceit and pernicious policy agenda. That is because the first half of the presentation recounted Ben-Ami’s personal story, with careful references to issues in American and Israeli politics that drew support from the audience. A Q&A session followed, but the questions were written on index cards and filtered by a J Street worker before they were given to the moderator. There was no opportunity to challenge Ben-Ami on his divisive agenda.
Many in that Lexington audience may have been persuaded by Ben-Ami’s charm or by his appeals to partisan values. Yet likability doesn’t erase policy. J Street’s record – on Iran, arms to Israel, and its alliances in Congress – speaks for itself.
Supporters of Israel and of genuine peace should look past J Street’s rhetoric. What it calls pragmatism is, in practice, a steady campaign to weaken Israel diplomatically and politically. Its vision isn’t one of reconciliation – but of surrender disguised as reason.