Israel Loses A Friend In Lautenberg

[Purveyor]

When the Senate voted 99-0 two weeks ago to support Israel if the Jewish State is compelled to take military action in self-defense against Iran's nuclear weapons program, people wondered who the mystery anti-Israel senator was who did not vote.

They were surprised to find out that it was New Jersey Democrat Frank Lautenberg, who would normally have been the first senator to back such a resolution. But he was hospitalized due to the viral pneumonia from which he died Monday at age 89.

Knowing Frank personally, it probably killed him that he missed that vote. I saw his love of Israel first-hand on his frequent visits here in my role as Israel correspondent for the New Jersey Jewish News.

Frank told me more than a decade ago that he had come here more than 80 times. He chaired the United Jewish Appeal, was president of the American Friends of Hebrew University, and donated the central park in a former Rishon Lezion slum 30 years ago that is now a relatively nice neighborhood.

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http://www.jpost.com/Jewish-World/Jewish-News/Israel-loses-a-friend-in-Lautenberg-315397

[Purveyor]

1. Related: Was Frank Lautenberg sufficiently pro-Israel?

Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post berates AIPAC for what she calls its “fawning” remembrance of Frank Lautenberg, the longtime New Jersey senator who died yesterday:

As for Lautenberg, AIPAC’s fawning can be chalked up to the gradual lowering of the bar for Democrats in an era in which most are pro-Israel, except when inconvenient. They therefore chose to overlook Lautenberg’s support for anti-Israel Chuck Hagel for defense secretary and his demands for a unilateral settlement freeze by the Jewish state. It wasn’t so long ago (1988 to be exact) when he signed a letter to George Shultz lambasting publicly then prime minister Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir on Israel’s negotiating posture. AIPAC, I suppose, chose to overlook Lautenberg’s muteness during this administration when the president “condemned” Israel for building in its capital.

“Fawning” suggests a transactional relationship. Rubin does not make clear what AIPAC derives, exactly, from praising the dead.


Read more: http://www.jta.org/2013/06/04/news-opinion/politics/was-frank-lautenberg-sufficiently-pro-israel#ixzz2VHJxBpD5