- NEW YORK -- Certain Jewish
figures and organizations are deliberately acting to cause a crisis between
Israel and the White House in an effort to prevent the implementation of
the road map, the president of the World Jewish Congress (WJC), Edgar Bronfman,
told Haaretz yesterday.
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- Bronfman said that his letter to President George W.
Bush last month urging opposition to the separation fence expressed his
concern for the future relations between Israel and the American administration.
Details of the letter, co-signed by former undersecretary of state Lawrence
Eagleburger, were reported in Haaretz yesterday.
-
- Bronfman, who is spending the summer vacation on his
Idaho ranch, said Israel and the Jewish community cannot afford a fight
with the White House now. Bronfman is known as one of the harshest critics
of the pro-Israeli lobby AIPAC and the Conference of Presidents of Major
American Jewish Organizations that are "dominated by the right wing."
-
- Labor Party Chairman Shimon Peres and Justice Minister
Yosef Lapid were among the many Jewish leaders and Israeli public figures
who wrote Bronfman letters of support following the report of his letter
to Bush.
-
-
- Bronfman and Eagleburger are old friends and live next
door to one another. Eagleburger was undersecretary of state in the administration
of George Bush senior, during the crisis between Bush and former prime
minister Yitzhak Shamir in which the administration withheld the loan guarantees
to Israel.
-
- WJC chairman Israel Singer yesterday slammed right-wing
Jewish leaders, saying they are doing everything to destroy the political
pluralism in the community and boycotting anyone whose opinion is different
from theirs. He said public opinion polls indicate that some 80 percent
of the Jews support the road map and the peace process and just as right-wing
officials can express their opinions, so can the left-wing camp.
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- http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=326444&contrass
ID=2&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y
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