News Analysis: ‘free-lance’ Lobbying in Congress Expected to Continue Under Likud

When Israel’s Likud opposition failed to muster enough support in the Knesset to thwart Israel’s accords with the Palestinians, the party sent some of its top officials to Capitol Hill.

Benjamin Netanyahu, then head of the Likud and now Israel’s prime minister- elect, was among those seeking to recruit U.S. lawmakers to their cause – specifically to end aid to the Palestinians.

For their part, American Jewish groups sympathetic to that position had failed to convince the organized Jewish community to end its support for U.S. aid to the Palestinians.

So they, to, took their case directly to members of Congress, hoping to elicit support for measures that in effect would end aid to the nascent Palestinian Authority and, in some cases, the peace process itself.

The increasingly boisterous disagreements over Israeli policies silenced any lingering believers in the myth that the Jewish community leaves its differences at the steps of the Capitol.

For five years, the unified voice has continued to deteriorate, first with a bitter settlement dispute that began under the last Likud regime, and most recently over objections to the Labor-led peace process.

Now, with the imminent return of the Likud government to power in Israel, most Jewish activists expect that unity in the Jewish community will continue to erode.

Americans for Peace Now, the left-wing group whose positions had become mainstream under the Labor government, is pledging to be “vigorously active” on Capitol Hill “to ensure that Israel lives up to its commitments,” said Gail Pressberg, the group’s Washington director.

Already, the American Israel Public Committee, once the sole voice for pro- Israel causes in Congress, and the Conference of President of Major American Jewish Organizations are trying to figure out a way to minimize dissent before it reaches the halls of government.

The pro-Israel lobby machine has acquired influence in the nation’s capital rivaling that of the gun and tobacco industries.

Many attribute that historic strength to the fact that the community speaks on most issues with one voice.

Whether mere illusion or representative of American Jewry, that sense of unity hammered home to many lawmakers the importance of the pro-Israel agenda to their constituents and donors.

As increasing numbers of “free-lancers,” as lobbyists outside AIPAC are frequently called, take to the halls of Congress, the very bedrock of the pro- Israel lobby’s strength is at risk.

Aides to Jewish members of Congress and staffers for members immersed in Middle East issues say the feud in the Jewish community has not weakened support for the core issues on the pro-Israel agenda – foreign aid and the U.S.-Israel strategic relationship.

In fact, Congress is expected to approve soon this year’s foreign aid bill. While the total foreign aid package continues to decline, the bill maintains the current level of $3 billion in U.S. assistance to Israel.

Even among new members of Congress, there is largely support for foreign aid.

But the disunity over other issues has turned off many of these new lawmakers, particularly those with no Jewish constituencies.

“I’ve had a hard time distinguishing between the positions of all the groups,” said one senior aide to a member of Congress from the Midwest.

“You’re blowing your whole game if you pull from both sides. People here just move on to the next issue instead of getting to the bottom of the matter,” said this Hill veteran of 19 years.

Many Jewish leaders agree there is a problem.

“Congress should not be a football field for the Jewish community to play out its differences,” said Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents.

“If we start bombarding them with our differences, they’ll just walk away from the issues,” Hoenlein said.

In an effort to counter those who see Congress as a wide-open ball field, Hoenlein has often adopted the role of referee.

Hoenlein oversaw bitter dissent in 1991 when unity began to slip in the American Jewish community over the issue of $10 billion in loan guarantees to help Israel resettle the influx of refugees from the former Soviet Union and Ethiopia.

Americans for Peace Now went to Congress to urge opposition to the guarantees unless the Israeli government curbed its expansion of settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

The feud over lobbying against the policies of the Israeli government continued as Peace Now sought membership in the Conference of Presidents two years later.

One of the fiercest opponents to including Peace Now in the umbrella group was Morton Klein, who today heads the Zionist Organization of American and has been widely criticized for his individual lobbying on Capitol Hill.

Two years ago, Hoenlein was called on to play mediator in a dispute between the ZOA and AIPAC, when AIPAC formally protested Klein’s lobbying activities and accused the ZOA leader of putting “the entire foreign aid bill in jeopardy.”

Klein has spent much of his time on Capitol Hill lobbying against aid to the Palestinians and in favor of a congressional ban on the stationing of U.S. troops on the Golan Heights.

Opponents of an Israeli peace deal with Syria capitalized on the troops issue to try to scuttle any future peace settlement with Israel’s northern neighbor.

Klein has vehemently defended his right to lobby against policies supported by the Conference of Presidents and the Israeli government.

Now, Klein vows to continue pushing against aid to the Palestinians, regardless of what position the new Likud government takes.

While in the opposition, Netanyahu clearly opposed U.S. aid to the Palestinians, arguing that they were not entitled to the $500 million in U.S. aid as long as they were not complying with their accords with Israel.

He has not indicated what position he will take on the issues as prime minister.

Klein now says, “Any organization has the right to go to Capitol Hill to present their case honestly.”

Hoenlein, meanwhile, said the rules for Jewish lobbying remain a “subject under discussion.”

But, he added, he expects, Jewish groups to coordinate their positions with AIPAC.

For its part, AIPAC is approaching the dilemma diplomatically.

“The more the community speaks with a single voice, the more influential we are,” said Howard Kohr, AIPAC’s new executive director.

Kohr acknowledged that AIPAC, the only organization authorized by the organized Jewish community to represent the pro-Israel agenda, has its work cut out for it as the group strives to maintain its influence on Capital Hill.

But he said the ensuing battles in the Jewish community for attention on Capitol Hill would not affect the most important issues on the pro-Israel agenda: foreign aid, maintaining Israel’s qualitative military edge and improving on the U.S.-Israel strategic relationship.

Despite all the challenges to AIPAC from within the Jewish community, those most involved with the pro-Israel agenda in Congress say their respect for the organization should grow along with the increasing need to decipher the Jewish community’s myriad positions.

“We hear from more and more people each year” in the Jewish community, said one congressional aide who works on foreign policy issues. “Someone’s got to help us sort it out.”

Part of that sorting has involved Israeli politicians in the opposition coming to Washington to work against policies of the Israeli government.

And now that the tables are about to be turned, one could expect Labor minyans waiting in the wings to come to the U.S. capital to push their own agenda as Likud members did over the past four years.

It is too early to tell whether they will.

In any case, some on Capitol Hill, as an aide to a leading Jewish member of Congress put it, are “planning for a calendar full of Israeli and Jewish appointments.”