12-31-10  IT would have been difficult for an attendee at AIPAC’s annual membership event in Oakland to not see that there was serious dissent to their celebration of support for policies of occupation and war at their annual membership event at the ritzy Marriot Hotel. Outside more than 200 people from a wide array of groups, including antiwar groups, Palestinian and Jewish groups, progressive Democrats and Greens, and community organizations came together to stand for peace and justice in the Middle East and an end of US support for the Israeli military while human needs are neglected at home. This short video is testimony to that diversity:

Inside the hotel, AIPAC guests were treated to a flash mob performance protesting AIPAC’s continued role in supporting US/Israeli policies of war and occupation that ended with the arrest of seven participants on charges of trespassing. You can see the video here and one participant shares why she risked arrest to protest the policies AIPAC is promoting.

Beyond the protesters inside and outside the hotel, AIPAC guests that arrived via BART may have noticed the ads protesting US military aid to Israel that are displayed at the nearby underground station. Or any of them may have seen the commentary printed in a local paper just a few weeks previous asking why politicians present at the AIPAC event why they will be supporting policies they supposedly oppose.

What about those politicians? No doubt, there were some in attendance, but I suspect in shorter supply than in years past. Previously, this was one of those places that a politician wanted to be seen and their presence widely advertised, no matter their office. Yet the newly elected mayor of Oakland was a no-show. Ditto the mayor of Berkeley Tom Bates, and his wife Loni Hancock the State Senator. Mayor Gayle McLaughlin of Richmond, just re-elected to a new term, sent regrets that her full schedule prevented her from joining the protest.

The article in the local Jewish weekly following the AIPAC events is informative.

Bay Area groups critical of Israel have ramped up their public profile in the past two weeks, initiating street protests, placing posters in BART stations and staging a demonstration that led to seven arrests.

On Dec. 13, while AIPAC Northern California held its annual East Bay membership dinner at the Oakland Marriott City Center, a group of activists from varying left-wing organizations performed a routine in the lobby of the hotel’s convention center.

So instead of a story about how AIPAC once again drew support from politicians across partisan divides, there is only a story about the protests of the event. Nowhere does J Weekly mention any local politician that might have been in attendance. (Incidentally, the article was originally put on the web with this headline “Anti-Israel protesters ramp things up locally”, and it seems that the editors backed down from the inflammatory headline and went with the more accurate “Protesters critical of Israel ramp things up locally.” )

Something has changed. AIPAC doesn’t seem to have the attraction it once had, especially for up and coming politicians, at least in the Bay Area. No longer is association with it something to boast about, except to AIPAC members themselves.

After years of steady protests, politicians have learned that while there may still be an upside to standing with AIPAC, there is also controversy, and therefore also a clear downside. There may also be the fact that AIPAC is growing even more right-wing, even in its choices of speakers in the liberal Bay Area (Details here). Surprisingly, they chose a fundamentalist Christian, DeeDee Coleman, to keynote their event in San Francisco. The choice of Rep. Shelley Berkley for the Oakland event, a critic of Obama’s policy of mild (and ineffectual) criticism of Israel’s expansionist policies also put local politicians in a quandary. Berkley is a politician whose views of the conflict are perhaps even to the Right of the Israeli government, who she once criticized as being “too tolerant” of Palestinians in Gaza. How can a politician even pretend to support Obama’s “peace efforts” and at the same time applaud one who is such a harsh critic of Obama from the Right and supporter of increased settlements?

AIPAC seems to be painting itself into a rightwing corner.

Despite that, AIPAC still wields way too much power, including here in the Bay Area. For example, while local Congresswoman Barbara Lee often refuses to endorse many AIPAC-initiated resolutions in Congress, they can count on her for their all-important bottom-line support—unconditional military aid to Israel (see a summary of her record). Still, we see that the winds are shifting, slowly, and our protests are making a difference. We intend to keep “ramping things up” here in the Bay Area and hope that these efforts are duplicated around the country.

http://stopaipacforpeace.blogspot.com/2010/12/protests-put-aipac-defen...

Submitted by andie531 on Wed, 2011-01-05 03:27

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