Obama is kosher, say Jewish community leaders

Nov

2008

Written by Jesse W Kline

The leaders of Vancouver's Jewish community are optimistic about the election of Barack Obama. They are hopeful that the relationship between Israel and the United States will remain strong.

They know that the American President has a major influence on the relationship between the US and Israel and the outcome of future peace negotiations in the Middle East.

Some Jewish-Americans living in Vancouver were campaigning to ensure that Obama was elected President.

Rabbi David Mivasair, the Rabbi at Vancouver's Ahavat Olam synagogue, worked with Democrats Abroad to register Americans living in Vancouver so they could vote in the November fourth Presidential election. Democrats Abroad is an organization that works to spread the Democratic Party's message to Americans living outside the U.S.

“[Obama's] a real visionary, I think he's very capable,” said Mivasair. “I think Obama will be a strong supporter of Israel.”
Mivasair's efforts included setting up a booth at the Vancouver Folk Music Festival in July to make it easy for Americans to register to vote. In total, Mivasair says he was able to register over 100 Americans living in Vancouver.

He was also active in spreading the message to Vancouver's Jewish community. “Other efforts were focused on the Jewish community. I sent e-mails to Jewish people and Jewish organizations,” said Mivasair.

Others within Vancouver's Jewish community who were actively involved in campaigning for Obama include David Katz, a UBC graduate student and member of Hillel, a Jewish youth organization. Katz organized a team of three people who traveled from British Columbia to Nevada during the first week of October to register voters for the Obama campaign.

“[Obama has] really tapped into the disillusionment that people in their 20's feel toward politics,” said Katz, who was born in Vancouver but also holds American citizenship because his father is from New York.

Questions were raised throughout the campaign as to whether or not Obama would be a strong supporter of Israel. “There was a lot of skepticism from the Jewish community at first toward Barack Obama,” said Katz.

However, Obama managed to get the support of a majority of American Jews. According to NBC exit polls, 78 per cent of Jewish-Americans voted for Obama.

Obama's recent appointment of Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff has alleviated some people's fears that Obama will not be a strong advocate of Israel. Emanuel, who's father is Israeli, is seen as a strong supporter of the State of Israel. Katz believes that Emanuel's appointment “really shows that [Obama] had no ill will toward Israel.”

Obama faces numerous challenges in the Middle East as he gets set to take office, including wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the threat of a nuclear armed Iran, and the peace negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians.

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators have pledged to continue peace negotiations, even though a settlement will not be reached before the end of President Bush's term in office, as the Bush administration had originally hoped for.

However, there is likely not going to be a lot of progress on the peace negotiations until after Israelis go to the polls in February. “The Americans voted for a new president, but until there's a new government in Israel, probably nothings going to happen, nothings going to change,” said Ron Friedman of the Jewish Independent newspaper.

Yet, many are hoping the election of Barack Obama will help move the peace process ahead. “I think that if Obama can be taken on what he said during the campaign, that he's going to put a lot more time and effort into the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, more than the Bush administration is. Hopefully that'll get things moving there because they haven't been moving very far in the last few years,” says Friedman.