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Friends,

Let's cut right to the chase: If Jon Ossoff defeats Sen. David Perdue and if Rev. Raphael Warnock defeats Sen. Kelly Loeffler in the coda to the 2020 election season on January 5, the Senate will be split 50/50, giving Vice President Kamala Harris the tie-breaking vote and Democrats, not Mitch McConnell, control of the Senate.

The Jewish vote in Georgia could make the difference in these close races. A cardinal principle of pro-Israel advocacy is that Israel should not be used as a partisan football, because the result is weakening of bipartisan support for Israel. Yet in an effort to win the Jewish vote, Loeffler and Perdue have discarded that principle and are attempting to drive a wedge between the Black and Jewish communities. The truth is that only Ossoff and Warnock are strong on Israel, anti-Semitism, and the other issues we care about.

Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA), Warnock's opponent, is playing games with Israel. Last week, Loeffler and three other Republican senators sent a letter to Donald Trump urging him to label goods produced in the West Bank "Made in Israel." Not even Trump would go that far, but the State Department will now require goods made in Area C of the West Bank to be labeled with Israel as country of origin, which makes no sense because none of the West Bank is in Israel.

Israel has not annexed the West Bank, so goods made in the West Bank are made in the West Bank, not Israel. Loeffler supports inaccurate and misleading labeling. As Abe Silverstein explains, "it is difficult to imagine the State Department regarding products originating in Crimea as being made in Russia, even though Russian control of the territory is the 'reality' of the situation today."

Loeffler's letter suggests that labeling West Bank goods "Made in Israel" will combat the boycott, divestment, and sanction (BDS) movement against Israel, but the opposite is true. A key argument against BDS is that it is inappropriate and counterproductive to boycott Israel over its policies in the West Bank because it takes two parties, Israel and the Palestinians, not just Israel, to negotiate a two-state solution that would give Palestinians independence. Until then, the disparate treatment of Jews and Palestinians in the West Bank is a temporary situation pending resolution.

But if the West Bank is part of Israel--which is what "Made in Israel" suggests--then the case for BDS becomes stronger. Jews in the West Bank vote in Knesset elections, but not Palestinians in the West Bank. Jews and Arabs in the West Bank have different legal statuses. If the West Bank is part of Israel, that's unacceptable. The BDS movement seeks to conflate Israel with the West Bank to justify a boycott of all Israeli products. Loeffler's letter gives BDS a victory it could never achieve on its own and makes a two-state solution harder to achieve.

Loeffler's letter is another attempt to politicize the U.S.-Israel relationship. Her letter claims that "prominent Democrats" are working to oppose Israel and support BDS. Loeffler's claim is false, but it serves her purpose of politicizing the U.S.-Israel relationship.

The Democratic Party states in its 2020 platform that it opposes "any effort to unfairly single out and delegitimize Israel, including at the United Nations or through the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Movement."

President-elect Joe Biden, the leader of the Democratic Party, stated that his administration will "firmly reject the BDS movement — which singles out Israel and too often veers into anti-Semitism — and fight other efforts to delegitimize Israel on the global stage."

Rev. Raphael Warnock, Loeffler's opponent in the Senate run-off, "strongly opposes the BDS movement and its anti-Semitic underpinnings, including its supporters’ refusal to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist."

The vast majority of Democrats in Congress oppose BDS. Last year, the House passed H. Res. 246, which condemned BDS and supported a two-state solution, with support from over 90% of House Democrats.

But if you are still concerned about progressives and Israel, then the answer is to elect Rev. Raphael Warnock. Who could be more effective in making the progressive case against BDS, against conditioning aid to Israel, against cutting aid to Israel, than a person with impeccable progressive credentials, the Senior Pastor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s church?

Warnock has spoken out against what he perceives as injustice against the Palestinians. But his answer is not action against Israel. His answer is a two-state solution, which is the only path that will ensure Israel's survival as a Jewish, democratic state. As Warnock himself says, "I know that no singular country’s actions are perfect, including Israel’s – and yet the country is a true friend and our strong, democratic ally in the region." Isn't that what we want to hear in the progressive movement?

But what about Jeremiah Wright? Warnock has never said anything anti-Semitic, and he never defended any anti-Israel or anti-Semitic comments made by Jeremiah Wright. Warnock has defended Wright’s bluntness in talking about how America has failed the Black community. Given the undeniable injustices inflicted for centuries against Black Americans, it should not be hard to understand Wright's language or Warnock's defense of that language.

Dr. King himself would have delivered a sermon entitled "American May Go to Hell" had he not been assassinated. This is the language from Wright that Warnock defended: "Not God bless America, God damn America. That's in the Bible, for killing innocent people. God damn America for treating her citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme. The United States government has failed the vast majority of her citizens of African descent."

Can you blame Wright for saying that? We are commanded 36 times in the Torah to remember that we were oppressed in Egypt and to not oppress others. All of us should be outraged at how America treats Black Americans, and it is the epitome of condescension for us to tell Black Americans how to talk about their experience in America.

Loeffler and Perdue do not share our values. Loeffler warmly embraced the endorsement of Marjorie Taylor Greene, one of the anti-Semitic QAnon supporters who was just elected to Congress. Perdue ran anti-Semitic ads against Ossoff and taunted Kamala Harris with racist mocking of her name.

Yehuda Kurtzer explains why the Jewish community cannot allow 'its interests to be leveraged against emergent Black politicians" and concludes by hoping that Loeffler will "stop using us as a cudgel against her opponent. For the Jewish people, there is more at stake here than her political career."

Join the reality-based pro-Israel community in backing Jon Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock. Read Ossoff's position paper on Israel, Warnock's position paper on Israel, and Warnock's statement on Israel. For more information about these races, visit JDCA's Georgia Senate Election Runoff Hub.

Last week's newsletter.

ICYMI. Democratic leaders play a ridiculous blame game with progressives.

Tweets of the Week. Alex Blaze and Aaron David Miller.

Twitter Thread of the Week. Kelsey Davenport.

Facebook Post of the Week. Jeff Sherman.

Video Clip of the Week. Trump's concession speech.

Upcoming Events. Dana Goldsmith Gordon and I are co-hosts along with the Gurtin family, Lee Wolf & Jordan Cohen, April Underwood & Matthew Herrero, and Democratic Jewish Outreach Pennsylvania for an event in support of Georgia Senate candidates Jon Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock on Wednesday, December 2, at 7:00pm CT. Click here for details and to RSVP.

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