The Zionist Organization of America has strong objections to President Biden's nomination of Obama's Treasury Secretary and Chief of Staff, Jack Lew, to serve as the US Ambassador to Israel. Jack Lew shilled for the catastrophic Iran deal, "sticking to and trotting out every Obama administration line (and lie) to try to sell the Iran deal to the American-Jewish public."
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At a 2015 conference, Lew falsely told the American Jewish community that the Iran deal would "meet[] a tough standard of intense verification and scrutiny"; would be "built around an incredibly robust and intrusive inspections"; and would "effectively guarantee that Iran never obtains a nuclear weapon," among other lies. (The deal in fact paved Iran's way to the nuclear bomb; gave Iran $150 of sanctions relief; had sunset provisions removing restrictions on Iran in a few years, that belied Lew's guarantee that Iran could never obtain a nuclear bomb; prevented inspectors from accessing military facilities where nuclear weaponization was likely to take place; made it almost impossible for inspectors to visit undeclared sites; gave Iran long advance time before inspections; and even in a side deal allowed Iran to take its own soil samples.)
Lew again grossly misstated the truth when he told his conference audience that "No administration has done more for Israel's security than this one [the Obama-Biden administration]." Obama in fact promoted Israel's withdrawal to indefensible "Auschwitz borders" (the 1948 armistice lines); enriched Iran; armed Egypt when the Muslim Brotherhood temporarily took control; obscenely compared alleged "Palestinian suffering" to Jewish suffering in the Holocaust; and sent hundreds of millions of US tax dollars to the Palestinian Authority terror regime – which spends the same amount on "pay to slay" rewards to Arab terrorists to murder Jews and Americans.
No wonder the audience loudly and repeatedly booed Jack Lew.
Also, in 2016, Lew also deceptively publicly defended the Obama-orchestrated passage of UN Security Council Resolution 2334 – the most extreme, anti-Israel UNSC resolution ever. Lew misleadingly downplayed the resolution as simply carrying out US administration policy opposing settlements, when the resolution was much worse: In fact, UNSC Resolution 2334 shockingly and falsely labeled the Temple Mount, the Western Wall, Jerusalem's Jewish Quarter, Judea/Samaria, Hebrew University, Hadassah Hospital and the over-3,000-years old Mount of Olives Jewish cemetery as "occupied Arab land"; falsely claimed that the Jewish presence and homes in these historic Jewish lands have "no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation of international law"; and promoted BDS (anti-Israel boycotts, divestment, and sanctions). The US Congress overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan Congressional resolution (H. Res. 11) condemning UNSC 2334.
The recent JTA article cites a previous JTA report that, according to unnamed insiders, Lew privately favored vetoing UNSC Resolution 2334. If those insider reports are correct, that means that Lew knew how bad the resolution was when he misleadingly publicly supported it.
A record of honesty should be the basic requirement for any public servant.
Lew's false public statements about the Iran deal, UNSC Resolution 2334, and the Obama administration's record demonstrate that he cannot be trusted to tell the truth and deal honestly with Israel, the American Jewish community, and the US public. This record should disqualify Lew.
There are even more reasons to disqualify Lew, including the following: Lew's likely involvement, as treasury secretary, in the Obama-Biden administration's transfer of $1.7 billion in cash to Iran's mullahs; Lew's likely involvement, as Obama's treasury secretary and chief of staff, in other deleterious Obama-Biden administration policies, such as transferring hundreds of millions of dollars to the Palestinian Authority terror-fomenting regime; and the potential that the Biden administration is using Lew's Orthodox Jewish identity as "cover" to push for President Biden's long list of anti-Israel policies, including a Saudi deal that forces Israel to make concessions harming Israeli sovereignty and security.
There is also a palpable need for an authentically pro-Israel ambassador now, to repair the damage done by President Biden and his former ambassador, Tom Nides, who repeatedly disrespected, twisted the arms of, undermined, and interfered with Israel and her elected government.
It's useful to look back at the courageous public resignation of Mark Siegel from his position as President Jimmy Carter's deputy assistant for policy analysis and liaison to the American Jewish community in 1978 when Siegel was asked to lie to the Jewish community. Siegel's integrity highlights the stark contrast to Jack Lew's quisling actions in remarkably similar circumstances.
Mark Siegel was a staunch liberal Democrat and a former Democratic National Committee executive director. Siegel's successful ballot challenge to a Carter competitor in New York was largely responsible for Carter's election in 1976. But while serving in the White House, Siegel became increasingly concerned about the Carter administration's biased-against-Israel policies. (Carter's policies were many of the same policies of the Obama-Biden and current Biden administrations.)
In 1978, Carter's State Department gave Siegel the text of a speech to give verbatim to the American Jewish community, to promote Carter's deal to sell F-15s to Israel's enemies. The speech falsely claimed that the F-15s were merely defensive weapons. Siegel later recounted that, when he gave the speech to UJA young leaders in Washington, DC, he was loudly booed, and was told that he was saying lies. Siegel was shaken to be booed by his own people, and investigated. He found that he had indeed been lying for the Carter administration, and then resigned, with a detailed resignation letter. Siegel initially considered requesting another position in the administration but then realized that he could not serve such an administration in any post. It was a tough decision, that made Siegel "persona non grata" for a time in his own party. Yet, Siegel then bravely lobbied against the sale of the F-15s. Later, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin gave Siegel the Yonatan Netanyahu award for courage.
Contrast Siegel's integrity to Jack Lew's disgraceful actions. Lew was loudly booed and heckled for lying at the Jerusalem Post conference in 2015. But unlike Mark Siegel, Jack Lew continued to support the disastrous Iran deal and the administration that spawned it.
And unlike Mark Siegel, Lew failed to resign when Rabbi Prof. Dov Fischer wrote an open letter after UNSC Resolution 2334's passage, imploring Secretary Jack Lew to resign, in solidarity with the Jewish people.
We need a US Ambassador to Israel who has integrity. Lew is the wrong man for the job.
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