Jewish mainstream rushing to embrace Hagee and his controversial brand of pro-Israel activism.
James D. Besser/Washington - Washington Correspondent The Jewish Week May 3, 2007
Rabbi Jack Moline is a Jewish centrist in almost every respect. He is leader in the Conservative movement, a crusader against intermarriage and a fierce opponent of the religious right's growing influence on American life.
And the Washington-area rabbi is on the board of the Interfaith Alliance, a relatively new group that has taken the lead in holding the line on church-state questions.
So it caused more than a little astonishment in some circles when Rabbi Moline's name appeared on invitations to an upcoming "Night to Honor Israel" sponsored by a local Christian Zionist group under the auspices of Christians United for Israel (CUFI), the Evangelical group created by the fiery, controversial Pastor John Hagee.
Rabbi Moline says his views about the domestic dangers posed by the religious right have not changed, but conditions have. "We're no longer in a position of being too selective in choosing our friends," he said, citing the threat posed by Iran and Israel's growing isolation.
Rabbi Moline's participation marks the growing - if uneasy - acceptance of Rev. Hagee's brand of pro-Israel activism across the Jewish community. Mainstream Jewish leaders are rushing to embrace him, despite continuing concerns about his apocalyptic views about Israel's future, his open advocacy of war with Iran and his harsh domestic views, and critics are being pressured into silence.
One reason may have to do with dollars and cents - money raised through the "Nights to Honor Israel" and other Christian Zionist events could be a boon for Jewish organizations in this country and charities in Israel.
"There is a potential for a lot of money," said Dr. James Hutchens, the coordinator of a May 20 event in the Washington, D.C., area. "At our event we'll be raising money for the Shiloh-Israel Children's Fund."
Hutchens, who heads a group called The Jerusalem Connection and serves as a CUFI regional director, said that last year alone, Hagee raised "over $7 million" for Jewish charities in Israel and for Jewish groups in this country, including "$1 million for the Jewish Federation in Houston."
Hutchens said that the fundraising effort is accelerating and could provide badly needed money for other groups. Critics say most of the money funneled to Israeli projects by Christian Zionist groups goes to charities in the West Bank and the Golan Heights - reflecting their widely held religious view that Israel should not give up lands they say were deeded permanently to the Jewish people by God.
Jewish leaders who have been critical of Jewish participation in local "Nights to Honor Israel" say they have been pressured into silence.
"The pressure has been enormous," said a prominent Jewish leader who said he was contacted by local community officials after he raised questions about a local CUFI event. "I can't even talk about it now; I feel a real sense of intimidation because people in our own community are saying I'm opposing something that's good for Israel, that I'm hurting Israel."
The issue has also generated some heat on Capitol Hill. A Minnesota lawmaker who was invited to a "Night to Honor Israel" in Minneapolis sent a blistering letter to local organizers declining the invitation.
"Well-publicized public statements by Pastor Hagee demonstrate extremism, bigotry and intolerance that is repugnant," said Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), who last year clashed with the pro-Israel lobby over what she claimed was an effort to bully her into supporting a particular version of the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act.
In her letter, McCollum cited statements by the Texas mega-church leader suggesting that Hurricane Katrina was divine punishment because "New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God," and that "those who live by the Koran have a scriptural mandate to kill Christians and Jews."
She also cited his call for a "preemptive strike to take out the nuclear capability of Iran for the salvation of Western civilization," and said Hagee's views are "clearly inconsistent with our Minnesota values and I believe with the values of the people of Israel."
James Hutchens, the regional CUFI leader, agreed that the group brings a distinct political perspective to its support for Israel.
"The stated purpose of CUFI is to support Israel in matters related to our understanding of the Bible," he said. "The implications of that include the fact that we do not support a two-state solution; we do not support 'land for peace.' We believe the covenant God made with Israel is permanent. And that there is an ultimate redemption the Jewish people will have."
Hutchens acknowledged that many Jews suspect "we are trying to promote Armageddon," but cited the involvement of prominent local leaders as proof that the mainstream community is coming around.
Among those he cited: Rabbi Moline, the Alexandria, Va., rabbi and leader in the fight against the religious right's domestic influence.
Rabbi Moline said Israel's growing international isolation and the looming threat of Iran call for extraordinary alliances, including with Christian Zionists like Hagee.
"I don't like his politics or his theology," he said this week. "But we live in a time when friends of Israel are few and far between. We have to recognize that we are receiving support from the Evangelical community that we are not receiving from our traditional friends."
That includes "mainline" Protestant groups that continue to be fierce critics of Israeli policy and some of which are increasingly supportive of radical Palestinian causes.
Moline said he will appear on the dais at the upcoming "Night to Honor Israel" in a Washington suburb. "I'll be happy to talk about the theological context after we achieve a safe and secure Israel," he said.
Mainstream Jewish groups that have fought the religious right on the domestic front are increasingly willing to embrace Hagee and his "Honor Israel" events, which have been held for 25 years but only recently have started to gain acceptance with mainstream community leaders.
"We are hearing much more concern about these events, but a lot of the concern is misplaced," said Ethan Felson, assistant executive director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA). "Hagee has a long track record with the Houston community. We need to be careful not to have a knee-jerk reaction."
Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League and a leading critic of the religious right, has declined to criticize Rev. Hagee's growing acceptance in the pro-Israel mainstream.
Leaders of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington say they welcome Hagee's event this month; recent events in Minneapolis and Madison, Wisc. were mostly welcomed by local Jewish leaders, although a Wisconsin rabbi delivered a sermon warning that Rev. Hagee's advocacy of war with Iran and opposition to Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts would ultimately hurt Israel.
"Those who call themselves Christian Zionists in this era do not simply pray for the return of the Christian Messiah," said Rabbi Jonathan Biatch in a widely reprinted sermon. "They have lobbied our government to actualize and hasten Armageddon, that prophesied battle that will presage the coming of the Messiah. And they do it through their agitating for war with Iran."
Rev. Hagee's speech at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) policy conference in March, widely covered in the press, "gave Hagee and his group a legitimacy that maybe they didn't have before in our community," said Rabbi James Rudin, a longtime specialist in interfaith relations for the American Jewish Committee.
Rudin said Jewish leaders increasingly are willing to disregard the apocalyptic views of Christian Zionists like Hagee even when those views are expressed through political advocacy because "they are so focused on the tactical support he offers. There is a real disconnect; Jewish leaders mostly aren't aware of his apocalyptic claims."
But more than that: most Jewish leaders don't seem to want to know. An informal survey of more than a dozen national and local Jewish leaders who have expressed opinions on the CUFI events revealed that not a single one had read one of Hagee's books-including his most recent, Jerusalem Countdown, in which he describes how Bible prophecy predicts a coming war with Iran.
Gershom Gorenberg, an Israeli journalist whose book "The End of Days" documents the growing relationship between American Jews and pro-Israel evangelicals, said that the fear factor is leading Jews here to make destructive alliances with Christian leaders who seek new wars in the Middle East and the ultimate destruction of the Jewish religion.
"One could argue that people feel that you don't ask questions when people throw you a rope when you're drowning," he said. "But that's a misreading of Israel's situation. We're not drowning; we're not in that desperate a situation."
Rabbi Haim Dov Beliak, founder of a Web site - JewsOnFirst - that battles the religious right on church-state matters, said Jewish leaders are making a mistake if they believe the claim by Christian Zionists that they are acting only out of love for the Jews.
"I am deliberately putting this in very harsh language," he said this week. "Many Christian Zionists share with the Nazis the paranoid idea that Jews and Judaism are the central actors in the world. And both seek the ultimate dismantling of Judaism and the Jewish faith-the Nazis through murder, the Christian Zionists through our 'redemption.' Why would we cooperate in our own undoing? Why would we work with people who want us to disappear as a people?"
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