Wednesday, August 27, 2003
JWR: Jews must reward Bush for stance on Israel By Edward I. Koch 
Israel's security should be a very high priority for American Jews. When Jews were persecuted and murdered in Nazi-occupied Europe, almost no one was willing to help them or give them refuge. During the Holocaust, from 1941 to 1945, six million Jews were murdered. The citizens of almost every country occupied by the Nazis, particularly France, collaborated with Hitler and turned their Jewish fellow citizens over to the Germans for extermination in the gas chambers...
...Before Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was decapitated by his Muslim abductors who videotaped the atrocity, he was compelled to say with his last breath, "My mother is a Jew. My father is a Jew. I am a Jew." Every Jew should embrace his or her identity with pride and vote their conscience. I remain a Democrat, but have supported candidates from other parties when my conscience so dictated. So let me now proclaim, "My mother of revered memory was a Jew. My father of revered memory was a Jew. I am a Jew."
Impression: Koch has got it right here. In spite of the fact that some think Bush hasn't been forceful enough, even hypocrtical, concerning Israel, there simply is no one else in view who will possibly do as well as he has with the situation - not to mention the overall War on Terror - where no Democrat candidate has shown themselves to have anywhere near his moral foritude.
The monolithic support by Jews of the Democratic Party has not served our interests well. We should be making the parties compete for our vote, not take it for granted. It was mostly the Democratic members of the committee tasked with approving Daniel Pipes that blocked him, not the Republicans. If Jews are concerned about some of the "right wing" elements of the Republican Party, then they will need to provide some of the vote base to replace the people on that end of things who may leave Bush if he doesn't go the way they want him to. George Bush is a Christian friend of the Jews who is moraly clear on terror. We should be supporting him.
It's time to re-examine long-held positions.
Interesting use of the word "we". I believe this is your first time stepping up and taking on the collective mantle.
Hmmmm...I'll have to take that up with the Solomonia editorial board...