JCRC's 'Stop Iran' receives national attention in D.C.
By Kristin Erekson
The Jewish Advocate
The Jewish Council for Public Affairs has postponed passing the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston's draft resolution addressing the Iranian nuclear threat, stating that more time is needed to review all of the policies.
During part of its annual plenum in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 26, the JCPA—the umbrella body for Jewish community relations councils and national Jewish organizations—approved a series of resolutions on topics ranging from immigration to civil rights issues, according to Martin Raffel, senior associate executive director of the council. However, the organization hesitated on pushing through JCRC's resolution that calls for a national "Stop Iran" campaign, Raffel said, because it was filed late.
The matter has now been passed on to the JCPA's Taskforce for Israel and International Concerns, where it will be considered expeditiously.
"The main point that needs to be underscored here is that we had already been working very hard on the Iran issue [prior to this plenum]," Raffel added. "Trying to prevent Iran from achieving nuclear weapons capability has become the highest priority for the organized Jewish community. [So] that's not the kind of thing we needed to have a resolution about."
Yet Raffel noted that the Boston organization's decree did bring forth a new suggestion regarding divestment from Iran—an issue that the JCPA will look further into.
JCRC Executive Director Nancy K. Kaufman, who attended the plenum, said she was not upset about the decision and, in fact, believed that the group "embraced the whole intent of the resolution." Since the core of the "Stop Iran" campaign wasn't approved by the JCRC's board of directors until two weeks ago, Kaufman added that she understood the consequences of filing the resolution late—especially since the acceptance process began in September.
"There was a consensus in the room that this was extremely important," Kaufman said. "It was really just technicality."
Following Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's comments in October of 2005 to "wipe Israel off the map," and the state-sponsored conference that questioned the Holocaust late last year, the JCRC felt it was time to take action. The organization has now convened a coalition of groups, such as The David Project Center for Jewish Leadership, the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Labor Committee and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which are planning on raising awareness about the Iranian threat through op-eds, conferences and other outreach efforts.
The campaign also calls for the passage of legislation that would require the Commonwealth to pull investments from the state's pension funds of $46 billion from companies that do business with Iran.
"A nuclear Iran threatens every American," said Alan Ronkin, deputy director of the JCRC. "If we unite now we can avert this clear and present danger."
