American Jewish groups held an “emergency leadership mission” to lobby Congress for additional security on Wednesday in the wake of a spree of violent attacks on Jews.
Eric Fingerhut, president and CEO of the Jewish Federations of North America, told JNS that congressional action is necessary to protect Jewish communities after incidents like the firebombing of Jewish ralliers in Boulder, Colo., and the assassination of two Israeli embassy staffers outside the Capital Jewish Museum in May.
“We need members of Congress to understand that these threats and the extreme costs of security are in their community. It’s in every community,” Fingerhut said. “It’s not just in Washington, D.C., where there was an attack. It’s not just in Boulder, Colo.”
“We need the help of the government to take the lead on their responsibility to protect people in their houses of worship and in their places of gathering,” he said. “That’s what we want members of Congress to know.”
Some 400 members of the Federation and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations held 200 meetings with members of Congress over two days to advocate for Israel and support federal efforts like the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which was briefly frozen in March.
Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) assured the Jewish groups that the funding designed to provide physical security grants to synagogues and day schools would go through after receiving confirmation from the director of the Office of Management and Budget.
“I’ve spoken as recently as today to Russ Vought,” Lankford said. “That funding is not at risk. It is going to be let go, and it should be let go very, very quickly.”
‘This shouldn’t be as difficult as it is’
On Tuesday, the House Appropriations Committee voted to increase funding for the grant program by $30 million to $335 million.
That was far less than the $1 billion in funding that Jewish groups, including the Federation, the Anti-Defamation League, the Orthodox Union and others requested after the D.C. shootings.
Lankford said that Congress should adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism after legislation to do so was spiked with poison pill amendments in the Senate in May.
“As I jokingly say to my colleagues, British football teams have already settled this,” he said. “We’re behind British football teams. That’s a bad spot for us to be.”
“We need to be able to resolve this, and this shouldn’t be as difficult as it is,” he added.
While the “emergency mission” was organized before the start of the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, Jewish leaders also connected Israel’s security to the security of American Jews.
William Daroff, CEO of the Conference of Presidents, told JNS that the Trump administration’s decision to strike Iranian nuclear facilities with bunker buster munitions would have a “positive, multigenerational effect” for the security of Israel and Jewish communities around the world.
“Obviously, Jewish security internationally is important, and Iran has been a major force in promoting hatred of Jews and killing Jews,” Daroff said. “We look back at the last two generations, just about every act of international terrorism directed at Jews has Iranian fingerprints.”
Republican and Democratic lawmakers also voiced continuing support for Israel and American Jews.
“Israel’s our best friend. Period. End of story. Bar none,” said Rep. Randy Weber (R-Texas). “People want to have a two-state solution? No thanks.”
Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) told attendees that she is “a Democratic lawmaker and a proud Zionist.”
“I see security outside of a shul on a Saturday. It sends a chill up your spine. Why is there security?” she said. “Well, there must be security. What happened in Boulder, Colo., could have happened in Michigan, and it was an attack on all of us.”
Daroff said that another objective of the mission was to present members of Congress with the unified message of the American Jewish community amid dissent from groups like Jewish Voice for Peace and other anti-Israel activists.
“One thing that they hear from their local Jewish communities and when they read the newspapers is about divisiveness within our community, with JVP or others, saying, ‘This is really what the Jews believe,’” he said.
“The truth is that the vast, vast majority of the Jewish people stand with us and stand with Israel on these very important issues.”
Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter, also emphasized the connection between Judaism and the Jewish state.
“Don’t tell me what Judaism is,” Leiter said. “You can’t disembowel Judaism from Zionism.”
