The American Jewish Committee hosted a pre-Passover seder for U.S. government officials and diplomats from dozens of countries on Wednesday.
Ted Deutch, CEO of the AJC, told JNS that the willingness of so many countries to stand by the Jewish community is a sign of strength amid the war in Iran and the growing threat to Jews around the world.
“For us to gather together with with diplomats from more than 75 countries, who chose to spend the night with the Jewish community, who chose to come have a Passover seder and recall with us the importance of our march to liberation, at a time when Israel is under siege, this is a very, very powerful night,” Deutch said.
Events in Iran were a primary focus of the evening. Keynote speaker Roya Hakakian, a Jewish Iranian-American political commentator, said that she feared that the Trump administration had entered into the conflict with a lack of clarity about its objectives.
“I hope the objective is to eradicate the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a force on the ground inside the country,” Hakakian said. “Anything short of that, anything that allows the corps to remain in any capacity, will only buy them time to renew themselves and return.”
After decades of repression, Iranians no longer believe that the United States and Israel are the cause of Iran’s problem, according to Hakakian.
“We’ve come a long way from 1979 to see through their lies for a very long time,” she said, of the Islamic Republic. “Iranians don’t buy them.”Diplomats who attended the seder included representatives from countries that Iran has attacked in recent weeks, like Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, and officials from Spain, one of the countries that has been most vocal in opposing the U.S.-Israeli campaign.
Deutch told JNS that the warnings from people like Hakakian should alert the world to the threat that Iran poses.
The conversation with Hakakian “helped to clarify for anyone who was listening what’s at stake for the Iranian people, what they’ve endured since 1979, why this regime has posed such a threat to their own people, to Israel and the region and to the world,” he said.
