WASHINGTON — With all that’s going on in Israel and the territories, small wonder why it was the biggest AIPAC conference ever, with attendance at a couple of thousand.
Or the biggest Bay Area delegation ever, for that matter.
The Pacific Northwest region, based in San Francisco, accounted for a whopping 270 participants of last weekend’s American Israel Public Affairs Committee policy conference, up from 135 in 2001.
To kick off the three days of rallying behind the Jewish homeland and its prime minister, Ariel Sharon, Bay Area delegates at the Washington Hilton first rallied behind their homegrown leader, Amy Friedkin.
“This is Amy’s show,” said Zack Bodner, AIPAC’s Northern California director, referring to Saturday’s regional dinner to honor the incoming national president. Friedkin will be the first San Franciscan as well as the first woman to lead AIPAC.
Using that platform, the former president of the Jewish Federation of the Greater East Bay linked the spiraling terror in the Middle East to anti-Semitic incidents in the Bay Area.
“Like Israel, we live in a tough neighborhood,” Friedkin told the banquet attendees, citing two recent attacks at U.C. Berkeley.
The president-elect, who delivered more formal remarks at an official plenary, thanked those who traveled from the West Coast, for being there and for their ongoing efforts to ensure “a safe Israel, now and forever.”
Another San Franciscan, California’s Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, briefed the crowd on her new bill, co-sponsored by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), to introduce sanctions against Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Liberation Organization for terrorism.
Elliot Brandt, AIPAC’s Western States director, acknowledged the overwhelming turnout of first-timers at the oversold conference. “If anyone’s uncomfortable,” he quipped from the podium, “blame the new people.”
Carol Traeger of Tiburon was one of those new people. An AIPAC board member in the Pacific Northwest region, she recruited her daughter, of San Anselmo, to attend for the first time as well. “I’m here this year because of where Israel is now,” said Traeger, who returned from a solidarity trip four weeks ago. “I’m heartsick. Israel was different than I have ever seen it.”
Eli Engelman, a Cupertino resident originally from Tel Aviv, was also a conference freshman. For him, coming to the nation’s capital to lobby was non-negotiable.
“It’s very important for the White House and the Senate to know what we’re facing,” said Engelman, who aligns himself politically with the Labor Party. “I don’t care if you’re Likud, or what you are — peace is whatever you want. It’s how you achieve it…” Engelman trailed off, struggling to complete the thought.
Engelman believed his trek to the East Coast sent a forceful message of a united front, reflected in the title of this year’s conference: “America and Israel Standing Together Against Terrorism.”
Ditto for Rita Jacobson, whose children and grandchildren live in the Jewish state. A seasoned AIPAC member, the San Jose woman and her husband, Jerry, are on their consecutive “sixth or seventh year” and attended the national pro-Israel rally on the Capitol lawn April 15.
“We wouldn’t miss [the conference]. It’s the most important thing we can do as American Jews to support Israel,” she said.
While inside the Monroe Ballroom was buzzing with variations of an AIPAC mantra — “Israel has a right to defend herself” — outside the hotel a couple of hundred protesters, barricaded by police, lined nearby Connecticut Avenue. They called for an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Many more pro-Palestinian supporters joined on Monday, capping a week of left-wing demonstrations and civil disobedience.
Back inside, Palo Altan Eli Pasternak, originally of Holon near Tel Aviv, said AIPAC was the most important ideological group he could support. Although the weekend’s lineup consisted of four ideologically disparate Israeli prime ministers — Ehud Barak, Benjamin Netanyahu, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, and Sharon via satellite — Pasternak was certain they would “have one clear, common message against Palestinian terrorism.”
Even though the United States is Israel’s closest ally and has made counterterrorism a priority since Sept. 11, Pasternak expressed worries about the relationship between the two countries he calls home.
“What Israel is facing now is a signal to the future of the entire free world,” said the Silicon Valley high-tech executive. “The free world cannot protect itself without having to take harsh steps…When you are the first to experience terror, you learn from it.”