who challenged the ADL, J Street finds itself
playing David to AIPAC's Goliath. The new
group projected its annual budget at $1.5
million, compared to the roughly $50 mil-
lion AIPAC spends, and its staff totals just
four people. Still, organizers promised that
J Street would play as tough as the big boys,
animated by the belief that the majority
of U.S. lawmakers support more intensive
American involvement in the peace pro-
cess and want to see more done to support
Palestinian moderates but are afraid of the
political consequences of speaking out.
Meanwhile, in New York, a grass-roots
campaign from the other end of the politi-
cal spectrum targeted a Barnard College
anthropologist, Nadia Abu El-Haj, who was
up for tenure. The campaign, led by a group
of mostly Jewish Barnard alums, charged
that Abu El-Haj was guilty of shoddy schol-
arship and harbored deep animosity toward
the Jewish state. Her defenders countered
that her views are consistent with those of
many leading Israeli archaeologists and were
twisted by her right-wing critics.
Barnard announced in early November
that Abu El-Haj was granted tenure.
Early in 2008, Obama found himself
fending off a grass-roots campaign of a dif-
ferent sort when e-mails began to circulate
claiming that the Democratic presidential
contender is a Muslim, had attended a
madrassah as a child in Indonesia and had
been sworn into office on a Koran.
All three claims are false, as the media
and a host of Jewish defenders were quick
to point out. Obama's father was a non-
practicing Muslim and the Illinois senator
embraced Christianity at Chicago's Trinity
United Church of Christ, an association that
would soon reveal a different set of liabilities.
In January, leaders of several of the largest
American Jewish organizations — among
them the United Jewish Communities, the
American Jewish Committee, the Jewish
Council on Public Affairs, and the Reform
and Orthodox congregational arms — took
the unusual step of signing a letter refut-
ing the rumors about Obama. Seven Jewish
senators later signed a letter echoing the
same theme.
"These tactics attempt to drive a wedge
between our community and a presidential
candidate based on despicable and false
attacks and innuendo based on religion:' the
organizational leaders' statement said. "We
reject these efforts to manipulate members
of our community into supporting or oppos-
ing candidates!'
Still the charges, which continued to cir-
culate widely during the primaries, raised
doubts about Obama among some Jewish
voters. One former Orthodox Jewish official,
writing on his personal blog, speculated that
Obama might be the Muslim version of a
pintele Yid — a Yiddish expression describ-
ing someone who isn't Jewishly identified

Aaron Rubashkin, outside his Brooklyn butcher

shop on June 3, said his Agriprocessors firm
"don't do no injustice to nobody, not to a cat."

but retains some unconscious attachment to
his roots.
Eventually the lines of attack against
Obama moved to more conventional ground,
with Jewish critics focusing — whether fair-
ly or accurately was a matter of debate — on
his associates, positions and experience. But
as recently as May, the New York Times was
reporting that Jewish voters in the key swing,
state of Florida were still under false impres-
sions about Obama — that he's Muslim, a
member of Chicago's Palestinian community
and was endorsed by Al Qaida.
In primaries in several of the states with
the largest Jewish populations, Obama lost
out to his main Democratic opponent, U.S
Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y. On Clinton's
home turf; New York and New Jersey, and in
Pennsylvania, Obama lost the Jewish vote
by sizable margins. But he handily won
among Jews in Connecticut, 61 percent to
38 percent, and narrowly in California and
Massachusetts despite losing those two
states overall.
Several polls show Obama stalled at 60
percent of the Jewish vote in his general-
election fight against his Republican foe, U.S.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. — a significant
drop from the 75 to 80 percent enjoyed by
recent Democratic standard-bearers — sug-
gesting that the successive waves of grass-
roots attacks against him may still be taking
a toll.
For their part, the establishment organiza-
tions say they are the victims of smear cam-
paigns as well — the ADL by the Armenian
activists, AIPAC by its liberal critics and
Hagee by those who portray him as a sexist
and a homophobe.
That sort of back and forth — with both
sides charging they are being unfairly tarred
by their adversaries — also was characteristic
of perhaps the biggest Jewish news story
of the year: the controversy surrounding

President George Bush, center, walks with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud
Olmert, left, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Nov. 27 at the
U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.

Agriprocessors, the largest kosher meat pro-
ducer in the United States.
In May, federal authorities conducted the
largest immigration raid in U.S. history to
that point at the company's packing plant in
Postville, Iowa, netting 389 illegal workers
and prompting a flood of allegations against
the company from former employees. A
grand jury investigation is ongoing and the
Iowa attorney general is separately consider-
ing criminal charges in 57 cases of alleged
child labor. No senior management has yet
been charged.
The company's owner, Brooklyn butcher
Aaron Rubashkin, has denied wrongdo-
ing while his defenders allege a witch
hunt orchestrated by the United Food and
Commercial Workers Union and abetted
by liberal Jews and the media. The critics,
meanwhile, say the company has a storied
history of running afoul of government
regulations and is out to maximize profits on
the backs of immigrant laborers.
Both sides accuse the other of failing
to live up to the high-minded ideals they
espouse.
As the recriminations flew, the episode
provided a boost to the Conservative move-
ment's upstart food certification, Hekhsher
Tzedek, which aims to label kosher food that
has been produced in an ethical and envi-
ronmentally responsible manner.
The brainchild of a Conservative rabbi in
Minnesota, Morris Allen, Hekhsher Tzedek
released its guidelines in late July and repre-
sents the first attempt by non-Orthodox Jews
to influence the exploding kosher food mar-
ket. And while Allen insists his certification
is meant to coexist with existing certifica-
tions, established kosher agencies are casting
a wary eye on his efforts.
"What does somehow trouble me a little
is the fact that they are devoting all their
efforts to kosher food companies:' said Rabbi

Avrom Pollak, the president of Star-K, a
kosher certifier that works with more than
1,500 manufacturers. "I think it should be
a much broader effort. All the services that
we use and buy should also be subject to the
same scrutiny!'
As the outcry over Agriprocessors' conduct
grew, a coalition of 25 Orthodox rabbis trav-
eled to Postville to conduct their own inspec-
tion. They issued the company a clean bill
of health, but critics were quick to point out
that their trip was paid for by Agriprocessors
and they did not meet with the former work-
ers who were alleging mistreatment. The
rabbis spent three hours in the plant.
Though the Orthodox community
largely rallied to the company's defense, an
Orthodox social justice group, Uri L'tzedek,
broke ranks and called for a boycott of
Agriprocessors products. The boycott was
quickly called off — too quickly, some said
— after the company hired a compliance
officer and took other measures to ensure its
workers were treated fairly.
Though dismissed by right-wing
Orthodox figures as a fringe group with a
tiny following, Uri L'tzedek was thrust into
the public eye by the controversy, raising
its profile in a way that will likely boost its
potency down the road. Some critics charged
it had seized on the Postville situation for
precisely that reason.
Though most upstart-establishment battles
split the community along religious, political
or generational lines, one fight that tran-
scended all three was the one over a bill in the
U.S. House of Representatives that would give
Holocaust survivors the right to sue European
insurance companies over World War Thera
policies.
The Holocaust Insurance Accountability Act
is still making its way through congressional
committees.
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