Last week, Congress overwhelmingly voted to condemn United Nations Resolution 2334 that denounced Israel, as well as the Obama administration’s failure to uphold the longstanding U.S. policy of vetoing U.N. attacks on Israel. Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), who in 2015 stunned the American Jewish community by voting in favor of the Iran nuclear agreement, this time joined with a handful of other Democrats in proposing an amendment to the Senate resolution that would have reinforced the U.N.’s criticism of Israel’s settlement policy. That attempt to appeal to the far-left-wing of the Democratic party was rejected by the bipartisan majority.
{mosads}I have known Cory for 25 years and engineered his introduction to the Jewish community. We met for Shabbat dinner at Oxford and quickly became soul-friends, studying hundreds of hours of Torah together. Our friendship became something that others viewed as remarkable: the Chabad rabbi and the African-American politician. But there was nothing unpredictable about it. What brought us together was a shared belief in acting according to our consciences to fight intolerance, racism, anti-Semitism and genocide.
Cory subsequently became the head of my pro-Israel student organization, the Oxford University L’Chaim Society. To some it was remarkable to see a non-Jewish African-American man choose to ally himself with Jews who supported Israel. But, for me, it was natural for such a principled individual to recognize the moral values that Israel shares with the United States. His conscience was his guide in appreciating Israeli democracy and the people of Israel’s unceasing desire for peace.
Cory demonstrated his love and commitment to Israel both before and after entering politics. I helped him share his passion for Israel with the American Jewish community, which rewarded him by making him the single largest recipient of pro-Israel financial support in the country.
Just before Cory’s vote in favor of the amendment that would have criticized settlements, he had made national news for becoming the first-senator to testify against a Senate colleague. Cory’s testimony against Attorney General-designate Jeff Sessions was roundly criticized by the national media and many of his Senate colleagues as a political maneuver to launch a national election bid. In addition, critics pointed out that Cory had earlier joined Sessions, the Republican senator of Alabama, to award the Congressional Gold Medal to participants in the 1965 Voting Rights March from Selma to Montgomery. “I feel blessed and honored to have partnered with Senator Sessions in being the Senate sponsors of this important award,” Cory had said at the ceremony.
But Cory defended what was seen by his fellow senators as an unpardonable breach of etiquette as a “call to conscience.” He said, “I will always choose conscience and country,” adding, “The arc of the moral universe does not just naturally curve toward justice, we must bend it.”
Indeed.
A call to conscience is exactly why I publicly called on Cory to oppose the catastrophic deal with Iran and now call upon him to reaffirm his earlier support of Israel.
Iran is the world’s leading sponsor of terror and an anti-Semitic, genocidal regime that repeatedly calls for the annihilation of the Jewish state of Israel. While Cory bought President Obama’s false dichotomy between war and John Kerry’s nuclear deal, I joined many others — including approximately 80 percent of the American public — in believing it was possible to negotiate a better deal that would not leave open the possibility for Iran to develop a nuclear bomb while ignoring altogether its development of ballistic missiles, its threats to its Arab neighbors, and its support for Hezbollah and other terrorists.
It was the duty of every member of Congress, from both parties, to tell Obama that giving $150 billion to murderers was deeply immoral and dangerous for the United States and its Middle East allies. I could not see how any person of conscience could stand by and allow this deal to be approved.
I understood it was difficult for Democrats like Cory. This was a test of conscience for all Democratic members of Congress who had to choose between party loyalty and allowing the most genocidal regime on the planet the opportunity to obtain the means to carry out its evil designs. Like my close friend and mentor Elie Wiesel said before criticizing Ronald Reagan’s decision to go to a cemetery that included graves of the SS, it is sometimes necessary to speak truth to power.
I expected my friend Cory to do just that. When he did not, I had no choice but to criticize his decision, just as he felt obligated to criticize a colleague. I did not consider him any less of a friend and repeatedly said his disappointing choice still did not affect our relationship.
However, our personal friendship could not outweigh the need to speak truthfully, as a matter of conscience, about the disastrous deal and the public officials who betrayed their constituencies by supporting it.
In the months since Cory approved the Iran agreement, the Iranians have repeatedly violated its terms, continued to seek hegemony in the region, escalated their sponsorship of terror worldwide, and intensified their butchery in Syria. Still, Cory has remained silent, preferring to stand behind the administration’s feeble attempts to justify paying ransom for Americans taken hostage by Iran and its false claims to have closed off all avenues for the genocidal Iranian regime to obtain nuclear weapons.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) was one of the few Democrats who had the integrity to stand up to his president and tell him he was wrong, despite the risk of losing the chance to become his party’s leader. Some saw Cory as refusing to follow suit for fear of losing the president’s favor and jeopardizing the chance to become his party’s vice presidential nominee. Ultimately, Cory was overlooked by Hilary Clinton for vice president, while Schumer is now the Senate minority leader.
Friends, especially ones as close as Cory and I, must speak honestly to each other.
Stopping Iran from joining in the murder of hundreds of thousands of Arabs in Syria and children in Aleppo will not happen naturally. We must break the evil will of Iran and bend it toward justice.
It is, simply, a matter of conscience.
Shmuley Boteach, “America’s Rabbi,” whom the Washington Post calls “the most famous Rabbi in America,” has just published “The Israel Warrior: Standing Up for the Jewish State from Campus to Street Corner.” Follow him on Twitter @RabbiShmuley.
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