American Jewish Committee

The American Jewish Committee (AJC) was "founded in 1906 with the aim of rallying all sections of American Jewry to defend the rights of Jews all over the world. It is one of the oldest Jewish advocacy organizations in the United States and has been described by the New York Times as "the dean of American Jewish organizations.

About

The American Jewish Committee, established in 1906 by a small group of American Jews concerned with pogroms aimed at Russian Jews, determined that the best way to protect Jewish populations in danger would be to work towards a world in which all peoples were accorded respect and dignity.

AJC is an international think tank and advocacy organization whose key areas of focus are: combating anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry; promoting pluralism and shared democratic values; supporting Israel's quest for peace and security; advocating for energy independence; strengthening Jewish life.

The organization has regional offices in 26 American cities, 7 overseas offices, and 31 international partnerships with Jewish communal institutions around the world.

AJC's American offices include the Belfer Center for American Pluralism, the Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights, Contemporary Jewish Life, Domestic Policy and Legal Affairs, Interreligious Affairs, Latin American Affairs, Middle East and International Terrorism, the Office of Government and International Affairs, Project Interchange, and Russian Affairs. AJC publishes the American Jewish Year Book.

Mission

The organization's mission statement is “to safeguard the welfare and security of Jews in the United States, in Israel, and throughout the world; to strengthen the basic principles of pluralism around the world, as the best defense against anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry; to enhance the quality of American Jewish life by helping to ensure Jewish continuity and deepen the ties between American and Israeli Jews.”

History

AJC was established in 1906 by a small group of American Jews concerned about pogroms aimed at the Jewish population of Russia. "According to the official statement of the committee...it is to prevent infringement of the civil and religious rights of Jews and to alleviate the consequences of persecution." AJC has since headed advocacy campaigns on issues such as Holocaust denial, church-state relations, and American dependence on foreign oil.

The organization was dominated for years by banker Jacob H. Schiff, who relied on his wealth, his power, and his single-minded certainty to shape the organization. He was a partner in Kuhn, Loeb and Company and worked closely with corporate lawyer Louis Marshall and with Cyrus Adler, the intellectual who headed the Jewish Theological Seminary. Also involved was Adolph S. Ochs, owner of the New York Times. Business, personal, and family relationships tied these AJC founders to a network of key supporters, including the Warburgs (especially Felix Warburg), the Strauses and the Guggenheims, the Sulzbergers in Philadelphia, and to similar groups in Boston, Chicago, St. Louis, and San Francisco. The founders died out in the 1920s and were replaced by Judge Joseph M. Proskauer, Jacob Blaustein, and Irving M. Engel, who maintained ties with wealthy sponsors. Local chapters were established, which somewhat weakened the control of the central office in New York, but it had become bureaucratized with a permanent staff of well-paid experts. By the 1930s they were supporting social science research into the causes and cures of prejudice. They learned that prejudice was indivisible, and that in the United States it was less desirable to argue in favor of the rights of Jews than to defend the equality of all Americans, including Jews. Alliances were sought with other ethnic and religious groups.

Recent efforts

In December 1987, AJC's Washington representative, David Harris, who would later become the organization's executive director, organized the Freedom Sunday Rally on behalf of Soviet Jewry. 250,000 people attended the D.C. rally, which demanded that the Soviet government allow Jewish emigration from the USSR.

In 1992, Japan, citing AJC's diplomacy, reversed its policy of supporting the Arab League boycott of Israel.

In 1997, the organization became the first American Jewish organization to establish a full-time presence in Germany. It established a Berlin Office / Lawrence and Lee Ramer Institute for German-Jewish Relations, opened in 1998, works to combat anti-Semitism and promote education in democratic values.

In 2000, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Dore Gold, cited the organization as playing a central role in Israel's gaining acceptance into the UN's Western Europe and Others Group.

In 2001, "the American Jewish Committee and the World Jewish Congress reached an agreement, approved by the international board of UN Watch, to transfer full control of the organization [e.g. UN Watch] to AJC. From UN Watch's founding in 1993 until January 2001, UN Watch was a joint responsibility of AJC and the WJC

New Anti-Semitism

In an essay, “Progressive” Jewish Thought and the New Anti-Semitism by Alvin H. Rosenfeld, published on the organization's web site, the AJC criticized Jewish critics of Israel by name, particularly the editors and contributors to "Wrestling With Zion: Progressive Jewish-American Responses to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict" (Grove Press), a 2003 collection of essays edited by Tony Kushner and Alisa Solomon. The essay accused these writers of supporting a rise in anti-Semitism, and of participating in an "onslaught against Zionism and the Jewish State".

In an editorial, the liberal Jewish newspaper The Forward called the essay "a shocking tissue of slander" whose intent was to "turn Jews against liberalism and silence critics". Richard Cohen remarked that the essay "has given license to the most intolerant and narrow-minded of Israel's defenders so that, as the AJC concedes in my case, any veering from orthodoxy is met with censure or, from someone like Reinharz, the most powerful of all post-Holocaust condemnations—anti-Semite—is diluted beyond recognition".

The essay was also criticized by rabbi Michael Lerner and in op-eds in The Guardian and The Boston Globe, where Stanley I. Kutler noted that the AJC itself had opposed the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine until 1946.