Oh Jerusalem: If I forget thee, it’s not election time

In a controversial scene at the Democratic National Convention, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa made a questionable call on his third try for a two-thirds approval to amend the Democratic party platform to add a recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. The following capsule summaries of (and Web links to) commentaries by J Street’s Jeremy Ben-Ami and Israeli journalist Gershom Gorenberg are taken from J Street’s daily News Roundup email:

LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa

At the Democratic National Convention, J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami imagines what Bill Clinton would have said, writing “of course, Jerusalem will be the capital of the state of Israel,” and “Palestinians too [will have] a capital in their neighborhoods of Jerusalem…It’s time for everyone to stop pouring fuel on the fires of the Middle East while trying to score political points. And it’s time to start putting pursuit of American interests and the interests of Israel and the people of the region ahead of narrow partisan gain.”

Gershom Gorenberg asks “how many Americans will vote based on what the Democratic platform says about the Jerusalem? You can count them on your thumbs…Most American Jews will vote for Obama. If they are worried about Israel, they will notice that Obama has upped funding for Israeli missile defense, vetoed U.N. resolutions criticizing Israel, and kept Benjamin Netanyahu from launching a disastrous attack on Iran. The minority of Jews who support Romney don’t care if the Democrats put the entire Israeli national anthem in their platform, in Hebrew.”