Washington Report, October 15, 1984, Page 6

Lobby Activities

For Arabs:

Changes are underway in both organizational leadership and goals at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC).

James Abourezk, Chairman of the Board of ADC, states that at a September 23 meeting of ADC's 14-member executive committee in Chicago a decision was made to search for a successor to Dr. James Zogby, who has been executive director of the organization since its founding four years ago.

Dr. Zogby says the executive committee proposed a compromise arrangement. Under it he would assume other duties. The committee is expected to meet again later this month for further discussions.

For now, according to Mr. Abourezk, there are no plans to change ADC's mandate, although there is going to be a shift in the organization's priorities. He says there is going to be less involvement in "electoral politics" and more attention to increasing ADC's membership, which he said has declined by 50 percent to some 9,000 members.

Meanwhile, the National Association of Arab Americans (NAAA) called a press conference recently to highlight two victories which it says have been won by Arab Americans. Executive Director David Sadd said that the failure by Congress to pass legislation requiring the U.S. embassy to be relocated in Jerusalem resulted, in part, from hard work by numerous Arab Americans and that the outcome unquestionably was "a defeat for the Israeli lobby." He said the outcome demonstrated that it is far harder for the pro-Israel lobby to win on a given issue when that issue is debated publicly for a long period of time, as was the Jerusalem bill.

The second accomplishment for Arab Americans cited by Mr. Sadd was the Mondale campaign's recent appointment of three Arab American Congressmen as vice chairmen to provide informal liaison with the Arab American community. The three Democrats are Rep. Nick J. Rahall of West Virginia, Rep. Mary Rose Oakar of Ohio, and Sen. George Mitchell of Maine. In addition, the Mondale campaign stated in a letter to Mr. Sadd that it welcomed the involvement of Arab Americans as a whole. NAAA and ADC had been working for these measures ever since last summer, when a fundraiser for Mr. Mondale returned the checks of several Arab Americans in Chicago.

For Israel:

Israel's new prime minister was in Washington last week seeking additional U.S. financial assistance. If a recent editorial by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is any indication of how it intends to support this request, then the answer—at least for now—is quietly.

On the day Prime Minister Shimon Peres arrived in Washington AIPAC published a front-page editorial in its weekly newsletter on the visit, but said nothing about Mr. Peres's request for more American aid, or about whether the U.S. ought to provide it. Instead, the editorial in Near East Report described the visit only as an opportunity for Mr. Peres to "discuss his view of Israel's future" with President Reagan, and went on to discuss the Israeli prime minister's "appeal" to King Hussein of Jordan to enter peace talks.

One possible explanation of why AIPAC did not urge U.S. acceptance of Mr. Peres's aid request could lie in Jerusalem, where—according to Thomas Friedman of The New York Times—Israeli officials "seem very sensitive to the political dangers of asking American taxpayers to further subsidize their inflation-bound economy before they have instituted a full range of domestic economic changes and cutbacks." AIPAC officials may share these same concerns, particularly since only this month Congress voted the most generous aid package to Israel on record.

This same issue of Near East Report revealed that AIPAC does not intend to refer to the outcome of the "Jerusalem Bill" as a defeat, despite the fact that Congress failed to adopt a law—or even a weaker resolution—requiring the U.S. embassy to be shifted from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, which is what AIPAC had been fighting for. "Jerusalem Advances" was the headline on a story describing this year's last Congressional action on the issue, during which two House subcommittees approved a "Sense of the Congress" resolution calling for the change, but not requiring it. Last February, when the Jerusalem debate was just beginning, AIPAC said that it was working for passage of the bill because "it is our obligation to change U. S. policy so that it takes account of both reality and fairness."