Then too, AIPAC is concerned at the prospect of its members abandoning it for J-Street.
To date, both the Israeli government and AIPAC have denied the existence of a partisan divide.
For instance, an AIPAC lobbyist demanded that Gohmert abandon his efforts to advance his resolution on Iran.
AIPAC's ace in the hole is the idea that it represents Jewish interests in a country that is generally philo-Semitic.
AIPAC, they loathed the Oslo peace accords, and they provide much of the Republican Party's intellectual input, particularly on foreign policy.
Modeled deliberately on the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the main pro-Israel lobbying group, the CANF changed American policy toward Cuba.
The Anti-Defamation League, AIPAC, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs and other prominent American Jewish groups did not oppose the weapons transfer.
Sources close to the story say the AIPAC lobbyist told Gohmert that AIPAC opposes all Iran initiatives that go beyond support for sanctions.
But again in the interest of promoting the fiction of bipartisan support for Israel, AIPAC can be expected to pretend this has not happened.
Rather than focus his efforts on rallying the likes of AIPAC, Netanyahu would be better served to bring his message directly to the American people.
As for Emanuel's timing, it's directly tied to the AIPAC conference.
In the first instance, this means that if Netanyahu comes to Washington next week for the AIPAC conference, no senior administration official will meet with him.
To this end, Netanyahu must go to Washington next week and speak at the annual AIPAC conference as planned despite the administration's threat to boycott him.
To contend with this situation, the Netanyahu government would do well to hew very closely to the line that Netanyahu set out in his address to AIPAC.
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But what the AIPAC scandal shows is that it may be advantageous that Netanyahu's first visit to Washington as premier not be conducted as part of the AIPAC conference.
Just in time for the annual AIPAC conference, the US Justice Department announced last week it is dismissing its charges against former AIPAC staffers Keith Weissman and Steve Rosen.
As Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel made clear in his closed-door briefing to senior AIPAC officials this week, the administration is holding Israel indirectly responsible for Iran's nuclear program.
During a later stop at the Senate to vote on the budget, the Illinois senator confirmed reports that he and Clinton had run into each other backstage at the AIPAC conference.
By staking out a position to the left of AIPAC - and in line with the White House's policies - J Street claims it serves as the true voice of American Jewry.
It also identified the Jewish Americans who wrote against Freeman's appointment, and insinuated that AIPAC - which took no stand on his appointment - actually worked behind the scenes to undermine it.
CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Intelligence and the anti-Israel lobby
According to Congressional sources, AIPAC's desire to hide the partisan divide has caused it to preemptively water down Republican initiatives to gain Democratic support or torpedo Republican proposals that the Democrats would oppose.
It was therefore a little startling to see Mr Netanyahu, speaking to AIPAC a day later and only hours after visiting the White House, pay almost no heed to what his American patron said.
Representatives like Shelley Berkley, Nita Lowey, Steve Israel, Anthony Weiner, Jim Costa and many others have not taken stronger stands in support Israel because thanks to AIPAC, they haven't been challenged to do so.
First, AIPAC's cowardly decision to abandon Weissman and Rosen and the willingness of the overwhelming majority of the organized Jewish community to mutely endorse the move exposes an unpleasant truth about the nature of the American Jewish community.
Owing no doubt to the fact that most American Jews self-identify as liberals, J Street condemns organizations like AIPAC and the ADL as right-wing or conservative or hawkish to try to make American Jews feel uncomfortable supporting them.
Many in Jerusalem expressed their disappointment that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu decided not to travel to Washington this week to participate in the AIPAC conference but rather delayed his visit to the US for two weeks to better prepare for his meeting with Obama.
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