During the last phase of the US presidential election, the issue of the influence of the Jewish community in the United States in the elections returned to the spotlight.
Although this community represents only 1.9% of the US population, it wields tremendous influence over US foreign policy, especially in issues related to the Middle East, and its influence is not expected to diminish if Democratic candidate Joe Biden wins the elections.
The Spanish newspaper "Publico" published a report by journalist Eugenio Garcia Gascon highlighting the influence of the Jewish community in the American elections, in which he said that the meeting of Israeli prime ministers with candidates for the American presidential elections in the year before the elections is a long-established tradition. This reflects the size of the Jewish influence in choosing the president of the United States.
However, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's reluctance to meet Democratic candidate Joe Biden ahead of the current elections calls into question the truth about the position of US Jews in the race for the White House between the incumbent President Donald Trump and his rival, Biden.
Netanyahu ignores Biden
The writer pointed out that although Biden and Netanyahu's relationship extends for decades, this did not prevent the Republican candidate from making statements that angered the Israeli prime minister while he was running for Vice President Barack Obama.
Biden stated at the time that he liked Netanyahu, but that he did not agree with the "bloody ideas" the Israeli prime minister was talking about.
When he visited America in mid-September to sign what became known as "Abraham Accords" to normalize relations with Bahrain and the UAE, Netanyahu did not request to meet Biden, nor did he call him by phone, which the Democratic candidate was expecting according to media sources.
The writer pointed out that the lack of comment from the supervisors of Biden's presidential campaign or their denunciation of Netanyahu's bias towards Trump, their silence, and avoiding a clash with the Israeli prime minister instead are all surprising.
The report quoted the Israeli newspaper "The Jerusalem Post" as saying that Netanyahu's reluctance to meet Biden shows that "Israel has, in recent years, become a partisan issue" in American politics.
The writer believes that the Israeli prime minister's alignment with Trump and the Republican Party at the present time could change completely if Biden wins the presidential race, and Netanyahu will immediately switch to aligning with the Democratic Party.
Whom will the voices of the Jews go?
The report indicated that the majority of American Jewish votes go in favor of Democratic candidates, given the consensus on most domestic issues such as abortion, the right to bear arms, health, and gay rights.
According to the author, this trend is expected to continue in the current elections, despite Trump's identification with Netanyahu's demands, and despite the criticisms that Biden sometimes directs against Israel, including his rejection of the decision to annex Palestinian lands in the West Bank unilaterally, as he considered that a decision. This undermines the two-state solution.
The report indicated that a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center showed 71% of American Jews voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 elections, compared to only 24% for Donald Trump, as another poll conducted by a Jewish institute in September showed Last September, 67% of American Jews intend to vote for Biden, compared to 30% intend to vote for Trump, according to the author.