Obama Will Seek To Convince Aipac That He Is a True Friend of Israel

Senator Obama of Illinois plans to use a speech Friday to convince skeptical Jewish voters that he is as reliable a supporter of Israel as any of the better-known contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination.

"He recognizes that he is fairly new to the national scene and fairly new to the issues the Jewish community is concerned about," an adviser to Mr. Obama, who asked not to be named, said. "People are curious and wondering where he stands on Israel. … This is an opportunity to just lay it all out."

Mr. Obama is to speak in Chicago at a forum arranged by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. The venue was chosen so that the Illinois senator could be surrounded by Jewish Democrats who have backed him for years and say he is sensitive to the issues facing Israel.

One such supporter, Alan Solow, said he expects Mr. Obama to demonstrate that the first-term senator is as positive toward Israel as other presidential contenders. "I can't tell you if it will be different or the same as others. I certainly don't think it's going to be any weaker than what anybody else is saying," Mr. Solow, an attorney and chairman of the local Jewish Community Relations Council, said.

One area where Mr. Obama may show some individuality is on Iran, an issue that has tripped up several other Democratic hopefuls in recent weeks. "The kinds of communications that he would engage in and the pressure he envisions on Iran may differ in some respect from the other candidates," the adviser to Mr. Obama said.

At an Aipac dinner in Manhattan last month, Senator Clinton encountered some negativity when she mentioned her support for a direct dialogue between America and Iran, a position Mr. Obama shares. In recent days, the Democrats' vice presidential nominee in 2004, John Edwards, got into hot water for talking about the possibility of a nonaggression pact with Iran. In a less-noticed comment, another hopeful, Governor Richardson of New Mexico, told MSNBC that a nonaggression treaty is "an option" for resolving the dispute over Iran's nuclear ambitions.

The chief Washington correspondent for an Israeli newspaper, Ha'aretz, said yesterday that Mr. Obama is making the Chicago speech to assure Jewish donors that he is an acceptable choice. "I don't think his real motive is to win votes. It's, of course, Jewish money. In the Democratic Party, Jewish philanthropy plays a significant role," the journalist, Shmuel Rosner, said.

A panel of Israeli opinion leaders regularly surveyed by Mr. Rosner often gives Mr. Obama lower ratings than other Democrats, a showing the journalist attributed to the Illinois senator's short track record. He said Mr. Obama's team is aware of this skittishness and hopes to extinguish it with Friday's speech. The address is being prepared by the Illinois senator's main foreign policy adviser, Mark Lippert, and a former Senate aide who advises Mr. Obama on the Middle East, Daniel Shapiro.

Mr. Obama's record and past statements on Israel are fairly consistent with those of other prominent Democrats. He has condemned terrorist groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah while also criticizing the Bush administration for not doing enough to promote a peace accord between Israel and Palestinian Arab leaders.

"Israel wants more than anything to live in peace with their neighbors, but Israel also has real and very dangerous enemies," the senator told Ha'aretz recently.

Mr. Obama opposed the Iraq war from the outset and suggests at campaign rallies that he is the most authentic anti-war candidate. While his unabashed anti-war stance may turn off some hawkish Jews, it could burnish his appeal with most Jewish voters. A recent retabulation of Gallup polls taken over the past two years found that 89% of Jewish Democrats called the Iraq war a mistake. Given overall trends in public opinion, the current measure of Jewish opposition to the war could be even higher.

Mrs. Clinton's camp, as has become its custom, tried to upstage Mr. Obama yesterday by announcing the New York senator's sponsorship of a congressional resolution calling for the release of three Israeli soldiers captured by terrorist groups last year.

An aide to Mr. Obama said the senator met with the mother of one of the soldiers earlier this week. The Illinois senator promised to keep the plight of the missing soldiers in the spotlight and plans to follow through by raising the issue during his speech on Friday, the aide said.