Ex-Mayor ‘Emotional Winner' at Jewish Forum

WASHINGTON — Relying heavily on his confrontational style in New York, Mayor Giuliani is courting Republican Jews by pledging a strong hand against Iran and a skeptical attitude toward future negotiations between Israelis and Palestinian Arabs.

In a well-received 30-minute speech before a Jewish audience here, the GOP presidential contender drew stark lines in articulating his policy toward regimes hostile to America and Israel.

While he held out hope for productive talks between Jews and Arabs in the Middle East, he said they should occur only with steep conditions.

"You cannot negotiate with someone who is threatening to destroy you and your family," he said, drawing applause from members of the Republican Jewish Coalition at its candidate forum yesterday. Negotiations should only occur, he said, once Palestinian Arabs "forsake terrorism" and "say and acknowledge and mean it that Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state."

Mr. Giuliani was similarly unequivocal when it came to Iran, saying a president "can't hesitate" to use military power if it is in the country's best interests. "We've seen what Iran will do with ordinary weapons," he said. "If I'm president of the United States, I guarantee you we will never find out what they will do if they get nuclear weapons, because they're not going to get nuclear weapons."

That message was particularly effective yesterday. While three other leading Republican hopefuls espoused largely the same sentiments, Mr. Giuliani clearly enjoyed an edge with the coalition, which greeted his speech with more frequent and enthusiastic applause than it gave his opponents.

His address included a mix of stern policy declarations, off-the-cuff jibes at Democrats, and tales of his time in New York, including his ejection of Yasser Arafat from a Lincoln Center concert organized by the United Nations in 1995, and his decision to return a $10 million check from a Saudi prince who suggested America and Israel shared responsibility for the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001.

"His speech was just full of kosher red meat, and the crowd really ate it up," a former White House press secretary under President Bush who sits on RJC's board of directors, Ari Fleischer, said. He said he is personally neutral in the primary race, but he called Mr. Giuliani "the emotional winner" of the forum.

"Nobody has the history that Rudy has with the Jewish community," Mr. Fleischer said.

There are few if any substantive policy differences related to Iran or Israel between the leading GOP candidates, and the rhetorical fight over party loyalty that has erupted in recent days was mostly absent from yesterday's event.

The notable exception was Mr. Giuliani, who seemed to allude to the dispute at the outset of his remarks and offered an implicit defense of his party identification following criticism Monday by Fred Thompson over his endorsement of Governor Cuomo instead of George Pataki in 1994. "When they want to know, are you a real Republican, I gave my blood for the Republican Party in New York," Mr. Giuliani said.

He later took a shot at Mitt Romney with a dismissive reference to the former Massachusetts governor's statement at a GOP debate last week that he would "call the lawyers" to determine if he would need congressional approval as president to order a military strike against Iran.

Recounting his decision to throw Arafat out of the United Nations, Mr. Giuliani said, "I didn't call for a team of lawyers to tell me, ‘Well, on the one hand, you can throw him out, but on the other hand, you can't, and maybe you can partially throw him out. Maybe we could have him sit, like, further up." The audience laughed.

He added: "I just made a decision. See, I lead. That's what a leader is about. A leader has the confidence to make a decision."

With little daylight on policy between them, each candidate sought to portray himself as the man least likely to waver in the face of foreign threats to America and its closest ally.

Mr. Romney did so with a harsh denunciation of Democrats, many of whom he said were "in the most serious, delusional, and political-driven denial since Neville Chamberlain."

He suggested the party's presidential hopefuls were waffling on how to deal with Iran. "It is time for Democrats to break their silence: Will you act to stop a nuclear Iran? Let me assure you of one thing: I will," he said to applause. The former Massachusetts governor said America must make clear that "not only is the military option on the table, it is in our hand."

Mr. Romney and Senator McCain of Arizona were each critical of the United Nations, with Mr. Romney saying the organization had "failed." Yet both opposed calls for America to withdraw from the world body or let its headquarters be moved elsewhere.

Mr. Romney also cited his push for divestment from Iran and his call for America to cut off funding for the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Mr. Thompson delivered a more subdued speech, focusing on broader themes of confronting terrorism and Iran, and standing by Israel. On Iran, he said that in addition to "pursuing sanctions and other traditional means, we need to take other steps to reach out to the Iranian people and help them get rid of their hated regime."