Staff Writer

It's getting to be as regular a tradition as apples and honey on Rosh Hashanah ‹ Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) making comments that upset and offend the local Jewish community.

Although it had been a while since his controversial 2003 comments on the Jews and the Iraq war, he returned to that subject in a May interview, just published this month in Tikkun magazine, and once again angered constituents and local Jewish leaders.

Moran stated in the interview with Tikkun editor Rabbi Michael Lerner, who this week defended him, that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee "has pushed this [Iraq] war from the beginning."

While "I don't think they represent the mainstream of American Jewish thinking at all but because ... their members are extraordinarily powerful ‹ most of them are quite wealthy ‹ they have been able to exert power," Moran said.

He also said that AIPAC supports "domination: not healing. They feel that you acquire security through military force, through intimidation, even through occupation, when necessary, and that if you have people who are hostile toward you, it's OK to kill them, rather than talk to them, negotiate with them."

Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington executive director Ron Halber said he was not surprised by the comments, and criticized Moran's attempt to "drive a wedge" between AIPAC and the Jewish community.

Agudas Achim Congregation Rabbi Jack Moline of Alexandria said Moran's comments "rate a 10" on the scale of "egregious" remarks the representative has made over the years, citing his history of trafficking in statements about rich Jews who control the government.

Moran's remarks at a 2003 anti-war forum in Reston, where he said that "if it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq, we would not be doing this," and that the Jewish community was "influential enough" to "change the direction of where this is going" garnered national attention, leading Moline and five other Northern Virginia rabbis to call for his resignation, but Moran has made numerous statements over the years that have drawn ire from Jewish leaders.

Moran has often apologized, and in a statement released by his office Tuesday morning communications director Austin Durrer said that Moran "understands that the tone of some of his comments ... may have been unnecessarily harsh."

The lobbying group, the statement said, "is not the Jewish people, but an organization aligned with the Bush Administration and some in the Christian fundamentalist world that he critiqued."

Moran recognizes, Durrer said, "the progressive nature of the Jewish community as a whole, and notes that if the rest of America voted the way Jews vote, the U.S. would not be in the war in Iraq today, would have health care for all, and would not be involved in discriminatory treatment of gays or of immigrants."

An AIPAC spokesperson declined comment on the remarks, but many others were not mollified by his clarification.

National Jewish Democratic Council executive director Ira Forman said Moran's statement this week didn't address the real problem with his original remarks ‹ his allegation that AIPAC was "pushing" for the Iraq war.

"It's just wrong and should be challenged," said Forman, who pointed out that he had spoken with staffers working for some Jewish members of Congress who voted against the Iraq War resolution, and they have told him AIPAC never lobbied them on the war. The NJDC was the first to put out a statement condemning Moran's remarks last Friday.

Describing himself as "one of those Jewish voters" to whom Moran refers in his statement "who would cure the ills of the world if we had the influence he accuses AIPAC of having," AIPAC member Moline replied, "I am AIPAC."

The rabbi challenged Moran to identify to whom exactly he is referring when he talks about AIPAC supporting killing.

Another longtime constituent and Moran critic, Jerome Chapman of Alexandria, also said Moran's characterization of AIPAC as reflecting only a small sector of the Jewish community was off base. "I know that the AIPAC membership and leadership covers the broad spectrum of the American Jewish community, as well as the broad spectrum of U.S. political preferences," said Chapman, who is one of hundreds who serves on AIPAC's national executive board.

Chapman said he and some fellow pro-Israel activists from the Eighth District had tentatively scheduled a meeting for next week to discuss the issue with the lawmaker. He added that Moran's "appalling" remarks were unfortunate because they contrasted with his actions this summer, such as co-sponsoring the Iran Counterproliferation Act.

Lerner came to Moran's defense.

First, Lerner said that Moran's remark about AIPAC supporting killing was lacking some context. While the interview was printed in transcript form, edited only for grammar, the rabbi said, it was only a portion of a longer interview ‹ the other part of which appeared in the magazine's previous issue. In that portion of the talk, the two had been discussing how the U.S. approach to security should be based on "generosity" rather than on its current "militarism" ‹ and that "AIPAC forces played an important role supporting" such militarism instead of dialogue.

As for Moran's characterization of AIPAC as only representing a small segment of the Jewish community ‹ despite its ability to draw exponentially larger crowds to its annual policy conference than Jewish organizations lobbying for a different approach on Israel attract to their conferences ‹ Lerner argued that many American Jews who might agree with his viewpoint have been driven away from activism by Israel supporters who sometimes label them "self-hating Jews" for their criticisms of the Jewish state.

Lerner said he didn't disagree with anything the Virginian said in the interview, adding: Moran's "the most courageous congressman I know."