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Jewish World Review June 7, 2000 /4 Sivan, 5760
http://www.jewishworldreview.com --
MARK KEAM looks at the 11 Jewish members of the U.S. Senate and the large
amounts of money raised by Jewish philanthropic organizations in the United
States and is amazed.
Keam, volunteer Washington representative for the Korean American Coalition
and president of the D.C. Asian Pacific American Bar Association, sees the
American-Jewish community as the prototype for how an ethnic minority can
succeed politically, economically and socially in the United States.
In order to learn more, Keam recently joined eight other Asian-American leaders
from around the country on a trip to Israel sponsored by the American Jewish
Committee's Project Interchange. The group, which returned to the states early
last week, spent nine days touring and learning about various Israeli issues, from
absorption of immigrants to relations with the Palestinians.
The trip grew out of AJCommittee's ongoing effort to build coalitions with
Asian-American groups. Last year the group sponsored an Ethnic Leadership
Institute for Asian Americans and other ethnic groups, which featured speakers
from various Jewish organizations discussing how the Jewish community
developed and maintained its network of social services, philanthropy, education
and political advocacy.
The two groups also have been partners in lobbying on a number of political
issues, most notably immigration and hate crimes legislation.
"Asian-Americans see the [American] Jewish community as a model for
community development," said David Bernstein, the AJCommittee's Washington
area director, and are interested in learning how and why the Jewish community
became successful in America.
One aspect of that success is the strong connection that American Jews have
with Israel. Bernstein said the Israel trip was able to demonstrate why the Jewish
community has such a strong motivation to support Israel, which, in turn, provides
insight for Asian Americans interested in maintaining similar relationships with
their own countries of origin.
Keam said this is especially relevant to Korean Americans, since, like Israel,
South Korea is a democracy bordering an enemy -- North Korea -- with which it
could conceivably go to war at any time. In addition, Keam said that many Korean
Americans have "emotional ties" with South Korea; many are first or
second-generation Americans, unlike Chinese- and Japanese-American families
who have been in the United States for multiple generations.
Frank Wu, an
associate professor at the Howard University School of Law who has written on
issues of Asian-American interest such as affirmative action and immigration, observes that the American-Jewish community also is a model of diversity,
while being united around certain overall goals. "[American Jews] have fostered
tremendous internal diversity and dissent," said Wu. Both Keam and
Wu also point out that uniting their community is a big challenge, since Asian
Americans come from 30 different countries, each with its own native language
and, in some cases, multiple dialects.
Wu also noted that Asian Americans face problems familiar to Jews, such as
fighting the "unwarranted charge of dual loyalty" to their country of origin, as well
as dealing with "intermarriage" and figuring out how to assimilate into American
society while maintaining their own ethnic identity.
Keam emphasized that the relationships forged between the two groups from
programs such as these are an important part of coalition-building and can help to
prevent any intergroup problems which might arise in the future.
Asian Americans, he said, "have learned that it's too late to make a friend when
you need one; you need to make friends before the problem
Asian Americans see U.S. Jews as role models
By Eric Fingerhut
JWR contributor Eric Fingerhut is a staff writer at the
Washington Jewish Week. Comment by clicking here.
