How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love AIPAC (and Their Man In San Anselmo)

Amid Israel’s current Holocaust in Jabalia, a situation that imperils US national security, shouldn’t San Anselmo Town Council candidate Yoav Schlesinger have disclosed his past work for AIPAC?

Above: screenshot of “Hello Mazel” promotional video featuring founder Yoav Schlesinger, a former AIPAC Leadership Management Director

In early September, I wrote about how a group of pro-Israel Marinites linked to the SF Bay Area Jewish Community Relations Council had bullied town officials to shut down a local library presentation on Middle East history. The group falsely insisted that Professor Alex Boodrookas' presentation was somehow antisemitic and/or biased against Israel. The reactionary and Islamophobic JCRC-linked cohort of objectors included California Deputy Attorney General Roni Pomerantz; Epstein-Wexner alumnus and nonprofit director Greg Neichin; an especially dense administrative law judge (Regina DeAngelis); and two furious opponents of ethnic studies programs, Laliv Hadar and Jenny Holden, the latter now running for a local school board seat.

But among the correspondence, I should have included a complaint from one Yoav Schlesinger, a former AIPAC Director, newish resident of San Anselmo, and first-time Town Council candidate. Candidate Schlesinger has no evident civic or community involvement in Marin County, yet has rather mysteriously garnered some of the most valued endorsements in the county. These endorsements are particularly striking given that Mr. Schlesinger's work history indicates that he has consistently worked against the stated interests of most of the groups and individuals that endorsed him.

How many of those endorsements are related to Schlesinger’s AIPAC connections?

The Man From AIPAC and AI:

If Mr. Schlesinger has a bit of an astroturf quality to him, it may have been acquired at the opaque institutions for which he has worked.

Schlesinger, who declined an interview for this article, began his career at Adat Ari El, a conservative synagogue where he was the “youth and program director”. This may have been the only truly authentic work experience Schlesinger had. From there, he went on to a near three-year stint at the SF Jewish Community Center as a "Development and Grants Manager", before graduating into the role of "Leadership Management Director" at the much-reviled American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

At AIPAC, Schlesinger lobbied and fundraised for congressional candidates who were “friendly” to Israel. This is no small detail. AIPAC is controversial for its fierce grip on US electoral politics, with disastrous results for US foreign policy, as Israel's horrific carnage in Gaza and now Lebanon, has demonstrated. (As I write this, Israel appears to be conducting a final solution on Jabalia, and the images of bombed and sniped children are excruciating.)

AIPAC has routinely targeted elected reps who dare to criticize Israel, focusing with particular fierceness on progressive Black representatives such as Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush, against whom AIPAC spent $8 million and $14.5 million, respectively, in 2024.

As I noted in last week's article, the precursor organization to AIPAC, the American Zionist Council, had come under scrutiny by both the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations, who believed the group needed to be registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The clearest description of this is found midway through this article in The Columbia Spectator, although the topic is also covered in The Washington Post.

Schlesinger's relatively short stint at AIPAC appears to have been fruitful. Without a law degree, he then became an assistant director of development at Stanford Law School. It was a fundraising position, and one that Schlesinger has proved very successful at.

But does a successful fundraiser ever really leave AIPAC? It would be unrealistic to assume that Schlesinger has not continued to work with one of the most powerful lobbying groups in the country.

"Hello Mazel!" Schlesinger's Exploitation/Commercialization of Judaism:

A few years later, Schlesinger was on his way to starting a variety of vapid nonprofits centered on monetizing Jewish culture, the most telling of which may have been a nonprofit start-up called "Hello Mazel" which delivered to clients a Jewish-themed gift box four times a year. “Hello Mazel” was later sold, and numerous clients claimed to have been bilked by "Hello Mazel"; they did not, in fact, receive their regular delivery of single-origin hannukah gelt because they did not get any box at all.

(I admit a lack of sympathy for the clients of any "nonprofit" business that commercializes religious and/or spiritual practice. Schlesinger's consumerization of Judaism is akin to so many paintings of blonde Jesuses on black velvet. It might make money, but what does it have to do with God? Further, "Hello Mazel" seems of a piece with Schlesinger's overall approach to Judaism. It is not Judaism of the heart or of the soul, but a Judaism wielded for commercial gain. This seems in line with Schlesinger's prior work for AIPAC and the JCC, which used Judaism for political power. It is not a celebration of Judaism, but an exploitation.)

Bizarrely, Schlesinger's next destination was the Omidyar Network where, among other things, he was somehow placed in charge of "due diligence" for "diversity and inclusion in tech". The man who got his start at the racist and Islamophobic AIPAC, was placed in charge of due diligence for diversity and inclusion in tech, which already has its own extreme racism and sexism problem. Got it.

And from there, Schlesinger went on to become Oracle's Director of Ethical AI Practice, and then its Senior Director of Responsible AI and Tech.

But is there any such thing as "Responsible AI"?

How Does A Proponent of Environmentally Catastrophic AI Win The Endorsement of the Local Sierra Club Group?

Given how environmentally destructive "artificial intelligence" is already proving to be, you might wonder how Schlesinger won the coveted endorsement of the Sierra Club. I called Jenny Silva, who is on the Executive Committee of the Marin Sierra Club, and she provided only the most rote answers about the group's "rigorous" vetting process. When I asked how a "rigorous" vetting process missed that their endorsed candidate was an AI Director, Silva claimed she wasn't permitted to speak on that issue.

And so the conversation went for over twenty minutes, with my patiently asking specific questions not only about Schlesinger's current AI position, but about his rabid Islamophobia and ardent pro-Israel position, which at this point was a clearly anti-environmental position:

I explained to Silva that estimates for CO2 emissions from Israel's bombing had stood at over 60 million metric tons in merely the first two months of its assault on Gaza. Adjusted for the full year and Israel's additional bombing of Lebanon, the figure would likely exceed 200 million metric tons of CO2. On top of that, Israel is also using depleted uranium and white phosphorous in both Gaza and Lebanon, with disastrous effects not only on civilians but on the environment – plants, water, wildlife.

Silva told me she was "concerned" about the "atrocities" but that realistically, the Sierra Club would not be able to rescind its endorsement. How low can the new Sierra Club go?

A Takeover of the Sierra Club:

In prior years, Sierra Club endorsements in Marin County have gone to candidates like Ford Greene and Frank Egger, both of whom have a proven environmental record. (Despite the animus both men have earned from Marin DSA as opponents of a particular version of rent control, they are acknowledged by at least one pro-rent control DSA member as "having served their communities for years" on environmental issues.)

A Sierra Club member who left the Club in the last year described it as having been subject to a "hostile takeover" by a pro-business crowd that favors a pro-development position with a mask of "social justice". Thus Schlesinger, who has positioned himself as pro-rent control and pro-growth, checks a box that others do not, despite the fact that there is no way to gauge how reliable his campaign promises are, as Schlesinger has never held office or been accountable to even a commission or board in Marin County. Meanwhile, Schlesinger's AIPAC history does not appear anywhere on his campaign website.

The North Bay Labor Council's Endorsement:

Schlesinger was also endorsed by the North Bay Labor Council. This is noteworthy given the multifaceted threat that AI poses for workers. Again, the endorsement seems to be based on Schlesinger's stated-yet-unproven support for rent control and housing. But what is the possible calculus on that? How do you weight a known threat to labor against a mere promise from an unproven, anti-labor candidate?

But the endorsement of Schlesinger by the North Bay Labor Council is also starkly bizarre given the bullying by Schlesinger and his cohort of the Town's library staff who are, after all, labor. The issue of Schlesinger and his cohort’s bullying of library staff comes up repeatedly in correspondence retrieved via CPRA.

Guess who else is labor? The other target of Schlesinger's ire, the young professor Alex Boodrookas, who, incidentally, must deals with the onerous reality of AI every day on campus. Boodrookas and other professors see AI as a dire threat to academia, in part because it is more likely to be used by workingclass students who have to balance several jobs while trying to complete course work. This reliance not only degrades the students’ learning processes, it often leads to failing grades.

On every level, Schlesinger appears to be functioning on a level that is separate from the tangible reality that the rest of the world must face. (His near-total lack of self- awareness makes him in many ways a metaphor for the State of Israel itself.) Which brings us to his curious performance, or lack thereof, at a recent candidate forum.

Schlesinger As Diva at The San Anselmo Candidate Forum:

Serious questions regarding Schlesinger's attack on the library presentation (and thus on the First Amendment) were submitted by multiple participants. But these were dismissed by the moderator, the Marin League of Women Voters, a nearly all-white entity that functions largely as a gatekeeping operation for the County's status quo.

In the Zoom forum, Schlesinger, who has no record of service in the county, was featured center panel, with the long-serving and more qualified candidates, like Mayor Eileen Burke and Ford Greene, relegated to the outer edges. Even though the questions were softballs, and even though Schlesinger didn't even have to appear in person, Schlesinger looked uncomfortable and edgy even in his opening comments. It could have been a perfect opportunity to introduce himself to the larger public, but Schlesinger seemed determined to sabotage his own appearance.

Notably, a full year after Israel initiated its retaliatory genocidal assault on civilians in Gaza, and in a week when it appears that Israel is conducting a Holocaust in Jabalia, Schlesinger announced to the virtual audience: "I am a proud supporter of Israel."

What Happens At AIPAC Stays At AIPAC:

To be fair, many in the audience felt uneasy watching Schlesinger. It was eerie hearing Schlesinger later expound on "equity", "inclusion" and "justice" when they knew how he had spearheaded the attack on the library presentation simply because it addressed Israel/Palestine. It would have been more unnerving if they had known Schlesinger had once worked for AIPAC, and is quite likely still working with AIPAC.

An expert fundraiser such as Schlesinger does not simply give up AIPAC connections when they officially move to the next role. AIPAC connections can lend extraordinary political and fundraising power, and it is worth asking how that may have helped Schlesinger, with zero experience in office, win the Sierra Club, Marin Young Democrats, and North Bay Labor Council endorsements.

Schlesinger Falls Apart Under (No) Questioning:

Given a standard question about racism and hate crimes, Schlesinger's response addressed only antisemitism. Schlesinger made no acknowledgement that anyone besides Jewish people experienced racism and/or bias or violence. (This stood in stark contrast to the only Black candidate, Chantel Walker, who empathetically and generously responded to the general issue of hate crimes as impacting many groups.)

Schlesinger’s Ties to Anti-Ethnic Studies Crowd Come Into Focus

But another part of Schlesinger's answer was truly chilling. Schlesinger insisted that the antisemitism he saw would be addressed through "curriculum". But as I have repeatedly reported, the issue is "who now controls that curriculum?" Currently, curriculum is being “guided” by the Jewish Family And Children's Services nonprofit, which is receiving millions of dollars through the Marin County Office of Education for its "Holocaust Education Program" that omits any mention of genocide or ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.

(Schlesinger's campaign contributors include prominent members of the anti-ethnic studies group affiliated with the JCRC called "Marin Jewish Parents and Allies Union"; California Deputy Attorney General Romi Pomerantz (who wrote a self-damning letter of complaint to the Town library over Boodrookas' history presentation); as well as a disproportionate number of non-Marin residents and tech industry "entrepreneurs".)

In response to the same question, candidate Guy Meyer added that despite his own bar mitzvah (which would have occurred when the internal politics of both the US and Israel were far less right wing), his perception of the antisemitic incident was that it was less about hate and more about a general ignorance.

Greene Stares Down Hate, While Standing Up For First Amendment:

Candidate Ford Greene's response specifically addressed the anti-Black vandalism at Memorial Park, vandalism which he had protested. But Greene, whose national reputation is based on his fierce legal advocacy for the victims of religious cults, also addressed the need to preserve First Amendment rights amid the current political polarization.

It struck me that Greene and Schlesinger are a study in contrasts; Greene, a fierce opponent of religious cults and a defender of victims was “face to face” (on zoom, at least) with Schlesinger, a man who has embraced an essentially cultic (and opportunistic) interpretation of Judaism.

Greene has spoken previously about how cults demand that we view the religious institution as above reproach. Could he just as well have been describing the current Israeli government and the Israel lobby in the US?

Greene's mere mention of the First Amendment aggravated Schlesinger so much that he took half of his next sixty second response to the next question (about flood control) to push back against Greene's defense of the First Amendment, leaving very little time to discuss the actual topic of flood control policy.

Schlesinger's Ahab-like obsession with antisemitism underscores how much of his career has been focused on programs and institutions that focus on only one particular interpretation of one faith. Specifically, it is an interpretation of Judaism that accords with AIPAC’s pro-Israel position.

Given what Israel is now doing in Jabalia, a situation that imperils US national security, shouldn’t Schlesinger at least have disclosed his past work for AIPAC?

This is a developing story, I hope to hear back from North Bay Labor Council and two San Anselmo City Council members who endorsed Schlesinger. There is at least one progressive group in Marin that is considering issuing a statement about Schlesinger, and I hope to be able to share that soon.

Thanks as always to readers of this substack for their insights and information.

©️2024 Eva Chrysanthe