National Affairs

Abstract

After a period of transition in domestic and global affairs, the year ended much as it began. The quadrennial battle for the White House defined the political agenda for a gridlocked Congress and a political system that remained highly polarized. Jewish Republicans looked to a sluggish economy, high unemployment, and lingering doubts over the president’s commitment to Israel and calculated that 2012 would be their banner year. Jewish Democrats remained fairly loyal to a president whom they felt had earned a second term. Church, campus, and community activists carried out detailed plans to convince prominent institutions to divest from companies doing business in Israel. In the end, the American president was re-elected as were most members of Congress. Divestment efforts failed repeatedly. Divides between left and right, doves and hawks, Democrats and Republicans, seemed only to deepen.