Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
News

Jewish Mom Hopes to Set the Record Straight on Obama Rumors

There’s Jews for Obama, Rabbis for Obama, and now in the seemingly never-ending quest to address every possible demographic, there’s Jewish Moms for Obama. More specifically, it’s an Orthodox Jewish mom, who lived in Israel during the Second Intifada and the start of the Iraq War and now lives in Cambridge, Mass. with her husband and two kids.

Janette Hillis-Jaffe is the driving force behind the new http://www.JewsObamaIsrael.com Web site and video designed to make other Jews feel more comfortable about the Democratic presidential candidate.

Hillis-Jaffe, who says she was offended by the Swift Boating of Sen. John Kerry in 2004, wanted to do something to sway undecided voters, and conservative voters in particular. After researching Obama’s position on Israel and many of the rumors about his religion, Hillis-Jaffe wanted to set the record straight.

“I’m in a position that I may help people feel more comfortable with him,” she told the Forward.

In the video, Hillis-Jaffe talks directly to the camera while in a playground. She tells her own story of being on the frontlines of the war on terror.

“Two buses and two cafes were blown up within minutes of our home,” she says in the video.

If people don’t feel familiar or comfortable with Obama, who looks more trustworthy that “a nice Jewish mother with two kids?” she asks.

She says she wants “real peace and real security for Israel.”

Hillis-Jaffe wrote the script herself, but it was a collaborative effort. A professional documentary maker filmed and edited the 2-minute 29-second segment. A Web marketing expert helped do the promotional materials and Web site. And a journalist helped with a news release.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.

If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.

Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism. 

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.