I often meet people who think American Jews, as a whole, have always supported Israel.
Completely false. I know it personally. Most American Jews didn’t support the founding of Israel. And didn’t support Israel for many years afterward.
I remember my arguments with the mother of my closest friend, David Stern, at their summer house on Puget Sound where David and I used his small racing boat. It was 1955.
Mrs. Stern, as I had to call her, was on the board of the American Jewish Committee and president. She said she was national president.
Her organization had not supported the creation of the state of Israel and in 1955-56 still was distancing itself from Israel. The organization emphasized in its press releases that Judaism was a religion and American Jews were loyal Americans with no conflict of interest.
I argued with her, to no avail. On the other-hand, I now wouldn’t expect a 15 year old to win an argument with the mother of one of his buddies.
Here is a statement from the AJC in 1956 “AJC's approach to the Israel situation: "While friendly to Israel, we seek, as Americans, to advance our basic national American interests as we see them; and when we aim to be helpful to Israel... it is only in situations where we consider it to be within the framework of American interest.”
American Jewish support for Israel grew after Israel defeated Egypt in the war of 1956. (I was in Israel three years later and worked with a young Israeli tank commander from that war.)
In 1955 I could never believe that I would someday sit in my home and read the 1955 executive committee minutes of the American Jewish Committee in their original. Surprisingly, I could find no record of David Stern’s mother.
Footnote 2015: David's mother was part of the American Council for Judaism an even stronger opponent of Israel.