White House meets with rabbis to assuage concerns on Israel, Obama authorizes $205 million on top of $3 billion to Israel

JTA - Ron Kampeas
....two intimate White House meetings -- the second of which took place on Thursday -- with a carefully selected slate of 15 rabbis from across the country and representing the Orthodox, Reform and Conservative streams......

"I left with a clear impression that these individuals have a real passion about Israel," even if he did not agree with them on tactics, Goldberg said. Their interlocutors at the two meetings were high level: Dennis Ross, who runs Obama's Iran policy; Dan Shapiro, the deputy national security adviser who supervises policy for Israel and its neighbors; Susan Sher, the chief White House liaison to the Jewish community, and Emanuel....

The officials emphasized, for instance, the closeness of the defense relationship. On Thursday, as the rabbis were meeting with the staffers, for instance, the Obama administration authorized $205 million on top of the annual $3 billion in defense assistance for Israel to complete its Iron Dome short-range missile defense system.

The administration officials "spent a considerable amount of time emphasizing that the United States is addressing Israel's security concerns in a manner that [Israeli defense minister Ehud] Barak called better than at any previous time,” Moline reported.  Full story