J St conference begins amid the harsh crackle of neocon-Likud walky-talkies

The J Street conference begins tonight in D.C.. The liberal lobby group will be streaming some of the conference live, including Obama Mideast envoy Dennis Ross at 9am on Monday, here. You can see the full schedule and what else they're streaming online here. I see that the U.S. star of the Egypt revolution, Mona Eltahawy, will be on a streamed panel about the implications of the Arab revolutions. Lara Friedman of Peace Now and Lawrence Wilkerson, a real leader on the issue, will be streamed online, talking about whether Israel has become a liability to American interests. Unfortunately the biggest hot-button of the conference, in which the inspiring Rebecca Vilkomerson of JVP will make the case for boycott on a panel with Bernard Avishai and Kathleen Peratis among others, won't be online. It's called "Who's afraid of the BDS?"

Meantime, the J Street conference is being attacked by the rightwing. In Israel some members of the centrist party Kadima are angry at four Kadima members of Knesset who are speaking at the conference. Here are two other takes on the attacks. From Dan Fleshler of realistic dove and Ali Gharib at lobelog. Fleshler: