Black churches in US to counter Israel lobby on Iran agreement: Sharpton

American civil rights leader Reverend Al Sharpton has called on black churches in the United States to counter the Israel lobby’s massive campaign against the Iran nuclear agreement and work in favor of it.

Sharpton, Baptist minister and television/radio talk show host, has launched his campaign this weekend to back the historic conclusion of Iran nuclear talks, according to The Huffington Post.

“I am calling on ministers in black churches nationwide to go to their pulpits Sunday and have their parishioners call their senators and congressmen to vote yes on the Iran nuclear plan,” he said Friday.

“We have a disproportionate interest, being that if there is a war, our community is always disproportionately part of the armed services, and that a lot of the debate is by people who will not have family members who will be at risk,” Sharpton added.

He said that his campaign is designed to counter a coordinated effort launched by the Israel lobby against President Barack Obama’s historic diplomatic achievement.

“There needs to be a balance in this,” he said. “Clearly lobbyists and others like AIPAC are pushing on their side, and there needs to be an organized effort on the other side.”

“A lot of Democrats, I think, should have to consider how their voters will feel in their base vote,” the Baptist minister added.

Iran and the P5+1 group of countries - the US, Britain, France, Russia, China, and Germany – announced the conclusion of nuclear negotiations in the Austrian capital, Vienna, on July 14, following more than two weeks of intensive talks.

The Obama administration is striving to save the nuclear agreement in the Republican-dominated Congress which is reviewing it and is likely to vote on it in September.

The American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and other pro-Israel lobbying groups in the US have launched a massive campaign to defeat the historic agreement in Congress.

AIPAC has reportedly deployed about 300 lobbyists on Capitol Hill to try to convince lawmakers to vote against the nuclear agreement.

According to reports, the Israel lobby has so far spent about $40 million on television commercials and other propaganda material to inform the public “about the dangers of the proposed Iran deal.”

Most Republicans oppose the agreement with Iran, but they need a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress to override a possible presidential veto, and to reach that threshold, Republicans need Democratic support.

According to American political commentator and activist Daniel Patrick Welch, AIPAC is targeting vulnerable Democrats in order to change their mind on the Iran nuclear agreement.

“The foreign lobby, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC], is going into specific districts and trying to pressure Democrats who might be vulnerable in the next election cycle,” Welch, a candid critic of US foreign policy, told Press TV on July 30.

“And what they’ll do is paint anyone who doesn’t toe the line as being against Israel, and anti-Semitic etc, etc - the usual line. And they spend a lot of money doing that,” he added.

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