What Is Rahm Emanuel's Heaviest Baggage In His Run For Mayor?

After 2 years as Obama's Chief of Staff, what has Rahm Emanuel done that is controversial and would most likely turn off a portion of the electorate in the Chicago mayoral race?

Not Obamacare.
Not the economic stimulus package.

No it's something else entirely--and it is the reason that Jewish voters don't reflexively back Rahm Emanuel for Chicago mayor:

In the Jewish neighborhoods on the Far North Side, Rahm Emanuel is more associated with what he did in Washington than what he might do in Chicago's City Hall.

"There are questions about his positions on Israel," said Chesky Montrose, 32, who was wearing a skull cap and pushing one child in a stroller while keeping an eye on two others bicycling down Devon. "It's not logical that international policy would influence a race for mayor. But there is some resentment here, no doubt."

...Obama got a huge percent of Jewish voters, many of whom assumed Emanuel would give voice to their concerns as chief of staff, noted Cheryl Jacobs Lewin, Chicago co-chair of Americans for a Safe Israel.

"That has not happened, judging by the White House's heavy-handedness toward Israel," Lewin said in an e-mail.

The irony is that while a spokesperson for Emanuel counters that, "Rahm's support for Israel is well known, and he had many supporters in the Jewish community when he represented a half-million Chicagoans in Congress," it may be that the members of the Jewish community who will be most drawn to Emanuael are precisely those who will ignore the pro-Israel things Emanuel says in order to win pro-Israel votes and focus instead on Obama's tough stance on Israel:

Yet that very quality could be a plus for Emanuel among lakefront liberals, many of them secular Jews uncomfortable with a right-leaning Israeli administration.

"I'm sort of hostile to Israel," said James Alter, a founding father of independent politics in Chicago.

This mayoral election might seem to be an ideal opportunity to gauge how the Jewish community's attitude toward Obama, his Israel policy and the Democratic Party in general, but depending on just how big the split is between pro- and 'anti-Israel' Jews, assessing that attitude may not be so simple.

[Hat tip: Jennifer Rubin]

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