A screenshot from an anti Hagel ad.

American Jewish leaders have pressed the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) to stop publicly opposing the nomination of Chuck Hagel for defense secretary because making that a “Jewish issue” is “bad for the Jews,” the Jerusalem Post reported.

“I was called by major Jewish leaders, personally called, and [they] told me to stop our campaign against Hagel,” ZOA President Mort Klein told the Post.

ZOA was “the only major Jewish group to publicly oppose Hagel and [John O.] Brennan [for CIA head]” besides the Republican Jewish Coalition, according to Klein, who explained that such was the case because Jewish organizations are “frightened of making an issue seem more important to Jews than others.”

Klen said on Tuesday that “AJC, AIPAC, ADL [and] the Conference of Presidents never came out and said we oppose this man [Hagel] because he is horrible on Iran, he is horrible on terrorism, horrible on Israel, horrible on fighting radical Islam.”

Hagel chairs the Atlantic Council think tank, which in December published a column titled “Israel’s Apartheid Policy” as well as a policy paper predicting that Iran “should be viewed as a potential natural partner” for the U.S. He did not sign various pro-Israel letters backed by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) while he served in the Senate, but did sign a 2009 letter asking Obama to directly negotiate with Hamas. But in his Senate confirmation hearing, Hagel said “No one individual vote, no one individual quote or no one individual statement defines me, my beliefs, or my record.”