Democrats in civil war over support for Israel
“In the 40-odd years I’ve been working on these issues full time, I’ve never seen this level of support for Palestinian rights and challenging the status quo,” the Arab American Institute’s James Zogby told the Washington Post in reference to the Democrats’ grassroots.
Senator Bernie Sanders — who blamed the outbreak of violence on “the irresponsible actions of government-allied right-wing extremists in Jerusalem” — helped both lead and reflect this trend in his 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns. His calls to restrict US military aid to Israel were taken up by a number of other candidates in the 2020 primary campaign, although they were fiercely resisted by Biden who labelled them “bizarre”.
The ultimately victorious Biden was able to prevent the Democrats’ left-wing from toughening the party’s stance towards Israel in its platform. But there has nonetheless been a steady drum-beat of attacks on the Jewish state from an increasingly vocal minority within the party, even before the latest outbreak of violence.
Last month, for instance, Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren, his former rival for the Democratic left’s affections in the 2020 primary contest, redoubled their calls to restrict American aid to Israel. That cause has also been taken up by Minnesota congresswoman Betty McCollum, a long-standing critic, who last month introduced a bill which bars US funding to Israel being used in various military operations.
The proposed legislation
— which, despite the Democrats’ congressional majority, stands no chance of passing — is backed by a coalition of leftwing groups, including the dovish J Street, and has so far attracted the support of 19 Democratic members of the House of Representatives. Their numbers include Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley — the four high-profile leftwingers, dubbed “The Squad”, who have frequently grabbed the headlines since joining the House of Representatives after 2018’s mid-term elections. But they also include a number of left-wingers, such as New York’s Jamaal Bowman, Marie Newman in Illinois and Missouri’s Cori Bush, who unseated more moderate Democrats in primary challenges last year and have swelled the ranks of the party’s Israel critics.
Many are already making their presence felt. Newman, who recanted her previous support for BDS in the run-up to the primary, was at the forefront of a letter signed by 25 congressional Democrats last week which called on Biden’s secretary of state, Anthony Blinken, to condemn the planned Sheikh Jarrah evictions. Meanwhile, Bowman, who ousted the veteran Jewish and staunchly pro-Israel congressman Eliot Engel, slammed Israeli airstrikes, saying: “Enough of Black and brown bodies being brutalised and murdered, especially children … The White House must act.” (Bowman also condemned the rocket attacks on Israel).
The tilt against Israel is underpinned by a more sceptical stance towards the Jewish state among Democrat voters. In March, Gallup reported that while two-thirds of Democrats view Israel favourably, the number who want to see Biden put more pressure on Jerusalem than Ramallah to solve the conflict has jumped from 38 percent a decade ago to 53 percent now. The pollster warned, however, that it was too soon to tell whether this increase reflects “a temporary reaction” to Donald Trump’s close association with Benjamin Netanyahu or a more “fundamental shift” in Democrats’ orientation to the Middle East.
Zogby said the apparent hardening in Democrats’ attitudes towards Israel stemmed from the party electing more diverse representatives who reflected a base which rested less on the support of middle-class whites and more on African-Americans, Latinos, young people and women.
But even among some younger progressive Democrats, strong support continues to endure. Last week, Ritchie Torres — who, when he took his seat in January, became the first openly gay Afro-Latin American member of Congress — came under heavy fire on social media when he criticised rocket attacks. The 33-year-old, who backed Sanders in 2016, refused, however, to back down. “What is under siege is not only Israel, what is under siege is the truth itself,” he declared. “Circulating on social media in particular is a vicious lie, a lie that’s deceptively reframes the terrorism of Hamas as self defence and deceptively reframes the self-defence of Israel as terrorism. Increasingly, we seem to live in an Orwellian universe where the truth no longer matters.”