Tens of thousands of supporters of Israel rally in Washington
WASHINGTON — Supporters of Israel rallied by the tens of thousands on the National Mall under heavy security Tuesday, voicing solidarity in the fight against Hamas and crying “never again.”
The “March for Israel” offered a resounding and bipartisan endorsement of one of America’s closest allies as criticism has intensified over Israel’s offensive in Gaza, set off by the bloody Hamas incursion Oct. 7.
Overlooking a sea of Israeli and U.S. flags, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Speaker Mike Johnson and the House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jefferies, came together on the stage and, with Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa, joined hands. “We stand with Israel,” Schumer chanted.
Yet underneath that projection of unity, Democrats are sharply divided over Israel’s course and its treatment of Palestinians.
President Joe Biden is urging Israel to restrain some of its tactics to ease civilian suffering in Gaza after voicing full-throated solidarity with the Israelis in the war’s early weeks.
A succession of speakers took the stage to denounce the Hamas attack and what they said was a virulent spread of antisemitism internationally, “an embarrassment to all civilized people and nations,” in the words of Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who addressed the crowd by video from the Western Wall in Jerusalem.
After “the largest massacre since the Holocaust,” he said, “let us call out together, never again.”
“No one will break us,” he vowed. “We will rise again. … There is no greater and just cause than this.”
Ernst said Hamas’ brutality cannot be overstated. “They murder babies,” she said. “They rape women. They abuse the elderly. How anyone in America could sympathize with these terrorists is unfathomable.”