BIBI GUNNING
Schumer rebuked for wanting Isr. leader out
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer took to the chamber floor Thursday to call for a “new election” in Israel once the Jewish state’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip “starts to wind down,” denouncing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and “radical” members of his security cabinet as an “obstacle” to peace — earning rebukes from Republicans and Israeli leaders alike.
The extraordinary comments by the Brooklyn Democrat, 73, came in response to festering resentment among progressives and far-left Democrats over the Biden administration’s refusal to call for a cease-fire in the 5-month-old war, and fears that it could jeopardize the president’s re-election.
In his remarks, amounting to a public call for the leader of a foreign ally to be removed from office, Schumer alleged that Netanyahu and security cabinet members Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir had lost the support of Israelis and a new election was “the only way” to secure the Jewish state’s future.
“Of course, the United States cannot dictate the outcome of an election, nor should we try,” he said. “That is for the Israeli public to decide. A public that I believe understands better than anybody that Israel cannot hope to succeed as a pariah, opposed by the rest of the world.”
‘No longer fits’
“As a lifelong supporter of Israel, it’s become clear to me that the Netanyahu coalition no longer fits the needs of Israel after October 7,” Schumer concluded, though he gave no indication of which leader should take his place.
If Netanyahu remains in power “after the war begins to wind down and continues to pursue dangerous and inflammatory policies that test existing US standards for assistance,” Schumer also said, “then the United States will have no choice but to play a more active role in shaping Israeli policy by using our leverage to change the present course.”
Biden has been dogged in the primary elections by tens of thousands of “uncommitted” votes from Democrats who have criticized his support of Israel, most notably in Arab American and Muslim communities in Michigan and Minnesota.
Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish elected official in the US, said he backed a temporary cease-fire to provide further humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, while adding that a permanent halt to fighting “would only allow Hamas to regroup” and delay a two-state solution.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) issued a stern rebuttal following Schumer’s remarks, calling his Democratic counterpart’s criticism of Netanyahu “unprecedented.”
“The Jewish state of Israel deserves an ally that acts like one,” McConnell said in his own floor speech. “And Israel’s unity government and security cabinet deserve the deference befitting a sovereign, democratic country.
“Foreign observers who cannot keep these clear distinctions ought to refrain from weighing in. It is grotesque and hypocritical for Americans who hyperventilate about foreign interference in our own democracy to call for the removal of a democratically elected leader of Israel.”
Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition won 64 of the 120 seats in Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, in the most recent national election held in November 2022.
The prime minister and Knesset serve four-year terms but have often held early elections when coalitions break down.
Israeli Ambassador to the US Michael Herzog blasted Schumer for issuing a “counterproductive” message.
“Israel is a sovereign democracy,” Herzog posted on X. “It is unhelpful, all the more so as Israel is at war against the genocidal terror organization Hamas, to comment on the domestic political scene of a democratic ally. It is counterproductive to our common goals.”
‘Highly inappropriate’
Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, a Netanyahu rival, added in his own X post: “Regardless of our political opinion, we strongly oppose external political intervention in Israel’s internal affairs.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) also weighed in from the House Republican retreat at the Greenbrier in White Sulphur Springs, W. Va., where Herzog will be speaking with lawmakers.
“We want to speak very clearly and concisely to say that this is not only highly inappropriate, it’s just plain wrong for an American leader to play such a divisive role in Israeli politics while our closest ally in the region is in an existential battle for its very survival,” Johnson said.