As a new biopic called “Barbara Lee: Speaking Truth to Power” opens this month in Bay Area theaters, some activists are calling on the widely revered Oakland-Berkeley Congressmember to stand up to the power of Israel and its lobby and stop shoveling billions of taxpayer dollars to the Jewish state.
Lee, who has held her Congressional seat since 1998, styles herself a “renegade for peace and justice,” the title of her autobiography. Liberals and progressives have long lionized her for the courage and foresight she displayed in the immediate aftermath of September 11, 2001, when she was the sole member of either branch of Congress to vote “No” on the Authorization for the Use of Military Force, the short and vaguely worded resolution that has served ever since as the legal foundation for the U.S.’s global “war on terror.”
She also showed a flash of that courage in 2019, when she was one of only 17 House members who voted against a resolution condemning the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
But on other issues involving Israel and the Palestinians, it’s a different story.
Lee’s track record on Palestine
Lee issues occasional statements and tweets deploring violence on both sides, calling for a renewal of diplomacy and a two-state solution, etc., but in practice she’s using her political clout to assist Israel in its crimes:
- In 2016, after Debbie Wasserman Schultz, then chair of the Democratic National Committee, appointed her to the committee drafting the party’s election platform, Lee voted against an amendment drafted by Sen. Bernie Sanders and allies calling in the mildest terms for an “end to occupation and illegal settlements” and “an international effort to rebuild Gaza.”
- This year, when Rep. Betty McCollum introduced H.R. 2590, a bill that aims simply to prevent Israel from using US taxpayer funds for military detention of Palestinian children, the unlawful seizure or destruction of Palestinian property, forcible transfer of civilians in the West Bank, or further annexation of Palestinian land, most progressive House members, including all of the “Squad,” signed on as co-sponsors – but not Barbara Lee. (Her staff claims she can’t because the bill could come before a subcommittee she chairs, but that’s bogus: other Congress members routinely sponsor bills coming before committees they chair, and even if she is unwilling to co-sponsor, there’s nothing stopping her from publicly endorsing H.R. 2590.)
- This summer Lee was the sole sponsor and legislative manager of H.R. 4373, an appropriations bill just passed by the House that will give Israel $3.3 billion in direct military aid in 2022, plus billions more in military funding for its allies Egypt and Jordan. (If you recall reading that Israel gets $3.8 billion in military aid from the U.S., you may be wondering whether Lee is actually trying to reduce the amount. No such luck – the other half billion will come in a separate bill, H.R. 4432, which has passed the House Appropriations Committee but not yet the full House. That one, sad to say, is sponsored and managed by Rep. Betty McCollum.)
Lee’s bill, which according to the Jewish News Syndicate was “advised by numerous pro-Israel organizations,” also includes a slew of other provisions that AIPAC, on Twitter, called “pro-Israel,” such as $5 million for resettling refugees there and a “sense of the Congress” call on Arab nations to normalize relations with Israel.
The bill does also appropriate $225 million for an “Economic Support Fund” for the West Bank and Gaza, but this provision is followed by literally pages of conditions and prohibitions on the use of the money. Some of these restrictions seem intended mainly to protect Zionist sensitivities, such as a provision prohibiting funding for “any educational institution located in the West Bank or Gaza that is named after an individual who the Secretary of State determines has committed an act of terrorism” (and the Department of State would undoubtedly follow Israel in classifying any armed resistance as “terrorism.”)
Some of the other restrictions, however, seem intended to discourage the Palestinian Authority from doing anything to strengthen the Palestinian position. One, for example, would prevent distribution of funds not only to Hamas but also to “any power-sharing government of which Hamas is a member, or that results from an agreement with Hamas and over which Hamas exercises undue influence.” Even the PA itself would be denied any assistance if “the Palestinians obtain the same standing as member states or full membership as a state in the United Nations or any specialized agency thereof outside an agreement negotiated between Israel and the Palestinians” or if “the Palestinians initiate an International Criminal Court (ICC) judicially authorized investigation, or actively support such an investigation, that subjects Israeli nationals to an investigation for alleged crimes against Palestinians.”
The bill passed the House on July 28 by a margin of 217-212. While all Republican Representatives opposed it, the only Democrats who did so were Reps. Cori Bush, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Rashida Tlaib. Among those voting in favor, disappointingly, were Reps. Ilhan Omar, Jamaal Bowman, and Ro Khanna.
As the Israel lobby celebrated the outcome, AIPAC applauded Lee’s leadership, listing her first on its thank-you list both on Twitter and in a press release.
Push back from constituents
But her role also sparked a rare public challenge to the Congresswoman, who is widely popular in her district. Last week, more than 15 activists (including this writer) turned out to leaflet and hold signs calling out her support for Israel outside a “sneak preview” of the new documentary at Oakland’s Grand Lake Theater. In addition to summarizing the information presented above, our leaflet called on attendees, most if not all of whom were among her loyal supporters, to “Ask Barbara Lee to Speak Truth to the Power of Israel and its Lobby!” and specifically to:
• Stop voting to spend billions of US taxpayer dollars in military aid to Israel – use the money here to house the homeless, care for the sick, and educate the children.
• Demand an end to Israeli evictions, home demolitions, land annexations, and settlement expansion and endorse Rep. Betty McCollum’s H.R. 2590.
• Speak out against Israel’s brutal, illegal and immoral 14-year siege and military assaults on Gaza.
With 15 people outside the theater’s single entrance, we were a very visible presence, and we were able to offer our leaflet to just about everyone coming in, a majority of whom took it. I myself had the pleasure of offering one directly to Rep. Lee, but she turned me down with a gruff, “No.”
There will be another preview showing of the movie Thursday, Aug. 12, outside the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, and it is scheduled to open to the general public on Aug. 20 at theaters in Berkeley, San Francisco, and Sebastopol, CA. We expect to leaflet all these locations.
Obviously, that alone won’t change Rep. Lee’s pro-Israel inclinations. After all, more than two decades of behind-the-scenes lobbying by Palestinian-rights activists – and a few critical op-eds, such as here, here, and here – have had no discernible effect. As a black woman and a liberal, she can count on strong support from her district, which is generally liberal and where people of color make up a majority of voters. (She is regularly re-elected with 80-90 percent of the vote.) And her courageous opposition to the AUMF, as well her support for Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, affordable housing, gun control, legalization of cannabis, LGBT rights, and other domestic-policy causes, have earned her particularly intense loyalty from most of her most progressive constituents. Few seem aware that she has always been aligned with the Democratic Party establishment: even when she’s to the left of it on some policy matters, she has never really challenged it in the way the “Squad” has in recent years, and she spurned Bernie Sanders and endorsed Hillary Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 and Kamala Harris in 2020.
Even activists who have campaigned for justice for Palestine remain reluctant to challenge Lee in public. The Chapter Council of Jewish Voice for Peace-Bay Area, for example, decided not to participate in or endorse the leafleting of the movie because it didn’t want the organization involved in “shaming her at an event in her honor.” The local branch of the Workers World Party, which has often staged demonstrations against Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians, also opposed the action.
Still, politicians like Lee need to be reminded that growing numbers of their constituents are beginning to recognize that, as our leaflet put it, a “progressive except Palestine” is not a true progressive. I’m not sure we’ll ever get her to meet our demands, but maybe her successor will have the guts to acknowledge the reality of Israeli apartheid and to stand up to the power of the lobby.
If you are interested in helping with leafleting, contact SayNoToPEPs@gmail.com.
In 2004 Paul Larudee and I founded MEPAC (Middle East Policy Advisory Committee) to counter, in our own meager way, AIPAC and its toxic affect on our Congress. We focused on Barbara Lee, my Representative, since she proclaimed herself as a ‘renegade for peace and justice’ and, supposedly, one of the true progressives in Congress. We thought we had a natural ally in our fight for a fairer, more even-handed US policy towards Israel/Palestine. After all, she usually won then, and still does now, with over 80% of the vote in her district.
After 6 years of meetings with her (2), but mostly with her staff, all we got from our efforts was a resolution honoring the peacemakers! However, when we sought her help in holding Israel accountable for its crimes, Barbara went and hid behind a rock! She made it abundantly clear that her renegade persona stopped short when it came to this issue. We wondered why this was the case for someone who was, for the most part, progressive and not threatened with being removed from office by the AIPAC crowd. Then we realized that Nancy Pelosi was the problem. The message from Nancy was crystal clear: Step out of line and you will be ‘Cynthia McKinneyed’, i.e. shunned by the Democratic Party establishment, removed from committees and relegated to a far corner of the Congressional office building with little or no staff nor budget to pursue her agenda for her district.
Barbara turned to me during on of the 2 meetings with her and told me that I was, “– on the right side of history” with what I was trying to do for Palestinian justice. Well then, if that’s true, by her own assessment, Barbara would be on the WRONG side of history when it comes to justice for the Palestinian people!
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“Shai said ‘there were ideas to rely on other groups in America today’ for support, instead of American Jewry, but that he rejects such proposals. He appeared to be referring to recent remarks made by former Israeli ambassador to the US Ron Dermer who suggested that Israel should prioritize the ‘passionate and unequivocal’ support of evangelical Christians over that of American Jews, who he said are ‘disproportionately among our critics.'”
“’I have to make sure that hundreds of thousands of you will stay with us,’ said Shai. ‘They may be very critical of what’s going on in Israel. I also have a lot of criticism… it doesn’t matter.’”
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More evidence that the Zionists are beginning to panic:
‘We may lose US’ if liberal Jews continue backing BDS, BLM — Diaspora minister | The Times of Israel
The Times of Israel, August 10/21
‘We may lose US’ if liberal Jews continue backing BDS, BLM’ — Diaspora minister”Nachman Shai couples Israel boycott movement with Black Lives Matter, which was criticized for antisemitic remarks made by some of its leaders but won support of many US Jews” by Jacob Magid, Times of Israel, August 10/21EXCERPT:
NEW YORK — “Diaspora Affairs Minister Nachman Shai warned last week that if liberal American Jews continue supporting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions and Black Lives Matter movements, Jerusalem may lose the support of the United States altogether.
“Making a guest appearance on the American Jewish Committee’s People of the Pod podcast, Shai said he recently briefed fellow members of the Israeli government on the status of American Jewry, telling them that ‘if we see more of the radical left and progressive liberal Jews continuing to support BDS and Black Lives Matter, and similar to the Palestinians… relat[ing] to Israel as a genocide state or an apartheid state, we may lose America.’
“Israel has long identified the BDS movement as a significant threat against which millions of dollars have been invested, but the lumping of the boycott movement together with the Black Lives Matter movement is less common.
“Some major Jewish organizations in the US have expressed opposition to statements and positions made by some BLM activists. However, the movement has won the support of many US Jews, and the Anti-Defamation League has spoken out against portraying its supporters as ‘violent extremists.’
“Over 600 Jewish organizations, representing the majority of American Jews, signed a letter in support of the Black Lives Matter movement that was published in a full-page New York Times ad in August 2020.” (cont’d)
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