Insofar as the subject of conditioning Israel’s aid has permeated mainstream political discourse, it’s remained largely hypothetical. Now activists are calling on progressive Senators who have voiced support for conditioning aid to Israel to get behind a policy with actual teeth.

Pete Buttigieg on the “horrifying” humanitarian crisis in Gaza: “Like many failures, this failure has many fathers. I think that not only should Israel be respecting the human rights of people in Gaza, but Egypt could be doing things differently. The international community could do a better job, the U.S. could do a better job, and, obviously, I’m not a fan of Hamas either.”

On Thursday,  by the Wall Street Journal’s Sabrina Siddiqui asked Biden whether he’d consider leveraging aid to Israel to curb settlement expansion. “Not me. Look, I have been on record from very early on opposed to settlements, and I think it’s a mistake,” Biden told the reporter, “And Netanyahu knows my position. But the idea that we would draw military assistance from Israel, on the condition that they change a specific policy, I find it to be absolutely outrageous.”

In recent weeks, the chancellors at the University of Illinois and University of Massachusetts have targeted pro-Palestinian voices on their respective campuses. The Illinois Student Government responded by passing a resolution titled “Condemning Ignorance of Racism and Equating Anti-Zionism with Anti-Semitism,” but the attacks come amidst a wider crackdown on such perspectives which is being fueled by the Trump administration’s Department of Education.

The push to acknowledge the genocide on a federal level has hit roadblocks for decades, but recent geopolitical events have forced the issue. On October 29 the House passed H.Res 296, a resolution that recognizes the mass-killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World War 1 as a genocide. While the measure passed overwhelmingly by a vote of 405-11, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) is facing criticism for simply voting “present.”

A major theme has emerged at this year’s annual J Street conference: conditioning U.S. military aid to Israel. This lines up with a wider shift that seems to be happening throughout the country. An October 25 report from the centrist Center for American Progress shows 56% of voters say they’d condition aid if the Israeli government continues to expand settlements or ends up annexing the West Bank. That number goes up to 71% when applied only to Democratic voters.

The Young Democratic Socialists of America at Georgia Tech have been found guilty of discrimination and sanctioned by the school’s Office of Student Integrity for barring a pro-Israel individual from attending one of their meetings over concerns that they would potentially be disruptive. The decision comes after a 6-month long disciplinary process from the OSI, which YDSA referred to as “open-ended, opaque, politically-motivated, and ultimately unlawful.”

Executive Director of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association Rabbi Elyse Wechtermanm tells Mondoweiss, “Our members have been working hard against child detention and family separation on the border here in the United States.  When the issue of child incarceration, torture and detention by the Israeli military was brought to our attention, we felt we could not ignore it – this is part of what it means to fight for justice locally and globally.”

IfNotNow co-founder Max Berger is an aide to the Warren campaign, a fact that has generated predictable hysteria on right-wing blogs and pro-Israel websites. However, last week DMFI founder Mark Mellman told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) that he received a call from Warren campaign manager Roger Lau, assuring him that Berger wouldn’t be working on any issue connected to “Israel policy or Jewish outreach.”

Voters want aid to Israel conditioned over humans rights violations. Elizabeth Warren has become the third candidate to address the idea: “Right now, Netanyahu says he is going to take Israel in a direction of increasing settlements, [but] that does not move us in the direction of a two-state solution. It is the official policy of the United States of America to support a two-state solution, and if Israel is moving in the opposite direction, then everything is on the table…Everything is on the table.”