Biden surrogates are giving no oxygen to the progressive criticism of Israel. They are running Biden to Trump’s right on the issue, saying that by removing forces from Syria, Trump left Israel with “no one to rely on” and his politicization of the issue in the U.S. undermines support for “the Jewish state.”

It’s a “canard,” says Halie Soifer of the Jewish Democratic Council of America. A “false story,” says former ambassador Dan Shapiro. Biden’s surrogates in the Jewish community go to great lengths to try to debunk a story that Joe Biden took on Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin over settlements in 1982. But the encounter is documented in the New York Times.

Israel supporters exult over Joe Biden. He wrote the Democratic Party platform himself, which removes reference to occupation, says Robert Wexler. And Kamala Harris “clearly stands in the Biden wing of the Democratic Party in terms of Israel, so I don’t know what more VP Biden could possibly do to engender the type of confidence that he has built up over four decades of being one of Israel’s strongest, staunchest supporters day in day out in every circumstance. … His pick for vice president is exactly like him in staunchly supporting Israel.”