Florida Congressman Ted Deutch announces that he is stepping through the revolving door from being an advocate for Israel as the chair of the Middle East subcommittee of House Foreign Affairs to being the head of a lead Israel lobby group, the American Jewish Committee, starting in October. The smooth transition makes smart people cynical about the extent to which Democratic politicians are dedicated to supporting Israel.
Shanelle Jackson, Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s Democratic primary challenger in Michigan’s 12th district, accused the lawmaker of “antisemitic rhetoric” and championed the United States’ relationship with Israel in a recent interview.
As the word “apartheid” grows in popularity to describe Israeli oppression of Palestinians it is helpful to revisit another concept defined in the mid 20th century: genocide.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel called progressive State Rep. Omari Hardy him “the future of the Florida Democratic Party” in endorsing him for Congress. And that terrifies the Democratic Majority for Israel, which is seeking to block his progress because he supports BDS and Palestinian human rights.
Israel’s declaration of six leading Palestinian human rights and civil society groups as “terrorist” organizations continues to have reverberations in Washington. Rep. Betty McCollum has introduced a resolution calling on the U.S. House of Representatives to condemn Israel’s announcement, and specifically called for the Biden administration to “publicly condemn this authoritarian and antidemocratic act of repression by the Government of Israel against prominent Palestinian civil society organizations.”
For much of this year, Israel’s defenders have waged a successful battle to keep the word “apartheid” from entering the mainstream discourse. Israel just set that process back by smearing Palestinian human rights groups as terrorist organizations.
Israel is facing widespread backlash for its dangerous decision to label six Palestinian human rights groups as terrorist organizations. “Supporters of Israel often say to critics, ‘Stop singling out Israel. Stop picking on Israel. Treat Israel like any other country,'” Mehdi Hasan said on his MSNBC news program. “Well, okay then. Let’s condemn them for doing this then because when our other allies, like Turkey or Saudi Arabia or Egypt, crack down on human rights groups, we condemn them for it. We criticize them. So why give Israel a pass?”
The Democratic Majority for Israel group has been celebrated by Biden and Pelosi though it spreads a vicious lie with a tweet saying that Rep. Rashida Tlaib is complicit in terrorism because she is appearing with Mohammed El-Kurd, the face of resistance to the expulsions of Palestinians from Jerusalem.
Supporters of Palestinian human rights are always accused of antisemitism. Ben Cohen of Ben and Jerry’s gave a strong answer to such charges when he said he is “totally fine” with them because they are absurd. “I mean, What? I’m anti-Jewish! I mean, I’m a Jew, all my family is Jewish, my friends are Jewish.”
Rashida Tlaib speaking out against Iron Dome funding reveals opposing Israel’s occupation is no longer taboo among elected American politicians.