When it comes to Israel, the positions of the remaining Democrats seeking the presidential nomination of their party are positively alarming.
A common theme running through these politicians’ public pronouncements is that something is not quite right with the relationship between the U.S. and the Jewish state. Ominously, they all signal that some significant changes have to be made – whether Israel agrees to them or not. At a recent J Street conference, some even called for using U.S. aid to Israel as leverage to force such changes.
Sen. Bernie Sanders was the most emphatic in making the case:
At a time when we spend $3.8 billion on military aid to Israel, we have the right to say to the Israeli government that the United States of America and our taxpayers and our people believe in human rights, we believe in democracy, we will not accept authoritarianism or racism and we demand that the Israeli government sit down with the Palestinian people and negotiate an agreement that works for all parties.
Sanders also has the distinction of having hired the virulently anti-Israel Linda Sarsour as his frequent stand-in at political appearances.
Given Sanders’s significant support in the Democratic Party, there can be little doubt about what a Democratic victory in the 2020 presidential election would mean for Israel. The extraordinarily pro-Israel Trump policies would be history, to the detriment not only of Israel but to the Middle East security interests of the United States and overall regional stability as well.
The Obama embrace of the patently phony J Street “pro-Israel” agenda, with its core notion that Israel must follow the dictates of others, would return and all incentives for Palestinians to seriously negotiate with Israel would quickly evaporate.
We hope that our Jewish defense organizations will step up to the plate and defend Israel against the coming Democratic onslaught in the run up to 2020. The American Jewish Congress, the World Jewish Congress, and the Zionist Organization of America have already called upon Sanders to sever his ties to Sarsour. We hope they will not shrink from continuing to confront the Israel haters.
Several other prominent organizations, however, have unfortunately remained silent on the Sanders-Sarsour connection. It’s high time they were heard from on this no-brainer. And it’s high time that all of them – not only so-called “right-wing” organizations – decry any and all calls for pressuring Israel to make concessions with a Palestinian Authority that dreams of Israel’s destruction.