Political divisions among Democrats over the war between Israel and Hamas are at the center of several upcoming primaries against liberal members who oppose the war.
Political divisions among Democrats over the war between Israel and Hamas are at the center of several upcoming primaries against liberal members who oppose the war.
Freshman Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa., is a proud new member of the so-called “Squad” in Congress, made up of a handful of the party’s most liberal members. “We put forward the boldest priorities and fight for them, and we show other people how to fight for them,” she told NPR in a recent interview, “so to me it’s not a pejorative at all.”
While criticism of the Squad most often comes from conservatives, in the 2024 primaries forces normally aligned with the Democratic Party are working to defeat Lee and other members of the Squad for their critical stance on Israel in the ongoing war with Hamas.
“What we have now is a representative who has aligned herself with a small minority of the Democratic Party and has gotten a lot of votes, I would say, that are not with the majority of Democrats in Congress,” said Bhavini Patel, who is challenging Lee in the upcoming Pennsylvania primary on April 23.
Lee was one of nine Democrats who opposed a resolution to support Israel, condemn Hamas and reaffirm the United States’ commitment to Israel’s security following the October 7 attack on Israel that killed about 1,200 people, the worst attack against the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
And earlier this year, under pressure from fellow Democrats, including Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who is Jewish, Lee canceled an appearance at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Muslim advocacy group, after reports that some of the speakers scheduled for the event had made anti-Semitic comments about October 7.
“We need to ask ourselves why she would want to go and share that scenario to begin with,” Patel said.
It’s a question that resonates in his Pittsburgh-area district, which includes most of the city and the eastern suburbs, as well as in the historically Jewish neighborhood of Squirrel Hill, where Patel’s campaign signs dot the lawns of the neighborhood and where she proposed to establish the headquarters of her opposition campaign. The district is also home to the Tree of Life synagogue where, in 2018, a gunman killed 11 Jewish worshipers and wounded six others in the deadliest anti-Semitic attack in U.S. history.
Changing views on Israel are at the heart of the ‘Squad’s’ biggest challenges
Lee is the favorite to win her primary (she has the backing of prominent Democratic figures such as Senators Bob Casey and John Fetterman), but it is the first pressure test in a series of Democratic primaries in the coming months in which both donors Wealthy Republicans like pro-Israel Democrats are focused on defeating other members of the squad, including Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Cori Bush of Missouri and Jamaal Bowman of New York.
“We have a small group of anti-Israel members in Congress. It’s a small group, but we have to keep it from growing,” said Mark Mellman, a veteran Democratic pollster and strategist who helped from the Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI) in 2019. The arm politician, DMFI PAC, has endorsed primary challengers against Bush and Bowman (the first endorsements against the incumbents) and told NPR that more endorsements are likely.
Likewise, the American Israel Political Action Committee (AIPAC) has also endorsed the main challengers against Bush and Bowman, and other endorsements are possible.
This attack on progressive rulers prompted a coalition of nearly two dozen liberal activist groups, including the Democratic Socialists of America, to launch REJECT AIPAC just last month. It aims to counter the $100 million that AIPAC and its affiliates, including its super PAC United Democracy Project, are willing to spend on the 2024 campaigns.
This is not a dispute between friends. Usamah Andrabi, a spokesperson for Justice Democrats, one of the member groups, told NPR that a generational shift is occurring among young progressives in the way they view the pro-Israel lobby in Washington.
“AIPAC is the model of our generation [National Rifle Association]”He said, “How [the NRA] become a right-wing lobby aligned with Republicans against all gun safety legislation, no matter what type of gun violence the product was, we have seen the exact same thing happen with AIPAC, which has moved increasingly to the right on extremism of the Israeli government. that demands unconditional support from its sponsors [Israel]and increasingly to the right as his donor base has drawn increasing shares of Republican mega-donors.”
AIPAC does accept money from Republicans. Contributors to his super PAC include Republican mega-donors like Bernie Marcus and Paul Singer, both Jews with a long history of also supporting pro-Israel causes. However, AIPAC remains one of the largest contributors to the Democratic Party. One of the biggest recipients in this election is House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.
AIPAC says its “sole criteria” for endorsing candidates is their position on strengthening the U.S.-Israel relationship, and spokesman Marshall Wittman told NPR in response to this story that AIPAC “believes it is entirely consistent with the values progressives support the Jewish State.
Mellman acknowledges that there is no clear solution to this Democratic divide. “There is a gap among Democrats that can be healed, but it cannot be healed when people launch that type of invective against Democratic groups like ours or against the State of Israel or the Jewish people,” he said.
For his part, Lee rejected the argument that his position that progressives are out of step with public opinion on Israel. just last week a gallup poll showed that a majority of Americans now disapprove of Israel’s handling of the war in Gaza, compared to the majority who approved shortly after the Oct. 7 attack.
“Every day the number of people who see what is happening in Gaza and realize that it is an unsustainable situation increases,” he said, “and I think what we see a lot is people not getting the message across.” but the messenger.”
Debates among Democrats on Israel do not recede
Retiree Lisa Messineo lives in Lee’s district and has been campaigning to get out the vote later this month. She personally supports Lee, but told NPR that she believes Lee’s position on Israel hurts her in this primary. “Well,” she sighed, “I think so, yes.” Pennsylvania has closed its primaries, meaning only registered Democrats can vote in them. Messineo said she complains about Lee from “the old guard” of area Democrats, who generally don’t like criticism of Israel. “They don’t look at the work she does,” Messineo said, “they just say, ‘I don’t like it because she wants to be a member of the team.'”
Lee told NPR that the effort to oust progressives could have negative repercussions for the party in November. “When you see us on the ballot, we bring our communities with us,” said she, who is black and 36 years old. In Pennsylvania, voter turnout is important not only for Lee but also for President Biden in a critical swing state.
What these primaries could indicate is exactly who is welcome within the Democratic Party. “You can’t say the Democratic Party is a big tent and then, at the same time, walking into that tent is big enough to [centrist West Virginia Sen.] Joe Manchin, but that tent is not big enough for a progressive black woman,” Lee said.
