Bought-And-Paid-For: Biden's Long History Pandering to the Israeli Lobby
By Editors - February 13, 2021 0 Covert Magazine
[Source: timesofisrael.com]
Part 4 of: WHO IS JOE BIDEN, REALLY? - CAM exposes his 30-year history as a
pawn of U.S.-Israel policy despite its ongoing violation of Palestinian
rights and crimes against humanity.
While Democrats accused Donald Trump of being a Russian agent, they don't
seem to care that Biden is a bought-and-paid-for agent of the Israeli lobby.
In the late 1980s, Rannie Amiri, an independent commentator on political
affairs, challenged then-Senator Joe Biden on his stance toward the
Israel-Palestine conflict following a campus speech that Biden gave, asking
him:
Rather than succumb to the influence of various lobbying groups in
Washington, such as AIPAC [American Israel Public Affairs Committee-which
promotes the views of Israel's right-wing Likud Party], and the untold
amount of money they use to dictate policy, wouldn't it be more prudent to
examine the real effects that collective punishment, daily humiliation, and
countless civilian casualties inflicted by the Israelis have on an occupied
population, and use that understanding to formulate a more rational approach
toward the Palestinians?
According to Amiri, Senator Biden responded by walking directly from the
podium to where he stood and, nose-to-nose, tried to refute his analysis
about the influence of the Israeli lobby and the heavy-handed approach
employed by Israel toward the Palestinians.
At the end of the exchange, Biden turned, put his arm around Amiri's
shoulder, and addressed the audience.
If this was not such a fine, articulate, and sincere young man, and he
implied that my vote had been bought, I would give him a swift kick in the
ass.
The audience roared in applause, and Amiri sat back down to his chair
defeated. However, a friend rose up to defend him, telling Biden: "If my
father heard you say such a thing, I believe he would have done the same to
you first."
Bought-And-Paid-For
Amiri's remarks obviously hit a sore spot in Biden which remains relevant
today-over 30 years later.
During the 2020 presidential election, pro-Israel Political Action
Committees (PACs) provided Biden with $3,830,209, compared to $955,174 for
Donald Trump-indicating that Biden's vote on the Arab-Israeli conflict has
indeed been bought-as it has been for many years.
The Jewish Democratic Council of America (JDCA), a Jewish lobby group that
promotes Democratic Party candidates, proclaimed that "no candidate for
president in either party has ever run with as long and as strong of a
pro-Israel record as Joe Biden."
Characterizing Biden as a "mensch [Yiddish term for man who does good
deeds]," the JDCA pointed out that Biden, as Vice President, supported
"unprecedented levels of security assistance to Israel," helping to shape
the record $38 billion, 10-year memorandum of understanding between the U.S.
and Israel signed in 2016.
Biden with right-wing Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu in 2016. [Source:
timesofisrael.com]
During the 2014 Operation Protective Edge, which left more than 2,000 Gazans
dead and 10,000 wounded, Biden was a key advocate securing support for
"life-saving technologies like the Iron-Dome David's sling and arrow
anti-rocket and missile defense systems."
An Israeli missile launched from the Iron Dome defense missile system,
designed to intercept and destroy incoming short-range rockets and artillery
shells, in the southern Israeli city of Sderot. [Source: timesofisrael.com]
Eric Lynn, a senior Pentagon official, told The Times of Israel that
as soon as that request was made by the Israelis in the middle of the
conflict and taken to the president, Vice President Joe Biden's words and
President Obama's words were, 'Get it done.'
Young Biden and Golda
Biden was raised by Catholic parents who were staunchly supportive of Israel
and imbued him with a great respect for the Jewish state and need for a
Jewish homeland following the horrors of the Holocaust.
Biden's connection to Israel deepened in 1973 when the then-thirty-year-old
freshman Senator met with Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir as part of a
tour of Israel on the eve of the Yom Kippur War.
Biden considered the meeting "one of the most consequential" of his career.
Meir chain-smoked as she went into vivid detail about the Six-Day War,
reading letters from soldiers who had been killed, and then pored over maps
detailing the regional security threats facing Israel.
Next to her sat Yitzhak Rabin, the future Prime Minister who had commanded
the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in the Six-Day War.
When Biden expressed concern about Israel's security, Meir allegedly told
him "not to worry-we have a secret weapon in our conflict with the Arabs!
You see we have no place else to go."
(Left) Newly elected Democratic senator from Delaware, Joe Biden, on
December 13, 1972; (Right) Prime Minister Golda Meir speaking at the United
Nations, October 22, 1970. [Source: timesofisrael.com]
Biden at the time was somewhat critical of Israeli policies, warning Meir
that Israel's actions in the territories it had captured during the Six-Day
War, including the West Bank and Gaza Strip, were leading to "creeping
annexation."
Believing that Israel was militarily dominant in the region, he suggested
that the Jewish state might initiate a first step for peace through
unilateral withdrawals from areas with no strategic importance-something
Meir rejected.
Biden was further critical of the Nixon administration for being "dragged by
Israel," complaining that it was impossible to have a real debate in the
Senate about the Middle East as Senators were fearful of saying things
unpopular with Jewish voters.
However, after returning from his visit with Meir, Biden became more
unequivocal in his support for Israel, moving away from the position of J.
William Fulbright (D-AR.), Biden's predecessor as Chairman of the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee, who warned that, "by underwriting
intransigence," Israel's supporters in the U.S. were "encouraging a course
which must lead toward her destruction-and just possibly ours as well."[1]
J. William Fulbright [Source: wikipedia.org]
One of Israel's Champions in Washington
In October 1975, Biden co-sponsored a Senate resolution advanced by Hubert
Humphrey (D-MN) condemning a resolution adopted by the United Nations
General Assembly equating Zionism with racism, and another in July 1975
legitimately expressing disapproval of attempts to expel Israel from the
United Nations.
Five years later, Biden signed a letter with four other members of the
Senate Committee on Foreign Relations (Frank Church (D-ID), Paul Sarbanes
(D-MD), Jacob Javitz (R-NY) and Richard S. Stone (D-NY) urging
reconsideration of the Carter administration's rejection of an Israeli
request to renew an agreement giving Israel preferential access to the U.S.
strategic stockpile on diamonds, including the right to buy industrial
diamonds at a negotiated price.
In May 1982, Senator Biden co-sponsored a resolution sponsored by Edward
Kennedy (D-MA) barring weapons sales to Jordan, which had been at war with
Israel since 1948, and which aimed to ensure that Israel retained its
"qualitative military edge in the Middle East."
Joe Biden (left) and Edward Kennedy (right) co-sponsored legislation that
aimed to ensure Israel's qualitative military edge in 1982. The photo above
was taken in 1972 when Biden first campaigned for the Senate. [Source:
delawareonline.com]
Biden at this time was a leading opponent in the U.S. Senate of the proposed
sales of advanced weapons systems like the F-15 fighters and AWACS radar
aircraft to Saudi Arabia and other Arab states. In September 1981, he was
quoted in The New York Times, stating: "If the administration tries to bring
this deal up here now without modification, we will beat them."
Several months later, Biden voted to not only dramatically step up aid to
Israel-over the objections of President Reagan who was strongly
pro-Israel-but supported a measure that would ensure U.S. aid to Israel
would forever be equal to the amount of U.S. debt repaid by the country.
"It's one of the most extraordinary proposals I have heard," said Illinois
Republican Charles H. Percy, the then-chairman of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, who opposed the measure. "The first time in the history
of the United States. It makes the American taxpayer responsible for all
Israeli debts and all future debts."
Support for Lebanon War and Exchange with Menachem Begin
In June 1982, at the height of the Israeli war on Lebanon, which left 20,000
Lebanese civilians dead and was considered "Israel's Vietnam,"[2] Biden was
one of 36 Senators who met with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin on
Capitol Hill.
Israeli soldiers rampaging in Southern Lebanon following June 1982 invasion.
[Source: honestreporting.com]
Biden's colleague, Paul Tsongas (D-MA), expressed indignation at reports
that Israel used cluster bombs against civilians in Lebanon.
Paul Tsongas [Source: wikipedia.com]
Tsongas said that "the love affair with Israel from the time of Golda Meir
is gone because of Begin. How can I be concerned about human rights in El
Salvador and the Soviet Union and not speak out on Lebanon?'"
Biden by contrast told Begin that he supported the war in Lebanon and went
even further than Israel's position, according to Begin, when he stated that
he would "forcefully fend off anyone who invaded his country, even if it
meant killing women or children."
Begin said that he "disassociated myself from these remarks. I said to him
[Biden]: No, sir; attention must be paid. According to our values, it is
forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war . Sometimes there are
casualties among the civilian population as well. But it is forbidden to
aspire to this. This is a yardstick of human civilization, not to hurt
civilians."
Biden and Begin, also at the meeting, clashed over the issue of settlements.
Biden said he felt that Israel had to halt the policy of establishing new
Jewish settlements in the West Bank, stating that Israel was losing support
in this country [the U.S.] because of the settlement policy.
According to eyewitness reports, Biden banged the table as the exchange with
Begin grew heated, and Biden threatened to cut off U.S. aid to Israel over
the settlement issue.
Begin's reply became lore among his followers: "This desk is designed for
writing, not for fists," he said, according to an account written by a
confidante just after Begin's 1992 death.
Don't threaten us with slashing aid. Do you think that because the U.S.
lends us money it is entitled to impose on us what we must do? We are
grateful for the assistance we have received, but we are not to be
threatened. I am a proud Jew. Three thousand years of culture are behind me,
and you will not frighten me with threats.
Begin added that U.S. aid to Israel was not a one-way street, stating that
"we do a lot for you. And, also in recent battles, we did a lot for the
United States."
Menachem Begin [Source: mondoweiss.net]
A couple of weeks later, following the massacre of more than 700
Palestinians at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps by Lebanese Christian
militias allied with Israel, Biden reaffirmed his support for the Lebanon
war at a retreat held by the United Jewish Appeal Young Leadership Cabinet.
Biden spoke there alongside the executive director of AIPAC and future
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, stating that Israel's presence in
Lebanon was "vitally important."
Image from the aftermath of the Sabra and Shatila massacre which Biden
refused to condemn. [Source: trtworld.com]
Biden later appeared at the annual conference of Herut Zionists of America
(Herut was Begin's original party) where he blamed the lack of Middle East
peace on Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the Palestinian Liberation Organization
(PLO) and pledged that his next order of business in the new Senate would be
be to "educate my colleagues on the financial sacrifices Israel has made as
a result of Camp David [accords signed by Jimmy Carter in 1979 ending
Israel's conflict with Egypt]."
In February 1984, Biden co-sponsored a resolution promoted by
neoconservative Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-NY) requiring that the
U.S. Embassy in Israel and the residence of the U.S. Ambassador to Israel be
moved to Jerusalem.[3]
Daniel Patrick Moynihan [Source: nytimes.com]
The move was later fulfilled under President Donald Trump in a blow against
the Palestinians whose aim had long been to establish East Jerusalem as the
capital of a future Palestinian state.[4]
The Best $3 Billion Investment
In June 1986, four years after his exchange with Begin and thirteen years
after meeting Golda Meir, Biden gave an impassioned speech before the U.S.
Senate in which he stated:
It's about time we stop apologizing for our support for Israel. It is the
best $3 billion investment we make. If there weren't an Israel, the US of A
would have to invent an Israel to protect her interests in the region.
These interests centered on control of Middle Eastern oil, which was enabled
by Israel's function as a regional Gendarmerie.
A year after Biden's speech, the U.S. topped the $3 billion threshold in the
amount of aid it dispensed to Israel.
At the time, the Republicans were viewed as the party that was less friendly
to Israel compared with the Democrats, as was exemplified by Biden.
In February 1986, Biden met with the former Israeli ambassador to the U.S.,
Meir Rosenne, and then-embassy staffer Yosef Lambden in an attempt to
burnish his pro-Israel credentials in preparation for his first presidential
run.
Meir Rosenne [Source: haaretz.com]
In their conversation, Biden asserted his belief that U.S. officials had not
done enough for the Jews during World War II-an accurate assessment-and
should not publicly criticize Israel as they would not do so to other
favored allies like Great Britain, adding that Israel was "America's best
investment, where we get the biggest bang for our buck."
In Biden's view, a fatal mistake in U.S. policy had occurred in 1982, when
the Reagan administration decided to strive for strategic consensus in the
Persian Gulf and shifted the center of gravity from America's true friend,
Israel, to others [referring to the sale of warplanes to Saudi Arabia].
Biden went on at the meeting to compare the PLO to the Irish Republican Army
(IRA), which originally fought British colonial rule during the country's
War of Independence (1919-1921).
Lambden wrote that,
as someone of Irish descent, [Biden] considered the IRA to be like any other
terror organization which would never compromise with the moderates, with
the lowest common denominator always holding sway.
Yasser Arafat, Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from
1969 to 2004 and President of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) from
1994 to 2004. [Source: american.aljazeera.com]
This assessment ignores the circumstances that gave rise to the IRA and PLO
and the fact that both were ridden by factional divisions between radicals
and moderates and often amenable to diplomacy.
In 1974, the PLO adopted a ten-point platform that allowed for engagement in
diplomatic channels, and provided validation for future compromises made by
the Palestinian leadership in its goal of establishing a Palestinian state
consisting of the West Bank and Gaza.[5]
By contrast, Israel, fearing that the Palestinians would exploit any
territorial compromises or gains to improve its position for attacking and
ultimately destroying it, largely pursued a rejectionist course-with the
exception of some efforts in the late 1990s under Ehud Barak.
Israel believed that it would prevail in any conflict because of its
military superiority.[6]
Biden felt he had to show his pro-Israel orientation while running for
president in 1988. [Source: haaretz.com]
During the meeting with Meir and Lambden, Biden reiterated his commitment to
Israel when he stated the U.S. should "tell the Arabs that Israel is
foremost among its friends, and that if the Arabs had a problem with that,
they should be aware that they would have a problem with the U.S. as well."
Biden ended by saying that "Israel wouldn't be sorry if he were elected to
the White House"-a statement that holds just as true today, nearly 35 years
later.
Choosing Goliath over David
While his ideological conviction appears strong, Biden's strong support for
Israel has at its core always been opportunistic.
Early in his career, Biden had taken rather nuanced and balanced positions
on the Arab-Israeli conflict that dissipated over time. Biden told Israeli
ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren that he lives by the dictum "Never
crucify yourself on a small cross." The message: The Palestinians are not
influential enough to champion, and that taking up their cause would be
political suicide.[7]
In a 2013 speech, Biden bragged that he had "done more fundraisers for AIPAC
(the main Israeli lobbying organization) in the '70s and early '80s
than-just about as many as anybody." One year, he even participated in their
membership drive.
Biden speaks at AIPAC conference. [Source: timesofisrael.com]
In the mid 1980s, Senator Biden's personal assistant, Sam Lauter, a
University of California Berkeley graduate, was on the board of the
Democratic Majority for Israel, which tries to enhance support for Israel in
the Democratic Party and was a decades-long AIPAC leader.
Lauter had met Biden at an AIPAC conference in the early 1980s. His mother,
Naomi, a close friend of Nancy Pelosi, was involved in AIPAC's founding in
the 1950s and was a key Bay Area leader of the group.
Democratic political strategist Sam Lauter with Joe Biden in 2019 at a
fundraiser in U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein's house. [Source: jweekly.com]
During Biden's 1988 presidential run, the youth director of his campaign,
Jonathan S. Kessler, was a former AIPAC staffer, and one of his fundraisers,
S. Harrison Dogole, a Philadelphia businessman, sat on AIPAC's national
advisory council and had a hand in two pro-Israel PACs. His national finance
chair also began in political fundraising through AIPAC and other pro-Israel
groups.
When Biden made another presidential run in 2008, his finance chairman,
Michael Adler, a wealthy Miami real estate investor and bundler for Biden in
2020, was also an AIPAC lobbyist.
According to the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, Biden had been
the pro-Israel lobby's "anointed candidate" in the 1988 race, and after the
election he continued to be among the top ten Senate recipients of money
from pro-Israel PACs, receiving tens of thousands of dollars from them each
year.
Biden was also among the highest recipients of pro-Israel honoraria-cash
payments from private groups for attending events like private meetings and
seminars, or for delivering speeches. These not only ran around Federal
Election Commission (FEC) regulations but could be used by candidates to pay
their personal debts.
"Part of Our Mishpucha:" The 1990s and 2000s
The effect of Biden's ties to the Israeli lobby had become evident by the
1990s and 2000s when (1) Biden no longer publicly challenged any Israeli
leaders on the settlements issue, (2) helped block peace overtures, (3) more
vocally criticized Palestinians for promoting terrorism, and (4) sought to
expand U.S. support to Israel even when it was taken over by the far-right
Likud Party.
In 1991, when President George H.W. Bush tried to topple Israeli Prime
Minister Yitzhak Shamir by withholding loan guarantees over settlement
activity, which Bush was trying to curtail, Biden signed up as an original
co-sponsor to Republican-led legislation in the Senate that would have
funded loan guarantees without condition.
Though devastated in 1995 to see his old friend Rabin assassinated for
making overtures toward peace, Biden worked closely with his successor,
Benjamin Netanyahu, whose political lineage traced to the militant,
uncompromising strand of Zionism promoted by Zeev Jabotinsky, which believed
that Israeli security could only be guaranteed through subjugation of the
Palestinians.
Netanyahu counted Biden as a close personal friend since the 1980s,
welcoming him to Israel as "part of our mishpucha [family]."
Biden and Netanyahu: Two old friends. [Source: israelhayom.com]
When a collection of Republicans sent letters to Clinton and other lawmakers
denouncing the Clinton administration's efforts to revive peace talks that
had lain dormant following Rabin's assassination, Biden and other liberals
sent a gentler letter also discouraging the idea.[8]
In the early 2000s, when the second Palestinian uprising, or intifada,
erupted after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon set foot on the Temple
Mount, the third holiest site in Islam which Israel was trying to retain
under its sovereignty, Biden introduced a Senate resolution expressing
solidarity with Israel.
Biden further teamed up with Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to introduce and pass
the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act, described by the Jerusalem Post as "one
of the harshest bills ever drafted" against Palestinian terrorism and a
rising Hamas, the Islamist militant organization that was elected to rule
Gaza.
In April 2002, when the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) massacred civilians at
the Jenin refugee camp and then bulldozed much of the camp, leaving some
4,000 people homeless, Senator Biden blamed the victims, claiming that
Palestinian terrorists had hidden among the civilians, making their killing
justifiable.
Image of remains of part of Jenin refugee camp after it was bulldozed by the
IDF. [Source: hrw.org]
When Israel subsequently started carrying out its policy of assassinations,
or so-called "targeted killings," Biden insisted the extra-judicial killings
were legal and even criticized the Bush administration for condemning them.
This latter stance signaled Biden's transformation from the somewhat earnest
young Senator who suggested to Golda Meir that Israel should withdraw from
non-strategic territory that it occupied into a seasoned pol who understood
the power of the Israeli lobby and was trying to gain political advantage
from the Islamophobic political climate after 9/11 and fear about terrorism.
Eulogy of Ariel Sharon
Following Ariel Sharon's death in 2014, Biden gave a stirring eulogy in
which he characterized the former Israeli Prime Minister (2001-2006) as a
"great man" whose "defining attributes-passion for the Jewish people,
physical and political courage, and love of this land-all played out on the
canvas of the State of Israel's historic trajectory."
Biden and Ariel Sharon in 2002. [Source: politico.com]
As an example of Sharon's political courage, Biden cited Sharon's push for
the removal of Israeli settlers from the Gaza Strip following the second
Intifada.
Biden left out that the settlers had to be removed because much of Gaza had
been devastated by IDF forces in a siege Sharon had ordered, and were
transferred to Israeli-occupied territory in the West Bank and Golan Heights
as part of a settlement expansion plan there.[9]
Biden's eulogy never mentioned the Palestinians, who considered Sharon a war
criminal-starting with the Qibya massacre of 1953 when forces under his
command killed at least 69 Palestinians in a West Bank village.[10]
The 1983 Kahan Commission found Sharon to be "personally responsible" for
"ignoring the danger of bloodshed and revenge" that culminated in the Sabra
and Shatila massacre in Lebanon.
Sharon also oversaw the suppression of the second Intifada (2002-2005) when
the IDF had evolved into a "killing machine whose efficiency is
awe-inspiring, yet shocking," according to the Israeli daily Haaretz.[11]
Sharon was a hated figure among Palestinians. [Source: timesofisrael.com]
PLO official Dr. Mustafa Barghouti told the BBC that the Palestinians had no
positive memories of Sharon.
Nobody should celebrate any death. But unfortunately, I have to say that Mr.
Sharon left no good memories with Palestinians. Unfortunately, he had a path
of war and aggression and a great failure in making peace with the
Palestinian people.
PLO negotiator and Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi added
to me, it's horrific to watch the hagiographies that are being produced by
people like Vice President Biden.about a man who really should have ended
his days at The Hague before the International Criminal Court.[12]
Vice President Joe Biden posed for pictures yesterday near Tel Aviv with his
wife, Jill, members of a U.S. aviation regiment, Israeli soldiers, and the
nation's defense minister, Ehud Barak. [Source: archive.boston.com]
Veep
Biden was considered "the best friend of Israel in the [Obama]
administration," according to Chuck Schumer (D-NY), helping to secure what
Netanyahu termed "unprecedented security assistance."
Michael Oren wrote that Biden embraced the perspective of Malcolm Hoenlein,
the executive vice-chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major
American Jewish Organizations, that there should be "no daylight" between
the U.S. and Israeli governments-when Obama himself had stated that during
George W. Bush's administration there had been "no daylight and no progress
[on the peace process]."
In a March 2013 speech before AIPAC, Biden boasted that he did not know of
any time "when there has [sic] been as many meetings, as much coordination,
between our intelligence services and our military. Matter of fact, they're
getting tired of traveling back across the ocean, I think."
Biden expressed further satisfaction that (1) America was the only country
in the UN to vote against the establishment of a fact-finding mission on
Israeli settlements; and (2) had invested $275 million in the Iron Dome
missile defense system, including $70 million the president had directed
last year on an "urgent basis," and was working to "deploy a powerful new
radar, networked with American early warning satellites."
Biden went on to (3) defend Israel's upholding a blockade against Gaza which
the UN deemed to be illegal, and (4) brag about helping Israel with damage
control after it was condemned for staging a military raid in May 2010 on a
flotilla carrying relief supplies into Gaza that resulted in the death of
ten Turkish activists.
Overlooked was a UN investigation which concluded that six of the activists
were killed on the flotilla in a manner suggesting execution and that
Israel's actions betrayed an "unacceptable level of brutality."
Activists hold banner of slain Turkish activists aboard Gaza Freedom
Flotilla. [Source: flotillayves1.weebly.com]
Besides with its assault on the flotilla, Biden said in his speech he was
proud that the Obama administration had "stood strongly with Israel in its
right to defend itself after the Goldstone Report was issued in 2009."
The latter was a report issued by a UN fact-finding team headed by South
African jurist Richard Goldstone, which called for further investigation
into war crimes committed in Israel's 2009 Operation Cast Lead, which left
1,300 Gazans and 13 Israelis dead.
Biden said that, "while the rest of the world, including some of our good
friend[s], was [sic] prepared to embrace the report, we came out
straightforwardly, expressed our concerns and with recommendations."
The U.S. by implication under Biden's leadership was trying to repudiate and
block a legitimate investigation into war crimes sanctioned by the UN and a
majority of world opinion.
Judge Richard Goldstone with his report detailing Israeli war crimes in
Gaza. [Source: theguardian.com]
Yesterday's Man Fights the Winds of Change
President Biden is inheriting a different political landscape from his
heyday in the Senate and even years as Vice-President, as public opinion on
the Israel-Palestine conflict has begun to shift dramatically.
Norman Finkelstein's book, Knowing Too Much: Why the American Jewish Romance
with Israel Is Coming to an End, documents how Jewish liberals-including
especially those under forty-increasingly do not identify with Israel's
right-wing, hyper-militaristic government and find Israel's disregard for
Palestinian rights to be shameful.
During the 2020 primaries, Bernie Sanders gave expression to their views as
the first viable presidential candidate in decades to raise concern about
Israel's human rights record.
Others on the left wing of the Democratic Party are also taking up the
question of Palestine as an integral part of their message against racism
and austerity.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), for example, has pushed for legislation to
defund Israel's ongoing annexation of Palestinian land, and
now-Congresswoman Cori Bush (D-MO) released a statement days before her
primary victory which read:
Cori Bush stands in solidarity with the Palestinian people just as they have
stood in solidarity with Black Americans fighting for their own lives.
Pro-Palestine Democrats: Cori Bush, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar. [Source:
english.alarby.co.uk]
As yesterday's man, President-elect Biden has a clear task ahead of him in
trying to restore the status quo and fight off the left flank of his party
on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
When Sanders suggested during the primary that "we cannot give [aid] carte
blanche to the Israeli government . We have the right to demand respect for
human rights and democracy," Biden retorted that "the idea that I'd withdraw
military aid, as others have suggested, from Israel, is bizarre."
Bizarre to him, perhaps; But not so to younger generations of voters who do
not see Israel in the same way as their elders.