Oakland, Ca. (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – Why has the Democratic leadership shown such reluctance to take effective legislative action to halt the flow of arms and military supplies to Israel, given the Netanyahu government’s orchestrated genocide and starvation in Gaza? Despite the overwhelming consensus among grassroots Democrats, the Democratic National Committee just last week shot down a resolution to impose an arms embargo on Israel, halt military aid to the country and support a Palestinian state.
The party leadership is in denial over how much of an albatross the Gaza War is around the party’s neck. Silence over Gaza likely contributed to Kamala Harris’ defeat in the 2024 Presidential Election, costing her enthusiasm especially among young voters.
Numerous “progressive” legislators have chosen to be beholden to the campaign contributions of the America Israel Public Affairs Committee. AIPAC largesse also explains the sudden spine-and-balls disappearances of Democratic leaders Hakeem Jeffries, Amy Klobuchar, Adam Schiff, among others over the Gaza genocide. Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer is an AIPAC recipient too, despite his dramatic Floor speech saying that US support for Israel is no longer unconditional. I was surprised to find the list of Congressmen who take big money from AIPAC to be as long and deep as it is.
Lobbying and influence-peddling are endemic to American politics. Campaign finance reform, made almost impossible by the Roberts court, has never been more urgent. In some respects, AIPAC does not differ from the pharmaceuticals lobby or other such special interest groups. It is unique, however, in that it represents the interests of a foreign country but its officials are not forced to register as foreign agents. It is certainly not a lobby for the American Jewish community. Some 53% of American Jews say they have “no confidence” in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to do the right thing. In contrast, AIPAC has an almost cult-like devotion to upholding the government in power in Israel, and to punishing its critics in Congress. AIPAC represents the interests of a small super-wealthy group, not of the broad Jewish American community. It doesn’t win every fight in the national legislature, but it has disproportionate, and increasingly pernicious influence.
Previously, I’ve called out how AIPAC has gone beyond traditional lobbying organizations by directly meddling in US politics, and financing primary challenges against Democratic House Reps and Senators, who challenge Israel’s depraved brutality. Because the American Right wing is so dependably an ally of the Israeli far right, AIPAC has become an effective weapon against American progressivism. AIPAC has financially supported over 137 House Reps and Senators, who voted to overturn the 2020 Election! AIPAC and the United Democracy Project (UDP), its super PAC affiliate, spent over $53 million in direct support for pro-Israel candidates in 2024, after spending $26 million during the 2022 midterms.
Memphis Congressional Rep. Steve Cohen appears to be the only Jewish House member who is not beholden to AIPAC’s “contributions,” though he is not a formal “AIPAC Rejecter.” Cohen is also the only Jewish House member, who represents a majority Black district. Instead, he has received financial support from J Street, the centrist pro-peace Jewish organization, which is opposed to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.
Cohen’s Congressional sinister mirror is David Kustoff, (who is also Jewish) and has accepted $227,697 from AIPAC and the Republican Jewish Committee (RJC). Kustoff represents the East Memphis suburbs in a brazenly gerrymandered district, which stretches to just west of Nashville. The political and social contrasts between the two men could not be more different. Yet they both represent parts of the same city, and are members of the same congregation, Temple Israel. My discussion comparing and contrasting the two men earned me banishment from the Memphis JCC, where I used to coach swimming and basketball. I accept that with honor! While AIPAC has not given money to Cohen, it has donated to all other members of the Tennessee Congressional delegation.
I have also discussed how Israel’s behavior in Gaza has made it into a “pariah state.” In keeping with like minds, NYT columnist Tom Friedman published a piece with a similar headline characterization on August 25. In his column, Friedman discussed various instances of Jewish or Israeli travelers encountering hostility because of their passports. He called out how 1600 Israelis were stranded near Syros Island in Greece in July, when their entry was blocked by protesters. Israeli travelers have been detained in European airports, denied entry into restaurants, and subjected to doxing.
By accepting AIPAC money, US elected officials are doing Israel no favor, for they are then led to support the governmental officials responsible for Israel’s “pariah” status. They are taking America itself down the same path of global alienation that Ronald Reagan did. But the stakes are higher now, with convicted felon Donald Trump abusing the presidency for his own grift, greed and retribution, and earning the United States its own “pariah” status.
Though Zionism arose in the late 19th Century out of the oppression of the Jewish community in Europe, t Zionist ideology never really adhered to many Jewish ideals expressed in the Torah, Talmud and Midrash. A recent Informed Comment discussion by Yakov M. Rabkin illustrates how Israeli Founding Father, David Ben-Gurion had no use for squishy, sensitive Biblical ideals, and rationalized a brutal mindset saying, “We are not yeshiva students debating the fine points of self-improvement. We are conquerors of the land facing a wall of iron, and we have to break through it.” That reminded me an opening scene in the film Papillion, when a Devil’s Island prison warden tells Steve McQueen during orientation, “We are not priests; we are processors.” Netanyahu’s government and followers have the same mindset to dispense with anything related to spiritual Judaism, in the quest for Zionist imperial domination. All this is abetted by Trump, who similarly has no use for Christian nor American ideals, in his personal quest for global domination. The two men are partners in crimes against humanity.
The “progressive” House Representatives and Senators who depend on AIPAC’s campaign contributions are indirectly associating themselves with the Israeli extreme right and its genocidal goals, blackening America’s own reputation, and disingenuously supporting Trump’s plans for a resort in Gaza and for the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians. By aligning with Trump on this issue, they are undermining their own progressive agenda and the electoral prospects of the Democratic Party. Democratic Party politicians must just say “no” to AIPAC, and those that won’t should be primaried.
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