The U.S. Democratic Party has been a strong supporter of the State of Israel since Harry Truman. President Truman was a fierce advocate of U.N. Resolution 181 in 1948, the partition plan that would have divided the British Mandate of Palestine into a Jewish state and Arab state after the Mandate ended and was influential in its passing. Despite the Arabs’ rejection of the resolution, Truman immediately recognized the State of Israel when it declared its independence on May 14, 1948, against the advice of his own State Department.
President Lyndon B. Johnson was also a fierce supporter of the State of Israel during his presidency, viewing its conflicts with Arab states like Egypt as a proxy war of the United States with the Soviet Union. Johnson therefore oversaw the sale of weapons to Israel and looked the other way when there were signs Israel was developing nuclear weapons. President Bill Clinton was instrumental in helping Israel and the Palestinians implement the Oslo Accords. He put his reputation on the line to help achieve a final status peace resolution at the Camp David Summit, which ultimately failed and was followed by the Palestinian terror waves of the Second Intifada. Clinton placed the blame for the failure squarely on PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, stating, “I’m a colossal failure, and you made me one.”
President Obama did not carry on this pro-Israel legacy. He regularly butted heads with the right of center administration of prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and did not offer the kind of full-throated support Israel was used to from previous democratic presidents. Worse, it can be argued that Obama’s administration opened the door to the rise of the radical progressive wing of the Democratic Party, which crystallized under Trump. With the election of several new House members in 2018, such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, and Rashida Tlaib, dubbed “The Squad,” criticism of Israel became a fashionable plank in progressive party politics. Their anti-Israel views and policies became a foil not only to the Israel-forward policies of Trump and Jared Kushner, but to those of moderate democratic House members like Steny Hoyer and Ritchie Torres.
Even before the vicious October 7th, 2023 attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists, the Democratic Party was undergoing an “Israel test.” So named by prominent Jewish philanthropist Adam Milstein in a 2021 article for The Jerusalem Post, the Israel test asks the important questions, “Where will [the party] stand when it comes to continuing America’s longstanding, bipartisan support for Israel? Will it banish the far left voices spewing hatred of the Jewish state? Or will these voices eventually become the party‘s mainstream?”
Adam Milstein has always been a clear voice on the tensions that exist between the moderate wing of the Democratic Party, now led by President Biden and pro-Israel firebrands like Congressman Richie Torres, and the progressive wing, which has since grown to encompass members like virulent anti-Israel representative Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush. An American of Israeli descent, Milstein co-founded the Adam and Gila Milstein Family Foundation with Gila, his wife in 2000, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting causes that strengthen American values, the U.S.-Israel alliance, the State of Israel, and the Jewish People. Thanks to his advocacy, Milstein knows full well the political impetus behind the progressive wing’s anti-Israel, anti-Zionist bent and how they’re riding the wave of popular left-wing frameworks like Critical Race Theory and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and fashionable academic narratives like anti-imperialism and anti-colonialism, all of which put Jews and Israel in danger.
Milstein’s fundamental “Israel test” questions have only become more stark since October 7th, as progressive House members continuously vow to block aid to Israel, even the vital Iron Dome funding. But much of Milstein’s analysis from 2021 still stands. Though they are loud and media-savvy, “these strident voices still represent a fringe minority of the Democratic Party.” And they’re not politically invincible. When former Ohio state senator and “radical leftist” Nina Turner ran for Ohio’s 11th House district, enjoying an endorsement from Senator Bernie Sanders and a “35-point lead in the polls,” she was ultimately defeated by centrist Shontel Brown, supported by Hillary Clinton. As Milstein says, “The proof is on the ballot.”
And once again, in the 2024 election, a Sanders-backed leftist faces off against a Clinton-backed moderate. Squad member Jamaal Bowman, who has recently accused Israel of genocide and called anyone who supports Israel complicit in genocide, was just challenged and defeated in the primary by George Latimer a Westchester County Executive. The contest was focused heavily Bowman’s incendiary views towards Israel. As democratic consultant Doug Gordon told The Hill, “This primary is more about the war in Gaza than anything else.”
Milstein says “the American public soundly passes the Israel test,” a claim which continues to be borne out in polling that shows the majority of Americans support Israel in its war against Hamas. Time will tell whether the public continues to pass that test in the 2024 election cycle. Whether the Democratic Party itself does is another story. Milstein argues that in order “[t]o stay vibrant and relevant,” the party “must unite around its support of Israel and disavow the radicals who are out of touch with the American public.”
Democratic politicians have been dealing with these internal tensions for some years now, but October 7th brought them out into the open in a drastic way. With the steady stream of news coming out of the Middle East about the Gaza war as well as Hezbollah and Iran’s attacks on Israel, the Israel test is now more visible than ever. But as has been shown, virulent criticism of Israel is not a winning strategy with the public. In order to keep from falling apart, Milstein says “Democrats must choose to stand with Israel, as they historically have and as most of them continue to do. If the Democratic Party recognizes that the Israel test will determine its future, it can muster the integrity to withstand the radicals, reclaim its time-honored support for Israel, and return to the deserved vitality it once enjoyed.”
The 2024 election cycle will help determine who passes the Israel test and who doesn’t.
