The Daily - The Democrats and Israel

Episode Date: February 19, 2019

In the weeks since they’ve taken office, two freshman Democrats — Representatives Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib — have been engulfed in controversy over their criticisms of Israel. We look at how, after decades of unwavering commitment to Israel, the Democratic Party is now dealing with charges of anti-Semitism. Guests: Sheryl Gay Stolberg, who covers Congress for The New York Times, and Jonathan Weisman, the deputy Washington editor of The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today. In the weeks since they've taken office, two freshman Democrats, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, have been engulfed in controversy over their criticisms of Israel. My colleagues Cheryl Gay Stolber and Jonathan Weissman on how, after decades of unwavering commitment to Israel, the Democratic Party is now dealing with charges of anti-Semitism. It's Tuesday, February 19th. New York, Friday, May 14th, 1948.

The United Nations General Assembly is in special session. To understand the long relationship between Democrats and Israel. A new nation is being born. You really have to go back to the founding of the Jewish state. Israel, they have named their state. This is what they have waited for. This is what they have prayed for. It was my attitude that the American government couldn't stand idly by while the victims of Hitler's madness were not allowed to build new lives.

Harry Truman, who was a Democrat, was the president who recognized Israel. Hitler had been murdering Jews right and left. It's estimated that he killed six million Jews, burned most of them up in furnaces. It was a horrible thing. that he killed six million Jews, burned most of them up in furnaces. It was a horrible thing. I saw it, and I dream about it even to this day. And on that account, the Jews needed someplace where they could go.

So it is associated with a Democrat, and Democrats felt a real affinity for the state of Israel. The concept of the kibbutz is relatively simple to explain. Everyone shares everything they have. They work together and they live together. The laborer and the manager have the same wages. The alliance was one of values. Israel was a very aspirational

state. It was a state about social justice, about a socialist way of thinking, giving an oppressed people a homeland. So all of those things really appealed to Democrats who envisioned themselves as the fighters for oppressed people. We are in the midst of a very critical situation. We should, therefore, carefully avoid approaching international problems on an emotional basis. Whereas Republicans were much more pragmatic

and realpolitik. Republicans' social policy views and foreign policy views did not really align with the Jewish state. Republicans certainly did not espouse socialism. And on the foreign policy side, Israel's establishment in the middle of the Arab world had foreign policy pragmatists within the Republican Party, very concerned that support for Israel would undermine America's ties with important oil-producing states like Saudi Arabia. And they saw Israel and the backing of Israel as a real complication in that. And was skepticism of Israel at this moment seen as anti-Semitic? Not really. And that is partly because American Jews were not absolutely sold on the notion of Zionism in an Israeli state. For the longest time,

American Judaism really evolved as its own religion. American Jews decided that the United States, this pluralistic, open, accepting society, was the new Zion. They were going to put their roots down in America. Then, the politics of Israel inside the United States really began to shift at the 1973 Yom Kippur War. At 2 p.m., the armies of Egypt and Syria crossed the border. It was a truly surprise invasion by the Arab countries. While the nation of Israel observed Yom Kippur, the combined military forces of Egypt and Syria launched a simultaneous and surprise attack

on Israel's southern and northern borders. In that war, Israel almost was wiped off the map. All the Israelis are moving in force across the canal in the central sector. They're having to run aground. The Israelis were backed against the wall. But... They battled their way out.

Three years after the Yom Kippur War came another major moment for American politics in Israel, and that was the raid on Entebbe. Israel is keeping some of the details secret, but it's known that three American-made transports flew 2,500 miles to Uganda, carrying Israeli commandos armed and ready for combat. After an Air France plane carrying largely Jewish passengers was hijacked by a

Palestinian group on its way from Tel Aviv to Paris. This Israeli commando force lands in this airport in Uganda and rescues a hijacked airplane. In 36 minutes, they killed seven hijackers and 20 Ugandan soldiers, and they helped the hostages to the waiting planes and took off for Nairobi and Kenya. With almost no loss of life, Ann takes these people, whisks them away. They suddenly seemed like, wow, they've got it together. So you had kind of this new narrative develop of Israel as this sort of small but mighty power in the Middle East. And I think that was very attractive to members of both parties in the United States. Republicans started seeing a country of real military strength and might and a really smart force in a very dangerous part of the world.

Democrats saw a country that was still beleaguered but willing to fight back. Tonight, Jesus of Nazareth passes by. And then... Tonight may be the last time that Jesus will ever pass you away again. This moment also came along with the rise of

evangelical Christianity. Born again free We could only come to the place of all-out commitment. We could turn the world upside down and start a counter-revolution, a spiritual revolution following the Christian flag.

Who were very, very supportive of Israel. Now, God has called this in the Bible the navel of the earth. Now, a navel is sort of like the place where a child is attached to his mother, and God used this as the place where he entered into human history. They believed that the Jews were the rightful inheritors of the land. This has been the center of God's activity and his revelation in the earth. And that's why all the world, the United Nations and the nations of the earth,

one day are going to come and move against Israel. This fits perfectly with the evangelical theology in which the Jews will once again gather in Zion, and that will herald the second coming of Jesus Christ, the rapture, and the beginning of the end of the world. We have a Jewish religion, and therefore we feel that the Jews are our brothers and sisters. We are one in the family of God. Makes me shout, there's no doubt, I know I'm born again. All of that fits so perfectly, and the Israeli government plays it to a hilt.

In 1981, when the Israelis bombed a fledgling nuclear reactor in Baghdad, for simple logic, we decided to act now before it is too late. One of the very first calls that Menachem Begin made to get support was to Jerry Falwell. The president of Israel, before launching an attack on an Israeli adversary, calls the leader of an evangelical movement in the U.S. That is correct. Wow. I have personally followed and supported Israel's heroic struggle for survival ever since the founding of the state of Israel 34 years ago.

struggle for survival ever since the founding of the state of Israel 34 years ago. And then it was during the Reagan administration where we saw the cementing of the special relationship across party lines. America's commitment to the security of Israel is ironclad, and I might add, so is mine. And coinciding with the emergence of this bipartisan support for Israel, there's the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, AIPAC, which exists by definition to support the positions of the state of Israel. They're the people who tell the Congress which legislation affecting Israel they like and which they don't. And it also runs these very well-known trips to Israel for members of Congress. These trips give new and returning legislators

the opportunity to see firsthand Israel's security challenges. One powerful aspect of these trips is that members from both parties spend time in Israel together. And it's almost like a rite of initiation. When you become a member of Congress, one of the first things that happens is AIPAC reaches out to you and says, why don't you come on this educational trip that we're running to Israel? And so you can see this kind of multiplier effect in a way across the country.

There are many who charge that AIPAC, with its sights set only on Israel, is just too demanding of U.S. politicians. Candidates who don't support that vision. Practically every congressman and senator says his prayers to the AIPAC lobby. Risk seeing people who are committed to AIPAC mobilize against them. A very good example came out of Illinois in the early 1980s when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman, Charles Percy, ran afoul of AIPAC. The special relationship between our peoples should not be put at risk by unilateral Israeli actions taken without regard to the interests of the United States

in strengthening regional security against external threats and advancing the peace process. Paul Simon, not the singer Paul Simon, but the former senator, revealed in his autobiography that he was approached by what he said was a nationally respected Jewish leader from Chicago who had been a board member of AIPAC to run against Percy. And AIPAC members mobilized on behalf of Paul Simon. And lo and behold, they've done an enormous job of corrupting the American democratic process. Charles Percy was involuntarily retired, and Paul Simon was the next senator from Illinois. In recent years, AIPAC and the pro-Israel PACs

have helped defeat, among others, Congressman Paul Findlay and Pete McCloskey, Senators Harrison Schmidt of New Mexico, Walter Huddleston of Kentucky, and Chuck Percy of Illinois. And whether they meant to or not, in their narrowing focus on Israel, these mainline Jewish organizations like AIPAC and the American Jewish Committee spread the notion and really inculcated the notion in the American Jewish community

that Israel is central to its identity. You start seeing banners in front of synagogues saying, we stand with Israel. Israel becomes much more powerful in the American Jewish consciousness than it had been for much of its existence. And as groups like AIPAC become more powerful, it becomes much more difficult to criticize Israeli government policy because its mission is to represent the views of the Israeli government. Therefore, criticism of Israeli government policy becomes criticism of Israel itself. And does that mean that criticism of Israeli government policy is criticism of Jews?

It's like a mathematical formula, you know, A equals B equals C. So if criticism of Israeli government policy is criticism of Israel itself, and American Judaism is identified with Israel, Judaism is identified with Israel, ergo criticism of American Israeli policy starts looking like criticism of Judaism. Then we're in delicate territory. Ever since Harry Truman first recognized Israel, every American president has worked for peace between Israel and her neighbors. Now the efforts of all who have labored before us bring us to this moment. The Israeli and the Palestinian peoples who fought each other for almost a century, have agreed to move decisively on the path of dialogue, understanding and cooperation.

The protests evolved from boys throwing rocks and people marching to fighters attacking Israeli soldiers and military targets. The future of Israeli PLO peace talks has once again been thrown into question, this time by a suicide bombing that ripped through two buses crammed with rush hour commuters and university students in Jerusalem. Hundreds of Israelis gathered at the site to express their outrage and demonstrate against the government's peace policy. Tel Aviv residents were forced to run for cover

as Palestinian militants fired rockets at the Israeli city for a second day running. This just one of 160 airstrikes by the Israeli military on Gaza overnight and into this morning. The Palestinian terror led by the Palestinian Authority, they believe that they will break our nation, but they failed. Things start to change in the early to mid-2000s because of something that happens in Israeli politics. Palestinian Authority leadership

being destruction to their own people. The rise of right-wing leaders like Ariel Sharon. Terror is terror, and there is no compromise. This terror and terror should be fought. And Benjamin Netanyahu. Terrorism is a war crime. And when we say that there has to be a remedy, an understanding, an exculpation, a justification, understand these people, you are saying, understand war criminals.

We will never understand these war criminals. We will always fight them. Both adopted very expansionist policies, expanding settlements on the occupied West Bank. All those communities that we build, they are not an obstacle to peace. They are an obstacle to war. We are being told that our building of these flats is a declaration of war. What an inversion of language. What a perversion of the basic concepts that guide our civilization.

And Israel started to look like the aggressor. Images of Palestinian youths throwing rocks and Israeli soldiers responding with bullets started to challenge the democratic notion of Israel as this kind of aspiring state that was committed to social justice. Good afternoon. I am honored to be in the timeless city of Cairo. And I would say that the real change came with the presidency of Barack Obama. We meet at a time of great tension

between the United States and Muslims around the world. Obama comes in idealistic. He's been promising to be a great peacemaker, a great foreign policy advocate. He goes, gives his speech in Egypt. I've come here to Cairo to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world. To say that he wants a restart of American Muslim affairs.

One based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive and need not be in competition. And then he turns to Israel. America's strong bonds with Israel are well known. This bond is unbreakable. It is time for us to act on what everyone knows to be true. And he says, we have talked about a two-state solution for now more than a decade. It's time to get real.

Too many tears have been shed. Too much blood has been shed. All of us have a responsibility to work for the day when the mothers of Israelis and Palestinians can see their children grow up without fear. And then he really steps in when he says the two-state solution must be predicated, at least, on the original 1948 borders with Israel.

The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. It didn't even seem like a radical thing to say, but there was a huge blowback from the Israeli political apparatus, AIPAC and its supporters. I was baffled by this statement because it doesn't reflect American values. Who said that he had gone too far. Today, after two years of negotiations.

That really crescendoed with the Iran deal. A comprehensive long-term deal with Iran that will prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Netanyahu decided this was an existential moment for Israel. He needed to stop it. This deal doesn't make peace more likely. It makes war more likely. At that point, Netanyahu breaks with Obama, and he openly courts Republicans. My friends, I'm deeply humbled by the opportunity to speak before the most important legislative body in the world, the U.S. Congress. And he actually arranges with the Republican Speaker of the House, John Boehner, to address a joint session of Congress on the Iran deal. I feel a profound obligation to speak to you about an issue that

could well threaten the survival of my country and the future of my people. Without consulting Obama. Listen to Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, Iran's chief terrorist proxy. Hezbollah, Iran's chief terrorist proxy. He said, if all the Jews gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of chasing them down around the world. There was a real sense at that point where you had to choose. Are you with Barack Obama? Are you with Netanyahu? And boy, people were really torn. And it's at this point where critics of Obama begin calling him an anti-Semite. This is an anti-Israel administration.

It's the first administration in American history that is obviously anti-Israel. It's borderline a Jew-hating administration. This begins to take root, especially in the hard right of the United States, where suddenly the epithet anti-Semite applies to a liberal Democrat. That is a very critical moment in the politics of anti-Semitism. And what is the Democratic response to this shifting dynamic that you're describing?

Democrats in Congress were still almost universally supportive of Israel. Uneasy, yes, but not with their votes, not voting against military aid for Israel. The fracturing was occurring, I think, more at the grassroots than it was on Capitol Hill. on Capitol Hill. Free, free Palestine! Free, free Palestine!

Protesters called for an end to Israel's violence in the occupied West Bank and besieged Gaza Strip. Remember, Barack Obama's coalition, the umbrella that elected Obama, the first black president of the United States, includes many, many more immigrants, and many of those

are sympathetic to the Palestinian cause. Many of those immigrants are Arab themselves, and this creates a real dilemma. And part of that progressive shift is really reflected by the emergence of J Street. J Street says it's America's new pro-Israel lobby. Pro-Israel, pro-peace. Pro-Israel, pro-peace. Pro-peace, pro-Israel. Our mantra is a pro-peace, pro-Israel.

As opposed to AIPAC, which has as its mission strengthening and promoting American-Israeli ties, J Street is dedicated to a two-state solution and a democratic Israel with equal rights and human rights for all people. And is there a politician who embodies the J Street approach to Israel? I would have to say the best known is Bernie Sanders. Overwhelmingly, the United States time and time again has looked aside when Israel has done some bad things. Bernie Sanders, who was actually raised Jewish, becomes the first openly critical American politician to really be willing to challenge Israel on the campaign trail. Israel was subjected to terrorist attacks,

has every right in the world to destroy terrorism. But we had in the Gaza area, not a very large area, some 10,000 civilians who were wounded and some 1,500 who were killed. Was that a disproportionate attack? The answer is I believe it was. And let me say something else. So fast forward from 2016 to the very next election, 2018. Rashida Tlaib is a democratic socialist who supports the Palestinian right of return in a one-state solution. She also supports Medicare for all, a $15 minimum wage and abolishing ICE. Now a group of Democrats, it's not the dominant group of Democrats, but a very vocal group of Democrats who are running on the Bernie Sanders platform. These people are willing to criticize Israel. And so when you get into Congress, will you vote against U.S. military aid for Israel?

Absolutely. If you get into Congress, will you vote against U.S. military aid for Israel? Absolutely. And they include the immigrants that had so powered the Obama umbrella. And those include Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, a Somali refugee running for Congress in Minneapolis. I won! Rashida! Rashida! Minneapolis. Both Omar and Tlaib wind up getting elected. Elected Ilhan Omar, the nation's first Somali-American lawmaker. I talked about what my win would have meant for that eight-year-old girl in that refugee camp. And now they have a microphone bigger than any microphone Israel critics have ever seen.

So people were watching for their views on Israel. Joining us now is Congresswoman Ilhan Omar to remind people what you tweeted about Israel in 2012 during the offensive in Gaza. You wrote, Israel has hypnotized the world. May Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel. And suddenly, people are looking at past things that they had said about Israel. Oh, that's really a regrettable way of expressing that. I don't know how my comments would be offensive to Jewish Americans. My comments precisely are addressing what was happening during the Gaza war. That phrasing that Israel had hypnotized the world really kind of plays

into these centuries-old anti-Semitic tropes of Jews trying to control the world, of the sort of manipulative, behind-the-scenes Jew working some kind of magic to influence events. The Republicans are looking as well, and they want to exploit what could be these fledgling cracks between Jews and the Democratic Party. The 116th Congress gaveled in for its first session on Thursday with lawmakers from both congressional branches eager to set their parties agenda. And the very first bill, S-1 in the Senate,

the first bill up for consideration is a Middle East policy bill that allows the punishment of any company that goes along with the boycotting or sanctioning of Israel. For those who are not familiar with BDS, it's Boycott, Divestment, and Sanction.

It is an effort, by and large, to punish Israel. It's an anti-BDS provision. By convincing companies, international companies and others, to boycott doing business with Israel or Israeli entities, to divest of investments in Israel or with Israeli entities. They know that they are doing this to try to divide Democrats and Jews and to try to provoke Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib. I don't want to be part of a vote that limits the ability for people

to fight towards that justice and peace. They are the only two members of Congress who are openly supporting the boycott movement. I cannot imagine our country not having the right to economic boycott. And lo and behold, Rashida Tlaib falls right into it. Just a few days after her exploitive, laden vow to impeach President Trump, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib's choice of words is making headlines again, this time for what some are calling an anti-Semitic smear. She actually sends out a tweet suggesting that supporters of this anti-BDS provision don't know what country they're representing.

Now even some Democrats are getting uneasy. firm against the profoundly biased campaign to delegitimize the state of Israel through boycotts, divestment, and sanctions. While Iran publicly executes its citizens, Turkey jails its journalists, scores of Arab nations punish homosexuality with imprisonment and torture. Why does BDS single Israel out alone for condemnation? When the world treats everybody one way and the Jew or the Jewish state another way, there's only one word for it. Anti-Semitism. Let us call out the BDS movement for what it is. And then last week, a freshman lawmaker is taking heat for remarks that critics are calling

anti-Semitic. Congresswoman Ilhan Omar in just her seventh week in office, again enduring sharp backlash after challenging support for Israel. Ilhan Omar tweets. In a tweet, Minnesota Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar suggested support for Israel is fueled by money. Quote, it's all about the Benjamins, baby. There has been swift and fiery response. This cannot sustain itself. It's unacceptable in this country. Now it's like a crisis within the Democratic Party.

They say that they condemn what she has said. Lawmakers are issuing statements. Congresswoman Omar's use of anti-Semitic tropes and prejudicial accusations about Israel supporters is deeply offensive. We condemn these remarks and we call upon Congresswoman Omar to immediately apologize. She needs to apologize. This is blatant anti-Semitism. A newly elected member of Congress is apologizing for criticizing supporters of Israel after a blast from her own party leadership. And that's what she does. She apologizes.

Representative Omar apologized today for the anti-Semitic tweet, saying she is, quote, listening and learning. Writing, quote, My intention is never to offend my constituents or Jewish Americans as a whole. This is why I unequivocally apologize. And Jonathan, what do you make of that? What is inside of these charges against these two Democrats of having trafficked in anti-Semitic troops? Well, on the one hand, the language itself sounds anti-Semitic.

But when is anti-Israel sentiment or anti-Zionist sentiment simply anti-Semitic? And that is a very difficult, difficult line to draw. Some people think that anti-Zionism itself, opposing a Jewish state, is by definition anti-Semitic. But other people would say, no, you know, you're allowed to have foreign policy views, even foreign policy views that some people find reprehensible without being accused of bigotry. And that, hey, you know, Ilhan Omar might really, really not like the Jewish state or what the Jewish state does in the Middle East,

but that doesn't mean that she hates the Jewish people. And an apparatus has existed in Washington now for decades that has pulled both parties into the view that Israel is sacrosanct and that criticism of Israel is tantamount to criticism of Jews. Sure, what's fascinating about this is that the Democratic Party, which, as you explained, championed Israel from the beginning, all the way back to 1948, is now the party fending off charges of anti-Semitism and the party struggling with questions around how deep its support

for Israel goes and how to handle this growing wing of its members who want a different approach, who are unhappy with Israel and its policies and very willing to publicly declare that. I think that's right. I think that Tlaib and Omar are the edge of the next wave. So right now, most Democrats on Capitol Hill are still in lockstep with Israel, Democrats on Capitol Hill are still in lockstep with Israel, but their constituents are not. And that means that the Democratic Party is going to kind of have to have a reckoning about Israel. I asked the Democratic caucus chair, Hakeem Jeffries, whether or not Omar's underlying point that we need to have a more open conversation about Israel is something that Democrats would entertain. And he was very strident in his answer to me that the Democratic Party stands with Israel. It was like really the straight party line answer.

But it's easy to see down the road that there are going to be more Rashidas and Ilhans in the future. And progressives who are a rising force within the party are trying to force that discussion. And many young Jews are trying to force that discussion. So at a certain point, Democrats can't avoid this conversation. And if you look at it over the long term, it really could herald the breaking of the longstanding bond between Democrats and Israel. We're not there yet, but you can see it from here. We'll be right back.

Here's what else you need to know today. Let's bring in Javier Becerra, California's attorney general, who is considering a challenge to the president's national emergency in court. Mr. Attorney General, let me ask you, can you say definitely that California will be filing a lawsuit and when that will happen? Martha, definitely and imminently. Attorneys general from multiple states say they are filing lawsuits to challenge the legality of President Trump's emergency declaration at the southern border. And imminently Monday, nothing will stop you. No reason. In an interview with ABC's This Week, California Attorney General Javier Becerra said that his lawsuit would be joined by New Mexico, Oregon, Minnesota, New Jersey, Hawaii, and Connecticut.

You know, the National Emergencies Act gives the president very broad authority on what qualifies an emergency. So where do you believe he's really overstepped his bounds, given this very vague law? Becerra said that the president's own words in declaring a national emergency on Friday, that he, quote, didn't need to do this, would be used against him in court. Well, he himself said it.

He did not need to announce or declare a crisis. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.