The Wretched of the Earth

Democrats face an identity crisis after Hamas’ attack on Israel.

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Palestinian supporters participate in a rally in midtown Manhattan following continued fighting in Israel and Gaza that has now claimed the lives of over 1,500 people on October 09, 2023 in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

We begin with a message from the secretary of state.

You’ll search in vain for that post today on The App Formerly Known as Twitter. It vanished on Sunday. In its place is this:

That wasn’t the only official U.S. government statement to disappear mysteriously this weekend. This post from Saturday, published while the pogrom in southern Israel was still in motion, also evaporated into the ether:

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  1. Avatar photo
    Davis

    Republicans were fully onboard with supporting Ukraine until they weren’t. Don’t expect support for Israel to be any different. Especially since Ukraine is a “Christian” country and Israel is, well, not.

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    1. Joe

      Republican here. I was on board with opposing Russian aggression in Georgia and Crimea. By the time the current war started I was in favor of a negotiated peace,with Ukraine ceding the Donbas and maybe a land bridge to Crimea. The reasoning was that a Ukraine war was "obviously unwinnable", that Russia is a nuclear superpower, and that this would all benefit our greater enemy in China. I still think I'm partially right but I've been proven wrong on a major point. Ukraine can obviously win this one, but at a very high cost. This also exposed major supply chain problems on our end. We ran out of ammunition! This needs to be fixed ASAP.

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    Davis

    Normally I agree wholeheartedly with Mr. Catoggio. But I have to criticize this piece. I think he’s overestimating the influence of the far-left on the Democratic Party. It’s understandable. The far-right has been dominating the Republican Party for so long that people that lean to the right just assume that the fringes of the left must also dominate the Democratic Party. But that just isn’t reality. Yes, there’s plenty of lefties on Twitter, or on college campuses who support Palestine over Israel. And yeah, maybe there’s two or three Democrats in the House of Representatives that sympathize with Palestine. But in general? Democrats are as disgusted by Hamas’s actions as anyone else. This isn’t one of those “both sides” problems. Generally speaking: Democrats are against both the invasion of Ukraine and Israel. Republicans on the other hand…

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      JDW

      On this particular issue, from a practical voting perspective you may be right. In general though, the far left has a lot of power over the Democratic party. Perhaps not as much as the the Republicans but a great deal of influence. Nancy Pelosi is no moderate. They kept reelecting her to Speaker.

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  3. Charles

    Like the Swiss, every Israeli household should be armed and trained. Every. One..

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    Jak41592

    First off, I'm irritated that you're skewering Joe Biden for this when it's obvious that Biden is not at all responsible for the attack and scoring political points to mock Democrats.

    Be that as it may: I disagree that this is a disaster for Biden. It does likely end a peace deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel, but on the flip side of the coin it ALSO provides Biden a cheap way to stand up to Progressives within his own party. Biden has unequivocally and unabashedly stood up for Israel repeatedly since the attack (more than just 'a solid statement' as you blithely put it) and the contrast between Biden and the left flank of his party is quite stark. That contrast is valuable to Biden.

    And one note on Iran. The reason why 'the bad guys' were nicer under Trump is precisely because the orange man seemed apt to do their own work for them! Why would Putin invade Ukraine when Trump seemed poised to hand him his biggest geopolitical victory possible in a second term? And what exactly was Biden supposed to do? Leave Americans hostage to Iran? That's also a bad look for an American president who's brand is empathy.

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  5. Bubba

    Ok, but there is no peaceful solution.

    You have a Palestinian population that has been barricaded within the Gaza strip and you have a Jewish population that has been expelled from other countries.

    They can't both live in the same place.

    At least the socialists are honest about the end game. The Israel-supporters are willing to accept the status quo only because Israel has free trade and movement.

    Unless the world agrees to provide the same thing for the Palestinians, this is the inevitable outcome. The median Palestinian is an unemployed 18 year old. That's not a path for hope.

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    1. Besht2003

      You an are saying that the Jewish population has been expelled--this is inaccurate and perpetuates a myth: 70.3 percent of Israeli Jews were born and bred in Israel. . The socialists are honest about the Hamas end game of the Palestinians reclaiming their national rights over a Jewish graveyard. This is a good thing? I think all these discussions overlook that Israel has agency and an army. It no longer matters what "the world" wants as far as a Palestinian state is concerned. With pressure, with BDS, with boycott, with international isolation, with being branded as an apartheid colonialist settler state--whatever. These talking points from Israel deniers or even Israel-supporters presume that the actual Israel doesn't exist with motive power. More importantly they fail to address the chasm between the before and after that was Saturday. The world has yet to see the inevitable outcome of this inevitable outcome.

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    2. Pundette

      And how many unemployed 18-year old men from 160 countries have walked across our southern border in the past three years? That's not a path for hope either.

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      1. Fudrock

        Holy Non Sequitur, Batman!

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  6. Avatar photo
    CJ

    A few points that plenty of other people have made. Conservatives who don't want to be painted with the broad brush of Trumpist stain shouldn't take the same approach with Democrats and Hamas apologists.

    The Gallup poll's question is not "how do you feel about Israel", it's "In the Middle East situation, are your sympathies more with the Israelis or more with the Palestinians?". Palestinians get 49%. Israelis get 38%. Neither/both gets 13%. A (admittedly slim) majority are at least neutral. And "sympathy" for Palestinians does NOT equate to support for Hamas.

    Furthermore, the same poll has the favorability of Israel (not versus Palestinians, but in general) at 56% for Democrats in early 2023, compared to 60% in 2001. Not that much of a change. It is less that younger Democrats are increasingly hostile to Israel, and more like they're increasingly favorable to the Palestinians. Support for Israel's right to exist and Palestine's right to an independent state (the official policy of the US government for many years running via a two-state solution) are not as mutually exclusive as right-wingers would have us believe.

    One other note: The people calling for Israel's ethnic cleansing, in NYC and elsewhere, are scum. Reports I have read from multiple news sources have said pro-Palestinian protestors in NYC were in the low hundreds. Even assuming they all vote Democrat (a very bold assumption) there's ~3.5 million total registered Democrats in NYC. That'd be something like 0.01% of Democrats in NYC. Heck, even AOC came out against these people.

    I have no problem with Nick, KDW, and others leveling legit criticism against the Democratic Party and the progressive movement. This isn't legitimate.

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  7. Dougrhon

    Thank you for finally noticing the serious problem with the Democrats and their radical Jew hating progressive wing. Ritchie Torres has always been supportive of Israel here in New York. Much of the City Council is not.

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  8. FreddySez

    Nick writes about the terrible bind all of this puts Biden in. But the real bind is the one American voters face next fall.

    With the world hotter, deadlier, and less stable with every new day, the perennial lesson asserts itself again: The world needs meaningful projections of American power, and America needs the will, the budget, and the military to provide it.

    Yet our likely choice will be between a president who bungles this role and a former president who is unlikely even to try playing it.

    You can vote for the team behind the Afghanistan withdrawal, sucking up to Iran no matter what, and slow-walking Ukraine aid after practically inviting Putin to invade.

    Or you can vote for the team of "we're killers too," "veterans are losers," active disrespect for our security alliances, and an eagerness to suck the toes of every dictator in the phone book.

    With problems like these, who needs ones like fiscal cliffs and abortion?

    We are entering the kind of era that calls for an FDR/Ike/Reagan/GHW Bush approach to the world. We should at the very least double the defense budget, unanimously, immediately. In any sane view of the present reality, America's shipyards and defense plants would be at triple shifts already.

    But instead, let's do go to our national demise covered in bumper stickers about how many bake sales it takes to buy a bomber.

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  9. Brian The 2nd

    What the actual hell?
    So much BS here. I know this situation gets people all emotional, as it should, but come on, focus that energy in the right direction. This should be bigger than partisan bickering.

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      Steven Spelledright

      It is not partisan bickering to point out that, on some issues, Democrats such as Cori Bush and Rashida Tlaib are dangerously nuts. It is just like pointing out that, on some issues, Republicans such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar are dangerously nuts.

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      1. Brian The 2nd

        Perfectly fair, and I agree about those folks. My point was that some events should be seen as "not the time" to play the nutpicking game.
        However this is the sort of thing that may help to crystalize where people sand on important issues and for the rest of us both sides of the isle say "enough!" get out of the way and let the adults work.

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    Jessicadaygriffin

    My young adult kids are progressive liberals who think Biden is too moderate (and too old). I am always challenging them to see complexity, and thankfully they are moderating as they mature.

    They would indicate less support for Israel than most older Democrats, but it’s not because they are antisemitic. They have Jewish relatives and close friends and neighbors. They wouldn’t indicate strong support for Israel in a poll because Netanyahu leans towards autocracy and he cozied up to Trump and Putin (who they recognize as dangerous thugs and enemies of democracy). Reading about Jewish settlements encroaching on the West Bank, and the views Orthodox Jews have about women doesn’t help.

    However, they were horrified by the attack on Saturday. They recognize that Hamas is evil. They may champion the oppressed, but would never celebrate terrorism. Please don’t despair of young Americans. They are still learning but already wiser than you think.

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