MOSHE HILL OPINION COLUMNS MARCH 20 2024
The biggest news from the floor of Congress was Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s speech telling Israel to have new elections to get rid of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. This was more than a despicable speech; it was an unprecedented interference into a democratically-elected government of an American ally. It’s also a statement from the Democratic Party to American Jews: “We don’t care about your interests.”
Ironically, the Democratic Party should not pander to Jewish people any more than they pander to any other group. Jewish people, as a general rule, do not want to be pandered to on the basis of Israel. Jewish people care about what everyone else cares about: safety, good schools, paved roads, and the ability to live life peacefully. Republican electoral strategy regarding Jewish communities is a broad one, because it’s the same as their electoral strategy regarding every other community: keep your money, live your life, and we’ll try to keep the government out of the way.
Democratic electoral strategy has been, since the Obama re-election days, far more narrow. Find a group, label them “marginalized,” tell them who their “oppressor” is, then fix the “problem” that Democrats themselves created. This group could be ginormous, like all women, or it could be small, like Jews. They could be completely wrong about what the group wants. They are still betting that they can scare enough members of the group into voting for them.
Take the Democratic strategy regarding women. Polling data shows that the issues that women worry about the most are the economy, schools, and safety – the same issues that men worry about the most. The number one thing anyone will hear from Democrats about women is abortion. The Democrats’ stated policy position on abortion is “no restrictions at any point, funded by the taxpayer.” This is a position agreed with by less than 20% of Americans, yet when Democrats say it, they claim to speak for all women. They say women are marginalized, Republicans are oppressing them, and by voting for Democrats, they’ll reinstate Roe as law (even though the Roe standard is a third trimester ban, which Democrats would label as an extremist MAGA law). However, that strategy will work on many women, who will vote for Democrats based on it.
For a long time, the Democrat strategy regarding Jews was twofold. First, they claimed that they were great on Israel. Second, they claimed that Jews were targets of white supremacists (and the Republicans who supported them) and that they alone could stop it. Both of these claims were spurious at best, but it’s more accurate to label them as lies. Democrats became increasingly worse in Israel since 2008, when JStreet began identifying and funding anti-Israel politicians. Partisan differences began to form in Congress regarding Israel. This exploded in 2018 with the introduction of the Squad.
The war in Gaza put Democrats in a precarious situation regarding how they pander to Jews, because it changes how they pandered to Muslims. Muslims were pandered to by claiming that they were the victims of Islamophobia, brought on by a post-9/11 America. However, while the Jewish population in America is approximately twice the Muslim population, anti-Semitic hate crimes in America are routinely 10 times more common than anti-Muslim ones. Even in 2002, when incidents did spike, that spike was less than half of what Jews get in a normal year. And both of those numbers are actually incredibly small considering the population – a few hundred incidents per year. Democrats amplify this to scare people and win votes.
These two groups are now at odds with each other regarding Israel and Palestinians, and Democrats face electoral challenges with both. It’s not possible to convince Jews that their main victimizer are white supremacists when there are anti-Jewish rallies and actions occurring in every major city in the country every weekend. You can’t convince Muslims that America is deeply Islamophobic when millions are marching on behalf of Palestinians after Hamas commits massacres and atrocities in Israel. So to which side are Democrats going to lean?
Schumer put to rest any argument that was remaining: Democrats are choosing the pro-Palestinian side of this argument, trying to get the Muslim voters and the college liberals that go along with them. Schumer calling for Netanyahu to be ousted is just what these people want to hear, even though it won’t change anything regarding the unity government and war council that is happening in Israel right now. Schumer was echoed by Representative Jerry Nadler, who never missed an opportunity to side against Jews. President Joe Biden said that Schumer gave a “good speech.”
Democrats have made the political calculus that they don’t need the pro-Israel Jewish community anymore. They think that the “Rabbis for Ceasefire” clowns that camp out in the halls of Congressional office buildings have any representation in the Jewish community. They think that they will be saved by the leftists who block streets and graffiti sidewalks with Jew-hating slurs.
The American Jewish community needs to teach the Democrats a lesson on what our political power really is. It is incumbent on anyone who was outraged by Schumer’s ridiculous speech to not only vote Republican, but financially support Republicans at every level. The greatest punishment Schumer can receive is to take his party out of the majority wherever possible.
