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It's been a good primary season for pro-Israel Democrats.
Last week, in Michigan's newly redrawn 11th congressional district, Rep. Haley Stevens—a two-term lawmaker who has distinguished herself as an avid supporter of the U.S.-Israel relationship in Congress—handily defeated Rep. Andy Levin, who had actively courted the support of Rep. Rashida Tlaib and groups harshly critical of the Jewish state.
Two weeks earlier, Prince George's County state's attorney Glenn Ivey, who has spoken out against efforts to boycott Israel or place conditions on U.S. aid to the Mideast ally, beat former Rep. Donna Edwards, who had previously declined to support a near-unanimous resolution affirming Israel's right to defend itself in the midst of an onslaught of rockets from Gaza, to become his party's candidate in Maryland's4th district.
In May, Ohio Rep. Shontel Brown—who has condemned efforts to delegitimize the Jewish state as fueling antisemitism—received roughly twice as many votes as challenger Nina Turner, who had expressed solidarity with a group that had accused Israel of "apartheid" during the 2021 escalation instigated by Hamas in Gaza, defeating the former state legislator for the second time in less than a year to secure her nomination to represent the state's 11th district in Congress.
Predictably, various detractors have griped about the role played by pro-Israel groups—and, somewhat more ominously, pro-Israel money—in these races and others.
"AIPAC bought another seat," grumbled Turner as Haley's decisive victory over Levin became apparent last Tuesday night. The anti-Zionist website Mondoweiss published a piece titled "Donna Edwards's defeat affirms the fact Israel lobby's power comes from the Benjamins," a reference to Rep. Ilhan Omar's 2019 remarks ascribing U.S. elected officials' support for Israel to Jewish money, which were roundly condemned by the entire Democratic leadership as antisemitic.
It's a convenient narrative, and one that misses the point entirely.
Money doesn't determine races—voters do. And the reason pro-Israel messages resonate is that Americans are overwhelmingly pro-Israel
Consider this: a 2021 Gallup poll found that a whopping 75 percent of Americans—including two-thirds of Democrats—have a favorable view of Israel—the highest number in thirty years. A Pew survey from earlier this year similarly found that two-thirds of Americans have a favorable view of the Israeli people. Asked by Gallup's pollsters whether they sympathize more with Israel or the Palestinians, respondents sided with Israel by a factor of more than two to one, with nearly 6-in-10 saying they sympathize more with Israel, compared to only 25 percent who said they sympathize more with the Palestinians.
As an executive at the American Jewish Committee, I oversaw the first-ever surveys of American Jews and the U.S. general population on antisemitism in America. We asked respondents whether they considered the phrase "Israel has no right to exist" to be antisemitic. More than 80 percent of Americans, both Jewish and non-Jewish, said yes: the belief that Israel has no right to exist—that is, anti-Zionism—is indeed a form of antisemitism.
It should come as little surprise, then, that in last week's Michigan primary—termed a "bellwether on U.S.-Israel politics" by one news source—the candidate viewed as more reliably pro-Israel won by a landslide. While Edwards in Maryland and Turner in Ohio tried to walk back some of their previous stances on Israel as their respective primaries drew near, their efforts were too little, too late, and both were trounced by their more pro-Israel opponents.
Pro-Israel groups like AIPAC are influential, but only because they reflect and channel public opinion, which is solidly pro-Israel. Elected officials can hardly ignore the will of their constituents, and so long as popular views of Israel and the U.S.-Israel relationship remain positive, so will Congress. Politicians perceived as hostile to Israel are simply out of step with where Americans stand—and so they will continue to struggle to be elected in most of the country.
Being pro-Israel isn't just good policy (though it certainly is that, too) – it's good politics. Presented with candidates with divergent views on Israel, voters are choosing those whose positions mirror their own—supportive of Israel, opposed to efforts that unfairly target the Jewish state or question its right to exist, and committed to strengthening the U.S.-Israel alliance.
America's elected officials are overwhelmingly pro-Israel because America is overwhelmingly pro-Israel.
Avi Mayer, who was most recently a senior executive at the American Jewish Committee, is a writer and policy analyst based in Jerusalem. Follow him on Twitter: twitter.com/AviMayer
The views expressed in this article are the author's own.
