PA Democrats Face Crisis In 'One-Sided' Support Of Israel

HARRISBURG, PA — The carefully constructed web of narratives and allegiances that define and reinforce modern American politics has been tangled and shredded in the fallout from the latest bout of violence and bloodshed in the Middle East.

Oceans away from the shores of the Mediterannean, Pennsylvania's leading Democrats find themselves facing both a reckoning and identity crisis over their largely unswerving and absolutist stance in support of the Israeli government's policies. It's a stance more closely aligned with Israel's own right wing Zionist hardliners — even with Trump's Republican Party — than it is with the United Nations and humanitarian organizations around the world.

"There is no moral equivalency here," Gov. Josh Shapiro recently said, categorizing the historical context of Israel's occupation of Gaza and the preceding decades of violence as "whataboutism." "Israel has a right to defend itself."

Since the Hamas terror attacks on Oct. 7, Israel's right to defend itself has resulted in the deaths of more than 7,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. According to The Guardian, it's estimated that around 3,000 of them are children. Nearly all of the dead are nonmilitary civilians. They also include dozens of journalists and dozens of UN aid workers caught in Israel's indiscriminant hunt for what it's defense minister infamously called "human animals." The Council on American-Islamic Relations called Shapiro's comments "one-sided."

Indeed, that the pro-Israeli rhetoric is so savage and Orwellian is far less surprising than the way it's been so fully embraced by the American left. Even slight rebuttal is pilloried in Tel Aviv as it is in Cambridge and Manhattan as Nazism. In Pennsylvania, even voices traditionally thought of progressive bulwarks find themselves dismissing calls for a ceasefire or a truce, which the United Nations says is the minimum needed to get supplies in to Gaza to protect millions of innocent civilians and children.

"I unequivocally support any necessary military, intelligence, and humanitarian aid to Israel," declared U.S. Sen. John Fetterman, the Bernie Sanders-aligned progressive icon who rarely misses a chance to call out the Democratic establishment. "The United States has a moral obligation to be in lockstep with our ally as they confront this threat. I also fully support Israel neutralizing the terrorists responsible for this barbarism."

Notably, the rhetoric is not taking sides in the ancient conflict over Palestinian statehood and the Israeli military occupation of Palestinian land, but rather is taking sides over whether or not to give carte blanche to the Israeli regime to wipe Gaza off the map. When the United Nations calls for an "immediate, durable humanitarian truce," it is not citing conditions in the open air prison in Gaza that led to the Hamas attack on Oct. 7. It is not rejecting or putting forth an opinion on "the Palestinian question." It is simply asking to stop the bloodshed.

Pennsylvania leaders who agree find themselves largely alone.

"Continuing the cycle of violence will do nothing to ensure the safety of Israelis and Palestinians alike," Pennsylvania's U.S. Congresswoman Summer Lee said last week. "It’s time for a ceasefire now."

Yet so divisive is the chaos, so deeply entrenched the prejudices, so sensitive the centuries-old wounds, and so resoundingly powerful the influence of the Israeli government, that even simple language like "ceasefire" is a trigger point. In a leaked internal memo, the U.S. Department of State recently urged its employees to avoid saying the words ceasefire or a de-escalation, out of fear that America would not be seen as a strong enough ally to Israel, according to the Huffington Post.

The rift between the progressive and mainstream elements of the Democratic Party is nothing new, but the violence in the Middle East upends expectation and makes opaque once transparent partisan lines. It's perhaps unsurprising that a progressive like Lee is among a growing chorus of voices in Congress formally calling on the Biden administration to demand a ceasefire. But it's another thing entirely to see Lee's wing at such diametric odds with nearly all of the Democratic Party. And while the establishment isn't moderating its tune, its hand may soon be forced.

In fact, outside of the Democratic and Republican political establishments, calls for a ceasefire have overwhelming public support. Some 80% of Democrats, 57% of Independents, and 56% of Republicans want a ceasefire in Gaza, according to a recent Data for Progress poll, while public disapproval of Israel supporters Biden (53 percent) and Trump (54 percent) remains very high.

In the very least, the conflict has further corroded the already tenuous tether the Democratic establishment had with progressives, a bloc that would be crucial for Biden to win in a swing state like Pennsylvania in 2024. And perhaps more consequentially, it could be shifting the causes - and concomittant allegiances - that define the Democratic Party itself.