[The way to stop AIPAC’s efforts, is to: 1) demand that the
Democratic party do something to stop this theft of democracy; and 2)
work like hell for the candidates who are pro-Palestine and beat the
machine.]
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PRO-ISRAEL LOBBY DROPS MILLIONS TO INFLUENCE US CONGRESSIONAL
ELECTIONS  
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Larry Hendel
August 3, 2022
Stansbury Forum
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*
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*
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_ The way to stop AIPAC’s efforts, is to: 1) demand that the
Democratic party do something to stop this theft of democracy; and 2)
work like hell for the candidates who are pro-Palestine and beat the
machine. _

Workers move a portable background during the American Israel
Political Action Committee (AIPAC) conference in Washington DC in
2020, Photograph: Erik S Lesser/EPA

 

One of the most closely watched races in the May primary cycle pitted
Texas conservative Democrat incumbent Henry Cuellar against
progressive challenger Jessica Cisneros, an immigration attorney.
Cuellar, an eighteen-year incumbent, is terrible on the environment,
labor rights and immigration, and the only remaining House Democrat to
oppose abortion rights. Cisneros almost beat Cuellar when she ran
against him in 2020. In this year’s rematch, Cisneros came up 289
votes short
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Cuellar squeaked by with 50.32% of the vote
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Were it not for major infusions of cash from outside organizations,
Cuellar would undoubtedly have lost. One such group was AIPAC, the
American Israel Public Affairs Committee. This decades-old, Jewish
organization has been the primary force in Washington when it comes to
pro-Israel lobbying. But this year, for the first time, the
organization formally involved itself in the electoral arena,
contributing to endorsed candidates and participating heavily in
independent expenditure campaigns. According to AIPAC spokesperson
Marshall Whittmann their mission is simple: _“We are engaged in the
democratic process to elect candidates who will support the
U.S.-Israel relationship and oppose those who will not.”_ In other
words, they won’t be looking at candidates’ views on the economy,
race relations, guns, abortion, the environment, or any other issue
important to American voters. Only Israel. This could be devastating
for progressives running for office.
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Last May, AIPAC, along with its sister political action committees
(PACs) the United Democracy Project (UCD) and the Democratic Majority
for Israel (DMFI), spent over $10 MILLION on five Democratic party
primary races. (For the purpose of this article, I will use
“AIPAC” to represent all three PAC’s, since they are definitely
partners in crime.) This equates to $2 plus million per
election. Besides the Cuellar-Cisneros race, AIPAC was involved in
two primaries in North Carolina, one in Ohio and one in Pennsylvania.
Their candidate won in four out of the five. Until this cycle, AIPAC
didn’t have a super PAC
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Now, with millions in contributions from both Democratic and
Republican multi-millionaires, it’s on pace to become one of the
most influential political funders in the country. 

In the Ohio race, Nina Turner, a close ally of Bernie Sanders, was
ahead in the polls for most of the campaign. But in the final
lap her opponent’s allies bombarded the airwaves with hit
pieces. AIPAC was the leading spender
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$1.5 million
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Turner eventually lost by a two to one margin. The AIPAC money
wasn’t the only reason she lost, but it made a huge difference.

As they do in many cases, AIPAC did not make support or non-support of
Israel a major topic in the campaign.
[[link removed]] Often
AIPAC prefers their signature issue to remain in the background, so
there are fewer fingerprints.  In this case they hit Turner by
saying she wasn’t a “true” Democrat. 

On July 19, AIPAC DROPPED $6 MILLION
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help Glen Ivey beat Donna Edwards in the Maryland’s fourth
Congressional District Democratic Primary 52% to 35%. And on August 1,
AIPAC invested $4 million in Michigan to successfully defeat Andy
Levin
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efforts to stay in Congress. Levin, a Jew, a former synagogue
president and a former union organizer, supports the concept of a
Jewish state in Israel but is unabashedly in favor of Palestinian
rights. AIPAC backed a more pro-Israel candidate, Haley Stevens.
Stevens won with 60% of the vote. 

AIPAC is not just dabbling. They intend to be players in electoral
politics, and they bring major money to the table. 

AIPAC’s foray into the campaign world is bad for progressives in
three major ways.

FIRST, in general elections, if there is a Republican who is more
pro-Israel than the Democratic candidate, whether that candidate is a
“progressive” or “moderate” Democrat, AIPAC is likely to back
the Republican, probably with major dollars. Whatever we think of the
weaknesses of the mainstream Democrats, if we don’t keep a
Democratic majority in Congress, this country will move to the right
at an even faster clip. AIPAC has already endorsed 37 incumbent
Republicans who would not vote to certify Biden’s election,
including notorious Trumpers Jim Jordan from Ohio and Scott Perry from
Pennsylvania. Perry, by the way, is the Congressman who
recently COMPARED THE DEMOCRATS TO NAZIS.
[[link removed]]  Apparently
the organization is more concerned about Israel’s financial and
military wellbeing than with the FUTURE OF DEMOCRACY IN THE UNITED
STATES.
[[link removed]] This
“my way or the highway” approach to politics is about as
self-centered and opportunist as one can get, and it’s frightening
that AIPAC is creating a situation where our elections will be heavily
influenced by people acting, in essence, as agents of a foreign
country.

SECOND, within the Democratic Party, AIPAC’s willingness to pour
millions into elections based on the single issue of support for
Israel will force progressives to make a choice: support Palestinian
rights and risk AIPAC’s wrath, or fight for what they believe in.
This will make it harder for progressives, and if the progressive wing
of the party doesn’t grow, and there is no left-wing opposition to
the Pelosi/Schumer middle of the road approach to politics, we will
probably never get, national healthcare, reduced militarism, requisite
environmental legislation and other critical reforms. We need
Democrats to expand their majority, _AND_ we need progressive
Democrats to gain power within the party. It’s a both/and situation,
not an either/or, and AIPAC’s involvement will make both more
difficult to achieve.

THIRD, if AIPAC’s efforts are successful, the US will be spending
even more resources strengthening Israel, an apartheid state that
started out as a settler colonial land grab in 1948 and has been
grabbing more land every year since. Occupied Palestine is the only
area in the world in which millions of civilians have lived for over
50 years both WITHOUT A STATE AND WITHOUT CITIZENSHIP OF ANY COUNTRY.
[[link removed]]Palestinian villages are
routinely destroyed, houses demolished, and people jailed without due
process or probable cause. Close to 700,000 Israeli settlers have
illegally established what they view as permanent communities on
Palestinian territory, and often ATTACK AND TERRORIZE NEARBY
PALESTINIAN VILLAGES
[[link removed]]. Israel
possesses state of the art military technology, including nuclear
weapons, and has become a dangerous, aggressive, nationalist state.
There is insufficient opportunity here to get into details about the
history of Israel, its degrading and oppressive treatment of the
Palestinians, and its toxic, race based, hierarchical, anti-democratic
view of human society. But I recommend the following books: THE
HUNDRED YEARS WAR ON PALESTINE, BY RASHID KHALIDI
[[link removed]] and UNDERSTANDING
THE PALESTINIAN ISRAELI CONFLICT: A PRIMER, BY PHYLLIS BENNIS.
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Palestinian refugees (British Mandate of Palestine – 1948).

How Israel has swallowed up Palestinian land since 1947

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Palestinian loss of land 1946 – 2009

So why is AIPAC jumping into electoral politics now when it never did
before?

In a nutshell, AIPAC sees the “special relationship” between the
US and Israel being threatened by the growing American support for the
people of Palestine, and it is playing offense in an attempt to
reverse that trend. 

First let’s talk about that “special” relationship, and then
let’s talk about the growing support for Palestine in the US.

After World War II, creating a Jewish state in the Middle East
relieved the US of accepting hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees
from post war Europe and provided a western outpost in the Arab world,
something the British and the Americans had wanted for decades. On May
15, 1948, the western powers “gave” historical Palestine to the
Jews. Immediately armed Israelis attacked Palestinian towns and
villages and 720,000 Palestinians, or 85% of the Palestinian
population were FORCIBLY EXPELLED
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their homes or forced to flee to avoid being attacked. 

Since World War II, the US has been Israel’s most fervent supporter.
From that time until now the US has given Israel $244 billion in
military and economic aid, in inflation-adjusted dollars, making
Israel the LARGEST CUMULATIVE RECIPIENT OF US ASSISTANCE
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far in that time frame. 

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Source: USA Facts 5/20/21

Today ISRAEL RECEIVES $3.3 BILLION ANNUALLY
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foreign military financing from the US. Earlier this year, our
government decided that wasn’t enough and gave Israel an extra $1
billion TO REPLENISH THEIR “IRON DOME”
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defense system. The two countries continue to conduct JOINT MILITARY
TRAINING
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coordination.

Washington politicians seem to love all this. There are more
congressional junkets to Israel THAN ANY OTHER COUNTRY
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far, most of them paid for by the American Israel Education
Foundation, an AIPAC affiliate. The percentage of trips made to Israel
exceeded any other foreign destination. House members made nearly
1,400 trips to Israel, while total subsidized visits to foreign
countries other than Israel were 2,500. See chart below from the
Arab-American, July 7, 2022.

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_Source: Travel Reports from the office of Clerk mandated by Section
304 of the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007_

Of the 3900 privately funded Congressional visits to foreign countries
between 2014 and 2018, nearly one third were to Israel. This past
February TWENTY-SEVEN DEMOCRATS AND FOURTEEN REPUBLICANS
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Israel. 

Under Trump, the Republicans embraced Israel like a long-lost
brother. Traditionally American support for Israel has stemmed from
the Jewish community, but over the last few decades, white
evangelicals have made Israeli domination over the Palestinians a
major objective for the Republican party. 

But the tide of public opinion is starting to turn.

Over the last few years, young Jews and young evangelicals have been
backing away from Israel and towards the Palestinians. A poll of
American Jewish voters revealed that a quarter of them now agree that
Israel IS AN APARTHEID STATE
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a number that shoots up to thirty-eight percent among those under age
forty. Twenty-two percent of Jewish voters overall agree that Israel
is committing genocide against Palestinians, a figure that rises to an
astonishing thirty-three percent among the younger group.

In the evangelical community we see the same trend. Among evangelicals
between the ages of eighteen and twenty-nine, RATES OF SUPPORT FOR
ISRAEL HAVE
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from 69% to 33.6%!

The primary reason for this change is, of course, the steadfast
organizing efforts of Palestinians, in the United States and
internationally. Publicity around the _BOYCOTT, DIVESTMENT AND
SANCTIONS (BDS)_campaign, launched in Palestine, has provided an
excellent vehicle for explaining Israeli apartheid to an American
audience. True, it has engendered a backlash, but the backlash just
heightens the contradiction and keeps the issue on the front burner.
The movement for Palestinian rights in the US has taken hold on
college campuses, particularly under the leadership of _STUDENTS FOR
JUSTICE IN PALESTINE_. Inspired by Palestinian resistance,
progressives have organized in non-evangelical churches, such as the
Presbyterians and Baptists, and many church groups NOW
[[link removed]] CONDEMN
ISRAELI APARTHEID.Over the last fifteen years more communities of
color have been won over to the Palestinian cause. Palestinian flags
were displayed at many _BLACK LIVES MATTER_ demonstrations and at
Standing Rock. George Floyd’s image can be seen throughout
Palestine. Activists have been stressing similarities between settler
colonialist conquest in Israel and in the United States, exposing
Israel’s lie that it is a democracy. Also, media coverage of
Israel’s brazen brutality and arrogance towards the Palestinians is
changing somewhat. Coverage is still very biased towards Israel, but
the PALESTINIAN SIDE OF THE STORY
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creep through. The raw footage of the bombing of Gaza, the house and
village demolitions, the military intrusions into the Al Aqsa Mosque,
and most recently the murder of Palestinian-American
journalist SHIREEN ABU AKLEH
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enough to make any honest person realize that Israel is an occupying
power and is doing terrible things to the Palestinians. The attack by
the Israeli military at Abu Akleh’s funeral made the whole world
gasp. 

This brings us back to Congress and why, after all these years, AIPAC
wants to start investing in electoral politics. For the first time,
there are now people in Congress willing to speak out against
Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people, and they are getting
some traction. At this time, it’s a small group: The Squad, Bernie
Sanders, and several dozen others, depending on the issue. But it’s
growing. Minnesota Congressperson Betty McCallum has THIRTY-TWO
COSPONSORS
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her bill prohibiting the use of US funds for unlawful detentions of
Palestinian minors. Rep. Stansbury (D-NM) _(not related to this
site)_ and Senator Merkley (D-OR), obtained signatures of over eighty
members of the House of Representatives and nineteen Senators ON A
LETTER
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on Secretary of State Antony Blinken to convince Israel to halt the
planned expulsion of over 1000 Palestinians from MASAFER YATTA
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a small area of villages in the West Bank. Fifteen progressive House
Democrats, led by Cori Bush (D-MO), SENT A LETTER
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was more forcefully worded, calling the expulsion of the villagers a
“war crime.”  RECENTLY TWENTY-FOUR US SENATORS
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almost half of the Democrats in the Senate, called on President Biden
to launch an investigation into the killing of Palestinian journalist
Shireen Abu Akleh after the Israeli government determined that Israeli
troops had nothing to do with it, in spite of overwhelming evidence to
the contrary. 

By themselves these are small, mostly symbolic actions. But as young
people become more conscious, and the contradictions in
Israel/Palestine continue to intensify, the movement will grow. The
Israel lobby does not want this ember to burst into flame, and it is
using the new PAC’s to try to stomp it out before it gets to that
point.

Additionally, around the same time as AIPAC made its move, another
leading Jewish organization, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), upped
its level of jingoistic rhetoric against those standing in solidarity
with the Palestinian people. This past May, in a major speech ADL CEO
Jonathan Greenblatt denounced three prominent groups that support
Palestinian rights –the _COUNCIL ON AMERICAN-ISLAMIC RELATIONS
(CAIR), STUDENTS FOR JUSTICE IN PALESTINE (SJP) AND JEWISH VOICE FOR
PEACE (JVP)_ – and said they contribute to the spread of
antisemitism as much as white nationalists. He described them
as “THE PHOTO INVERSE OF THE EXTREME RIGHT,”
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said the ADL plans to bring the full scope of its capabilities to
bear upon left-wing opponents of Israel. Even though it has been WELL
DOCUMENTED
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antisemitism is far more prevalent on the right than the left, the ADL
is so fixated on Israel that they are often willing to forgive the
right-wing’s antisemitism because of its support for Israel. And
both AIPAC and ADL equate criticism of Israel as antisemitism, by
definition, in an attempt to discredit any criticism of the state’s
actual attitudes or practices as “antisemitic” and therefore
invalid.

What should we do about all this?

It’s a cliché but nonetheless a truism, that all things are
connected. We can see that as Israel moves further to the right, its
leaders will continue to unite with the right- wing in the US, and try
to move both countries to the right, possibly towards fascism. Just
look at the bromance between Trump and Netanyahu. Conversely, as
working people and people of color become increasingly conscious of
how they are being screwed over, they will move to unite with other
oppressed people, here and in Palestine. The best way to stop
AIPAC’s efforts, is to: 1) demand that the Democratic party do
something to stop this theft of democracy. Their silence so far is
deafening. And 2) work like hell for the candidates who are
pro-Palestine and beat the machine. It’s critical that all
progressives move Israel/Palestine closer to the top of their priority
list. We have to educate liberals and moderates about the nature of
the Israeli state and normalize the Palestinian narrative among the
general population. We have to fight for justice in Palestine to
counter the efforts of right-wing, racist, settler-colonialists in
both countries.

But it’s not all bad news. Summer Lee, running for congress from
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was ABLE TO WITHSTAND AIPAC’S ATTACK
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In 2018 Lee was elected to the stage legislature. She continued to
build her community and activist base, supporting MEDICARE FOR ALL,
the GREEN NEW DEAL, strong environmental protections, Palestinian
rights and other progressive programs. When the local Congressional
seat opened up, she and anti-union lawyer Steve Irwin, competed for
the Democratic nomination. In March, Lee was 25 points ahead in the
polls. At that point UDC dumped $1 million in negative campaign ads
against her. This was on top of the $1.3 million they had spent
earlier in the campaign. Irwin gained rapidly in the polls.
But _Lee’s solid base in the district_ helped her beat him by a
fraction of a percent. HER REPUTATION AND HER ORGANIZATION
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key to her withstanding the onslaught of negative ads, and points to
how we can win in future elections.

Ilhan Omar had it partly right. Sometimes it is all about the
Benjamins. But candidates with a strong community base, and solid,
progressive politics can prevail over deep pockets if movements can be
built around them. As progressives, building these movements must be
one our primary tasks.

_Larry Hendel is a retired labor union representative and a member of
Jewish Voice for Peace._

* AIPAC
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* Democratic Party
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