If ever there were a moment that foretold the Democratic Party’s current alienation from Israel, it was the 2012 Democratic National Convention. It was there that the party preparing to renominate President Obama produced a previously unthinkable scene: delegates loudly booed as references to God and Jerusalem were added to the party platform.
Initially, the party’s platform had dropped “God” and excised recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital (both of which had been included in 2008). When word got out, and the bad press started, Obama told his party to restore them, lest his nominating convention be overshadowed by headlines containing the word “godless.”
Whatever Obama’s personal feelings about Jerusalem and God, the intraparty fight was a result of his elevation as the party’s standard-bearer because his apathy toward Israel convinced anti-Zionist activists on the left that they had an opening to challenge the party’s professed pro-Israel stances. As our Abe Greenwald wrote at the time: “Today, America got an unvarnished look at the Democratic Party’s internal conflict on Israel. Half of the Party represents the pro-Israel consensus in America. The other half? Not so much. For all the talk about the unrecognizably extreme new Republican Party, it’s the Democrats whose fringe has quietly made deep inroads into the center—especially when it concerns Israel—and fundamentally altered the nature of the Party.”
Here we are 13 years later, and this fight has been out in the open for some time now. Today in Minneapolis, the DNC’s resolutions committee waded into the issue again, and again accomplished nothing more than giving party chairman Ken Martin a headache. From Politico:
“Democrats had appeared headed for a showdown on Tuesday as the DNC’s resolutions committee considered the competing resolutions, one of which called for a military arms embargo and suspension of military aid to Israel.
“The committee initially voted to reject that measure while advancing the one backed by Martin, which called for ‘unrestricted’ aid to Gaza and a two-state solution. But soon after the arms embargo vote failed, Martin announced he was withdrawing his successful resolution, after speaking briefly with the backers of the vote on the sidelines of the meeting.”
So there were two resolutions: one less-politely critical of Israel than the other. The chair himself—presumably speaking for the party big shots—backed the more moderate one. He succeeded in having his preferred resolution passed instead of the more radical one, so he… pulled his successful resolution?
What was Martin’s plan, exactly? Was he hoping they’d both pass? Because then he could have, you know, backed both resolutions. One assumes, then, that Martin didn’t want the anti-Israel resolution to pass. And it didn’t! But now he wants to start the process over.
Again: What outcome today would Martin have been satisfied with? Did he go into the DNC meeting with only intolerable outcomes being on the table?
“There’s a divide in our party on this issue. This is a moment that calls for shared dialogue, calls for shared advocacy,” said the man who had just presided over separate votes on dueling resolutions.
Lamenting his victory, Martin is now opting for compromise. And perhaps that’s possible: Some DNC committee members seemed willing to vote for a more anti-Israel measure if it would at least mention Hamas. Which means the virtually guaranteed outcome here is a final resolution that is harsher toward Israel than the one that passed.
They have plenty of time to get there, though: Martin said the DNC would solve this by setting up a task force, though he didn’t say when he intended to form one. It might be easier to mediate an actual cease-fire between Israel and Hamas.
