A Jewish Political Realignment?

Gaza’s genocidal war against Israel has torn the Democratic Party apart by revealing the anti-Semitic core of its dominant left wing. Axios headlines: “Biden’s 2024 team roiled by Israel-Hamas war.”

Part of President Biden’s political team is in turmoil over the Israel-Hamas war, as some aides see the White House as abetting an immoral attack on Palestinians — while others believe Biden is showing “moral clarity” in protecting Israel from terrorists.

… The strife within the Democratic National Committee (DNC) — which Biden is leaning on for his re-election campaign — reflects larger generational and political divisions among Democrats.

Those divisions are chiefly between older pro-Israel Democrats and younger progressives who are more sympathetic to the plight of Palestinians.

And are entirely indifferent to mass murder, gang rape and the beheading of infants, where the victims are Jews.

At the Daily Mail, Alan Dershowitz writes that the relationship between Jews and the Democratic Party has been profoundly altered:

The Hamas atrocities of October 7th have forever fractured any political alliance between centrist and liberal Jews and woke, anti-Israel progressives.

It’s either them or us.

The coalition is at civil war.

Following the terrorist massacre of Israeli civilians and even before the military response, young woke progressives turned stridently against the Jewish State.

It was a knee-jerk reaction stimulated not by what Israel did – because it had done nothing to justify Hamas’ brutality – but what Israel is: the nation state of the Jewish people.

Anyone who rallies for Hamas is rallying for the extermination of Jews.

On Wednesday, Vice President Kamala Harris announced a new ‘National Strategy to Combat Islamophobia,’ which any sensible American would support.

But the streets of American cities and college campuses are not being filled with crowds celebrating the murder of Muslims.

These hordes are calling for the death of Jews – yet the President cannot muster a full-throated response that focuses on the current problem, namely rampant antisemitism.

And just last week, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre pointedly declined to say if the President had any plans to speak to the explosion of antisemitism among university students.

What are Jews who have been loyal to the Democratic Party to do?

If something is not done immediately – if it is not too late already – the breach between Jewish voters who support Israel (and even those critical of some of its policies) and the Democratic Party will become unhealable.

Maybe – permanent.
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[S]ince the days of Frankin Delano Roosevelt, a vast majority of Jewish-American voters could be reliably counted upon to cast their ballots for Democrats and contribute disproportionately to their campaigns.

This is unlikely to continue.

The silence of some Democrats, President Biden’s administration and America’s foremost liberal institutions in response to an eruption of left-wing anti-Zionism and Jew hatred is gut-wrenching.

It is nothing short of betrayal and Americans Jews must not move forward without a reckoning.

But then: where can disaffected Jews go?

Yes, centrist Jews have an alternative: they can become centrist Republicans. But that, too, will not be easy, since the Republican party is moving to the right on issues deeply concerning to many Jews – issues such as abortion rights, gay rights, climate control, gun control and the Supreme Court.

Blue collar and rural voters, many of whom were once Democrats, have turned to the conservative movement and the Republican Party. This is partly because they realized that conservative policies are more in their interest than liberal policies, but also, and perhaps equally, because it became evident that liberals despise them. Why should you vote for people who hate you?

That is a question that, in the years to come, many Jews will be called upon to answer.

STEVE adds: The last time a Democratic Administration was so openly hostile to Israel and its interests was the Carter Administration, and Reagan received a surprising 35 percent of the Jewish vote in 1980, helping to tip New York to his column. We’ll see if the current moment leads to another shift next year. (Obama was deeply hostile to Israel, too, but was more clever than Carter and disguised it better.)