What do the Super Tuesday results mean for Israel? - Analysis
Super Tuesday has winnowed the Democratic candidates. What does this mean for Israel?
By HERB KEINONSupporters of Democratic U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden hold up a HOPE poster of former President Barack Obama as he shakes hands with the crowd at his Super Tuesday night rally in Los Angeles, California, U.S., March 3, 2020(photo credit: REUTERS/ELIZABETH FRANTZ)
For US voters who vote in American elections for the candidate who is best for Israel, the results of the Super Tuesday primaries in 14 states were a mixed bag.There was good news, bad news, and good news in the results which essentially winnowed the Democratic primary race down to two candidates: Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders.The first piece of good news is that the campaign of Sanders, who boycotted this week’s AIPAC conference on the grounds that it “provides a platform for leaders who express bigotry,” and called Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “reactionary racist,” was slowed down.Though he went into the day as the front-runner, he ended up winning only four of the 14 states in play on Tuesday, while Biden won in nine, and possibly 10, states. While Sanders won the coveted California race, with its trove of delegates, he is now behind Biden in the delegate count 432-385.Why is this good news? Because most agree that a Sanders presidency – he has already said he would consider cutting aid to Israel to pressure the government – would make life extremely difficult for Israel.Howard Kohr – AIPAC’s executive director who, because of his organization’s desire to maintain sacred bipartisanship, always carefully chooses his words – unloaded on Sanders at the opening of the AIPAC conference on Sunday, even though he did not mention him by name.“Israel cannot afford false friends,” he said, in an apparent reference to Sanders repeatedly saying he is a friend of the Jewish state. “Any leader who energizes their political movement by demonizing Israel is not a friend of Israel.”Sanders, who has never attended an AIPAC conference in his nearly 30 years in Congress and is widely believed to be playing to the far-left wing of his party with his very critical stance on Israel, often sugarcoats his criticism by saying that he absolutely supports Israel’s right to exist.Kohr addressed this as well, again diplomatically, without mentioning names. “The leaders of this movement say they support Israel’s right to exist,” Kohr said. “But that’s not up for debate. Israel exists, and it doesn’t take a true friend to support that. Or these leaders say they support Israel’s right to defend herself, but every time Israel exercises that right, they condemn Israel.”That a candidate who Kohr made clear is no friend of the Jewish state lost footing in Tuesday’s primaries and is no longer the front-runner for the Democratic nomination is good news for Israel.
And the bad news from the primaries? That former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg got walloped, and subsequently withdrew from the race. Why is that bad news? Because of all the Democratic candidates, he was the best for Israel, the candidate with a strong emotional connection to the country.Bloomberg was the only candidate to appear at the AIPAC convention in person – Biden sent a taped message, while both Sanders and Elizabeth Warren boycotted.Bloomberg slammed Sanders for calling it a platform for racists, saying this was an attempt to “intimidate people from coming here and weakening the Israel-US relationship.”Calling Israel “our ancestral homeland,” Bloomberg said that if elected president, “I can promise you that I will always have Israel’s back, because Israel has a right to defend itself by itself, and that means that I will never impose conditions on military aid – no matter what government is in power.”Those words, obviously, were pleasing to ears in Jerusalem, but their significance was short-lived, as Bloomberg quit the race two days after he gave that speech.And the final piece of good news from the primaries, at least from Israel’s perspective, is that the progressive wing of the party – the wing of Sanders, Warren and congresswomen Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez – has not taken over.Biden’s victory – and the support he received from two other moderate Democrats who dropped out in recent days, Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar – shows that the moderates still control the party. And that is good for Israel, since the moderate flank of the party remains pro-Israel.Biden, too, addressed AIPAC in a five-minute tape. While it is clear he does not share the emotional attachment that Bloomberg, a Jew, has for the country, it is also clear that he does not share the antipathy that Sanders, another Jew, feels for the state.Israel knows Biden, and has dealt with Biden. He is a friend – a critical friend, a friend who, like president Barack Obama whom he served under, believes he knows what is better for Israel than Israelis themselves. But he is still a friend: one who has a nostalgic feeling about an Israel he once knew, and one who also understands the strategic importance of the country to the US.
