Israel’s war in Gaza dominates US midterm races as Democrats split

Summary

Tensions between progressive and moderate camps of Democratic party on display in key Senate race in Michigan The Israel-Gaza war created gaping divisions in the Democratic party and contributed to a resounding loss in a critical presidential election year in 2024. Two years later, the issue continues to dominate races across the country, as progressives try to seize on Israel’s falling popularity and a broad anti-war sentiment ahead of November’s midterms. A recent debate among two Democrats vying for one of the most competitive US Senate seats in the country openly displayed the tension between progressive and moderate camps of the party. “They clearly want one individual and it’s not me,” Michigan Democratic contender Abdul El-Sayed said, referring to pro-Israel groups such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee that are spending against him. “So long as our politicians continue to be bought off by Aipac, do not be surprised when we fight wars that are in their best interest to annex Lebanon, or to do genocide in Gaza.” Haley Stevens, the moderate US representative benefiting from pro-Israel spending in the Senate race, retorted that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was “trashing” her on CNN that day, saying she wasn’t afraid to stand up to Israel either. “No one owns my vote and no one owns my policies,” she said during the debate. “Anyone who is contributing to my Senate campaign is doing so because of my proven record of fighting for Michigan.” The careful balance of rhetoric and policy required of candidates trying to capture American sentiment on Israel has become a fraught litmus test. A poll by the Associated Press in June shows a third of US adults of all political backgrounds, and roughly half of Democrats, believe Israel has committed genocide in Gaza. The share of Democrats who said the US was too supportive of Israel was nearly 60%, up from 45% in January 2024. While younger Democrats were more likely to hold this view, older Democrats increasingly share it too , the poll found. Even among the American Jewish community, the US-Israel relationship is not typically the number one issue bringing people to the polls, deGroot said. (And this demographic is contending with its own shifts on the issue; a recent poll found that Zohran Mamdani, the face of the rising left, is more popular than Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu among Jewish Americans.) Foreign policy usually doesn’t crack the top five issues voters rank as important in a general election, deGroot noted. But it is one area where Democratic primary voters can see differences between candidates. “A candidate’s willingness to buck the status quo of our foreign policy is a good example, a good symbol for them to show that they’re going to be willing to buck the status quo on all kinds of issues that people care about right now,” she said. Darrin Madison, a state representative in Wisconsin who is also a democratic socialist, said voters in the state want to stand up against special interests trying to buy elections, such as when Elon Musk poured tens of millions in a supreme court race in the state. Scott Wiener, a state senator running for Congress in California, was hounded by protesters at a trans pride march and said people were “cornering me, touching me or trying to physically bully me out of a public event”.