The Memo: Democratic dissent over Israel grows, deepening Biden’s dilemma

President Biden is facing deepening political trouble as criticism of Israel’s assault on Gaza grows more widespread and a possible invasion of Rafah looms.

Discontent with Biden’s substantive support for Israel has spread across the Democratic Party, even as the president has toughened his rhetoric criticizing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

At the same time, Republicans are upping their attacks on Biden as insufficiently supportive of Israel in its war with Hamas and amid rising tensions with Iran.

Democratic strife has been and continues to be the bigger political danger to the president, who has seen scores of primary voters reject him over his handling of Gaza.

One of the most striking political developments in recent weeks has been the willingness of mainstream Democratic figures to try to rein Israel in.

Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), usually a stalwart supporter of Israel, is among almost 60 House Democrats who have signed a letter urging Biden to rethink weapons transfers.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) stunned many observers almost a month ago by criticizing Netanyahu and calling for new elections in Israel.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) has said that Palestinian children dying from lack of food are victims of “a textbook war crime.” Late last month, Van Hollen told The Washington Post the administration “needs to be very careful” not to get into a position of complicity with war crimes by supplying the weaponry Israel is using to bomb Gaza.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), a close Biden ally, told CNN recently that “we’re at that point” where the U.S. needs to think seriously about putting conditions on further military aid to Israel.

Biden has so far resisted the demands to impose conditions. 

The president backs a congressional proposal for $14 billion in new military aid to Israel. In addition, the administration in February asked Congress to approve the sale to Israel of F-15 fighter jets and munitions, worth about $18 billion. 

On Tuesday, the leading Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), told CNN he needed more information before he would sign off on the F-15 sales.

Criticism of Biden’s position is also seeping into liberal-leaning popular culture. Jon Stewart excoriated the administration for what he cast as double standards and timidity toward Israel during Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show” Monday.

More than 33,000 people have been killed in Gaza over the last six months, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. The current phase of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was sparked by the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas that killed approximately 1,200 Israelis.

A shift in Biden’s rhetoric first became notable in February when Biden called Israel’s response to the Oct. 7 attacks “over the top.” At the start of this month, Biden said he was “outraged” by an Israeli strike in Gaza that killed seven people working for the World Central Kitchen charity. In an interview broadcast Tuesday evening on Univision, Biden said of Netanyahu, “What he’s doing is a mistake. I don’t agree with his approach.”

However, during a Wednesday press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in the White House Rose Garden, Biden again sidestepped a question about whether he would place conditions on more weapons. 

Instead, he talked about the “shared support” from Kishida and himself for a “cease-fire and a hostage deal” but added that U.S. backing of Israel against any threat from Iran was “iron-clad.”

The rhetorical machinations are doing nothing to endear Biden to critics who believe he has embraced Netanyahu too close and for too long.

“For all intents and purposes, his position hasn’t actually moved. Rhetoric isn’t enough. He has not cut off weapons aid for Israel,” said Natalia Latif, the communications director of the National Uncommitted Movement, a group that has pressed for Democratic primary voters to register protest votes against Biden’s policy on Gaza.

The movement’s effort has proved powerful, with the “uncommitted” line garnering around 13 percent of the vote in Michigan and almost 19 percent in Minnesota.

Meanwhile, voices of criticism on the right are rising. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) wrote on social media Wednesday that Israel was “facing the threat of imminent attack” from Iran and its proxies. 

“Biden must stop the harsh criticism of the only pro-American democracy in the region,” Rubio insisted.

Also on Wednesday, former President Trump told reporters in Georgia that Jewish people who vote for Biden or the Democrats “should have their head examined.”

However, even Trump has acknowledged a downside to Israel’s conduct.

The former president told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt last week that Israel was “absolutely losing the PR war” and needs to “get it over with fast.”

American public opinion has gradually shifted against Israel as the death toll in Gaza has risen and the humanitarian crisis has grown near-catastrophic.

A Gallup poll late last month indicated that 55 percent of Americans now disapprove of Israel’s military actions in Gaza while only 36 percent approve.

Meanwhile. Biden’s poll ratings on the topic, pinched by opposition from both left and right, are grim. An Economist/YouGov poll released Wednesday found only 23 percent of Americans approving of his handling of the conflict while 58 percent disapprove.

The electoral consequences may be severe, especially if a lasting cease-fire does not come to an end soon.

“There are important electoral coalitions on both sides of this issue within the Democratic Party and Biden needs to turn them both out to win,” said Todd Belt, the director of the political management program at the Graduate School of Political Management at the George Washington University. “Appeasing one tends to alienate the other but trying to stay in the middle leaves everyone unhappy.”

If there’s a way out of that conundrum, Biden hasn’t found it yet.

The Memo is a reported column by Niall Stanage.