20 Days 20 Issues: Israel and Palestine

With just twenty days until the primary, I am using each day to discuss an issue I have highlighted on the campaign trail.

For Day 20, I am highlighting the relationship between Israel and Palestine, and the need for an open, honest, and compassionate conversation about the issue here in the United States.

I know the grief, anguish, and anger that this subject evokes in so many people with a deep and abiding commitment to their faith, to human rights, to ancestral homelands, to peace, and to the wellbeing of children.

As a scholar of religion, history, and policy, I have grappled with this in my classes and on the campaign trail. I know that not everyone who reads this email will agree when I call what Israel is doing to the Palestinian people a genocide. I know that many people who read this email have different visions for what peace and justice and the future look like for Israeli and Palestinian people.

And, we need a Democratic Party that can have that conversation.

This is why I was paying close attention when earlier this week, the New Hampshire Union Leader published an accounting of the donations to candidates in this race linked with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

The report showed that our campaign received one donation from a person who also contributed to AIPAC. We checked in with the reporter and followed up. They were correct.

So I refunded the contribution. Not because I think that a single $500 contribution from someone who also supports AIPAC will influence the way I would approach this issue in Congress, but because AIPAC has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on elections this cycle in an attempt to ensure that we cannot have an open and honest conversation about what is happening in Israel and Palestine.

The same is true of AI and Crypto PACs spreading false and deceptive messages and backing candidates who will allow these companies to write the legislation that will determine the role their technology plays in our lives for decades.

This is why I am calling on all candidates in this primary to refund contributions from individuals linked to AIPAC, Crypto, and AI special interests that are attempting to manipulate Democratic primaries and elect candidates who are willing to compromise on core democratic values in an attempt to gain power over our political and economic system.

That’s why we have built this campaign with nurses, educators, electricians and real people. In congress, I’m prepared to have a real conversation, without outside influences.