by Jonathan S. Tobin
The California congressman’s Judean misadventure was an attempt to boost his long-shot presidential hopes and move on from his sponsorship of the disastrous Graham Platner.
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| Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) speaks to members of the media near the U.S.
Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., as he arrives for the last votes
of the week before the Memorial Day recess, May 21, 2026. Photo by
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images. |
There was a time, not so long ago, when presidential aspirants from
both major parties visited Israel to boost their campaigns. They still
do so now, but for different reasons, as the recent misadventure of Rep.
Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) illustrated.
In the past, American
politicians traveled to Israel to make clear their solidarity with the
Jewish state and its American supporters. They understood that this
demographic was composed not merely of the vast majority of American
Jews, but also of tens of millions of American Christians. Such visits
were not merely ways to boost fundraising. They were an effort to
demonstrate that the candidate was someone who appreciated that Israel
was the sole democratic ally the United States had in the Middle East,
as well as a place that deserved the admiration of the world for its
tremendous achievements in the face of implacable hostility rooted in
Jew-hatred.
Today, they go there to virtue-signal their solidarity with that same hatred.
Anti-Israel virtue-signaling
That’s
something that many Israelis and American Jews struggle to understand.
Try as they might to see Khanna’s visit—or the previous one by veteran
politician Rahm Emanuel
in the context of Israeli politics and disputes about who should be
running the Jewish state and policies it ought to pursue (including
those regarding “violent settlers” in Judea and Samaria)—these episodes
are about something very different. They are a way to connect with the
left-wing base of the Democratic Party and other Americans who have
swallowed the idea that the struggle for global justice is inextricably
linked to the Palestinian Arab war on Israel’s existence.
Rather than continuing to litigate the dispute
about whether or not, as Khanna falsely claimed, “violent settlers”
threatened and illegally detained him (or, as he also falsely claimed,
the Israel Defense Forces and police aided those seeking to harm him),
we need to understand that something else is going on here. It is the
political context of the Khanna dustup that is significant—not the
specific facts of the case. Once one sorts through the congressman’s
disingenuous rhetoric and the credulous reporting about them in the
mainstream media, however, it’s clear that the congressman didn’t tell
the truth about what happened.
Khanna went to Israel to show the
world that he’s against the Jewish state. The fact that he subsequently
said that those who had explained his version of the incident were
largely made up out of whole cloth were the same people who “lied about
genocide” in Gaza tells you all you need to know about the story. Just
as there has been no genocide in Gaza, there is no “apartheid” in
Israel. Even some fellow Democrats who are not so invested in catering
to the anti-Zionist crowd have criticized him for such a publicity stunt.
A big deal over nothing
The
short version of the Khanna confrontation is that, accompanied by
anti-Israel activists and some press people, the congressman journeyed
into an area of Judea and Samaria that the IDF considers a closed
military zone. Had he chosen to coordinate his trip with the U.S.
embassy or the Israeli military or police, he likely would not have
encountered any trouble. But since he did not—his tour guide was unable
to ensure him ahead of time that there would be no issues—Jews who live
in the area became suspicious and stopped him.
One can argue that
they shouldn’t have done so, but videos supplied by Khanna’s entourage
don’t back up the assertion that settlers threatened or detained him.
Nor were they violent. They may have been armed, but all Jews living
there are because of the ongoing hazard of Arab terrorism, which
continues daily, even though it is rarely, if ever, reported in the
press.
It was only after this encounter that Khanna reached out to
the embassy, and soon, IDF soldiers arrived. When they arrived, not
only did they not “side” with the supposedly violent settlers and
acquiesce in Khanna’s “detainment.” Instead, they stayed in their
vehicles and made the relevant calls to higher authorities, and soon
sent him on his way.
It was, as Israeli commentator Haviv Rettig Gur, himself a loud critic of “violent settlers,” pointed out, an “irrelevance.”
Nothing
happened, save for the fact that Khanna was delayed for a while. And
that was largely because while traveling in a foreign country in an area
where violence is routine—not from Jews, but from local Arabs—he chose
not to inform the authorities where he was or what he was doing.
Why, then, did Khanna make a big deal about such a nothing burger?
The answer is obvious. Outlets like The New York Times, CNN,
and even some Israeli and Jewish media were willing to publicize the
event as an instance of “settler violence,” even before they knew the
facts. For them, it fits into a narrative of Israeli bad behavior that
they think defines the contemporary Jewish state. The liberal Times of Israel amplified
Khanna’s demand that the Jews who had asked what he was doing there
should be punished, since they think it helps undermine Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his supporters.
Why the focus on ‘violent settlers’
For
many inside Israel and in the American Jewish community, this isn’t
about Khanna and his ambitions, but a chance to vent their anger and
frustration concerning the hundreds of thousands of Jews who live in
Judea and Samaria. After the Second Intifada from the years 2000 to
2005, Israel—under then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon—withdrew from the
Gaza Strip in the summer of 2005. That move directly led to the
transformation of the coastal enclave into a Hamas terrorist state in
the summer of 2007.
The tragedy of Oct. 7, 2023, was the result of
that terrible decision. In light of the massacre of 1,200 people and
the kidnapping of 251 others that day, only a deluded radical fringe can
go on advocating for a two-state solution.
The goal of evicting
Jews from the heart of their ancient homeland to create a Palestinian
state that will bring peace between the two peoples is a fairytale that,
in reality, is a formula for more bloodshed. It is now painfully
obvious that Palestinian national identity is linked to the dream of
eradicating Israel, not achieving self-determination. So, all those who
believed in this pretense are left with is the demonization of the Jews,
who helped prevent their country from making the same mistake in Judea
and Samaria that Sharon made in Gaza.
Yet their narrative about
violent settlers, which has been adopted even by liberal Americans who
support Israel, is itself a calumny. As JNS has reported,
more than 90% of incidents reported as “settler violence” are nothing
of the kind. Most are ordinary acts of Jews merely living or worshipping
over the so-called “Green Line,” such as visiting the Temple Mount in
Jerusalem. Every time a Jew defends themselves against Arab terror, it
is considered an act of “settler violence.” And even incidents, such as
one I was told about during a recent visit
to the same region Khanna was touring, which involved local Palestinian
Arabs killing a sheepdog belonging to an Israeli farming family, have
been falsely reported as Jews killing a Palestinian Arab-owned dog.
Neither
Khanna nor those who cheered his antics in the media after he cried
“wolf” about settler violence care about these facts—or what happened
when some Israelis had the temerity to ask him where he was going.
The real context is what is happening in the Democratic Party.
A political chameleon
Khanna,
a native of Philadelphia and the son of Indian immigrant parents, is,
like many in his profession, something of a political chameleon. A
lawyer, he served as deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Department
of Commerce in the Obama administration. He was elected to Congress in
2016, where he continues to represent Silicon Valley.
He describes
himself as a pro-business “progressive,” a contradiction in terms, but
something that has ingratiated him with the left-leaning oligarchs who
run Big Tech. In 2022, he was part of a delegation of pro-Israel members
of Congress led by then House Speaker Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). But
since Oct. 7, the views of the once marginal left-wing “Squad” in the
U.S. House of Representatives about Israel and antisemitism have become
mainstream discourse in the Democratic Party, as well as in liberal
media.
Khanna is someone with national ambitions. He understands
which way the wind is currently blowing in his party and has used his
considerable sway with Democratic donors to invest in promoting
some of the most prominent left-wing anti-Israel primary candidates, in
addition to Democratic Socialists who oppose the capitalism that
produced Silicon Valley.
He endorsed and campaigned with Abdul El-Sayed,
a Michigan Islamist who has parlayed a nonstop stream of antisemitic
invective demonizing the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC into a real chance of
winning the state’s Democratic primary in August.
Khanna was also
one of those most responsible for promoting the political fortunes of
Graham Platner, the Nazi-tattooed Israel-basher who won the Democratic
Senate primary in Maine. Khanna aided those seeking to deflect attention
from scandals surrounding Platner, including those involving sexual
misconduct. But his efforts collapsed after a local woman he dated years
ago, a liberal activist, stepped forward with an accusation of rape,
which ultimately forced Platner to withdraw from the race.
As
recriminations among Democrats about those who foisted Platner on their
party grew, Khanna knew that he needed to do something to change the
conversation about his own role in that debacle. He may be a long shot
for 2028 and is not yet making the cut in polls
for the top 10 contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination,
which is currently led by figures like former vice president Kamala
Harris and California Gov. Gavin Newsom. But the congressman more than
realizes that the party establishment that has dominated the
presidential nomination process over the last three election cycles is
unlikely to fend off the progressives who backed Socialist Sen. Bernie
Sanders (I-Vt.) in 2016 and 2020. And so, he naturally turned to an
issue that unites the left as a way of refocusing attention on himself.
Seen
from that perspective, it doesn’t matter that thoughtful observers know
that he lied about what happened on his recent trip to Israel.
Had
he been interested in learning more about the conflict, in addition to
meeting Palestinians who support the war on the Jews—like the mayor of Hebron,
who murdered two Americans—then he might have met with Israelis from
southern Israel who had been held hostage by Hamas or those residents in
the north who have been rendered homeless by Hezbollah attacks from
Lebanon. His visit, however, was orchestrated to show support for the
blood libels about “genocide” and “apartheid.” All it does is reinforce
the determination of Hamas and other terror groups to keep fighting for
Israel’s destruction in the hope that someday, America will turn on its
longtime Middle East ally: Israel.
Thinking about 2028
It’s
unlikely that Khanna cares about the way he is helping to perpetuate
the conflict. All he wants is to create a narrative in which he can be
singled out as the most active and most-funded left-winger around whom
progressives can unite in 2028.
Will he succeed? As one among many
others on the left with similar ambitions, it’s difficult to envision
Khanna being his party’s standard-bearer in two years. But stranger
things have happened.
Still, his conduct should attract interest
not so much because of the dubious notion that he is presidential
timber, but because he is not mistaken about what will help galvanize
Democrats. As we have seen in primary after primary this year, hostility
to Israel has become, alongside a belief in open borders and anger
about ICE enforcing immigration laws, the organizing principle of
Democratic politics in 2026. If there is one prediction that seems safe
to make right now, it is that he won’t be the only presidential
candidate in two years who will try to weaponize anti-Zionism and hatred
for Israel to smooth his path to the White House.
Jonathan S. Tobin is editor-in-chief of the Jerusalem News Syndicate, a senior contributor for The Federalist, a columnist for Newsweek
and a contributor to many other publications. He covers the American
political scene, foreign policy, the U.S.-Israel relationship, Middle
East diplomacy, the Jewish world and the arts. He hosts the JNS “Think Twice”
podcast, both the weekly video program and the “Jonathan Tobin Daily”
program, which are available on all major audio platforms and YouTube.
Previously, he was executive editor, then senior online editor and chief
political blogger, for Commentary magazine. Before that, he was editor-in-chief of The Jewish Exponent in Philadelphia and editor of the Connecticut Jewish Ledger.
He has won more than 60 awards for commentary, art criticism and other
writing. He appears regularly on television, commenting on politics and
foreign policy. Born in New York City, he studied history at Columbia
University.
Source: https://www.jns.org/opinion/column/jonathan-s-tobin/ro-khanna-and-the-weaponization-of-anti-zionism-in-american-politics
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