Under fire for anti-Israel sentiment, outspoken Democratic progressives in Congress are finding themselves facing serious primary challenges by more moderate opponents.  

On Wednesday, the Democratic Westchester County Executive, George Latimer, announced his bid for New York’s heavily Democratic 16th Congressional district. Mr. Latimer will be facing off in the primaries against the vocally anti-Israel progressive and former Democratic Socialist, Jamaal Bowman, a member of Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s far-left “Squad.”

The head of the seventh-largest county in New York, Mr. Latimer’s campaign announcement comes in the wake of his recent trip to Israel, a lynchpin issue in the solid-blue district with a sizable Jewish population, including in towns such as Scarsdale and New Rochelle. 

In an interview with a local News 12 journalist, Tara Rosenblum, shortly after his announcement, the county executive said he was motivated to run because he has “heard from across the district a real desire from the people who live here that they want a member of Congress who is going to focus on their needs first, who is going to talk about delivering results rather than just rhetoric.”

“Right now in Congress, a lot of it is showtime down there. A lot of it is posturing and culture wars,” Mr. Latimer told Politico shortly before his Israel trip. 

Mr. Latimer, 70, added about Mr. Bowman, 47, that he “has been in Congress for three years, and I’ve done a bunch of things over the past three decades.”

Mr. Bowman, who, prior to office, was the principal of a public middle school he founded in an impoverished part of the Bronx, has been among the loudest voices in the House demanding a cease-fire and the end of Israel’s military operations at Gaza. 

On November 27, the congressman stated that he was “living through” an Israeli genocide at Gaza. He critiqued the Biden administration for “condoning it and being complicit.” His comments were criticized even by the head of the Progressive Jewish group J-Street, Jeremy Ben-Ami. Mr. Ben-Ami, whose organization gave $200,000 to the Congressman over the last election cycle, stated on X that he disagreed with the representative for “calling Israel’s response to Hamas’s terrorism ‘genocide’ and ‘ethnic cleansing.’” 

On October 25, less than three weeks after Hamas’ attack on Southern Israel, Mr. Bowman was among nine progressive democrats who voted against a bi-partisan resolution condemning Hamas and backing Israel. Mr. Bowman’s fellow Squad members have been the object of widespread denunciation for their anti-Israel comments, which have been criticized as bigoted and antisemitic. Most notably, Squad member Rashida Tlaib was censured by the House for supporting the antisemitic slogan “From the River to the Sea,” among other controversial comments.

Regarding his own position on Israel, in a statement published after he voted against the October 25 resolution, Mr. Bowman clarified that he does “strongly condemn Hamas and supports all efforts to defeat them” but demanded the Jewish state pursue “peace, not war.” 

That clarification has not appeased Mr. Bowman’s critics at Westchester County’s influential Jewish community. He has been rebuked by nearly every Jewish synagogue in his district. More than 40 rabbis affiliated with the Westchester Board of Rabbis in the district signed an open letter expressing frustration with Mr. Bowman’s anti-Israel positioning. 

Another letter, signed by 26 rabbis in the district, called on Mr. Latimer to challenge the Congressman, the Yonkers Times reported. 

In a notable political blunder, Mr. Bowman agreed to hold a discussion on antisemitism in a Baptist church, where Orthodox Jews are religiously forbidden from entering, the Forward reported. Just minutes before the event was set to begin, the pastor of the church, met by pro-Israel protestors, canceled the event out of concern about angering members of his congregation. The event was hastily relocated to Mr. Bowman’s office at White Plains, where he insisted that “I don’t call Israel an apartheid state.”

In addition to his anti-Israel posturing, Mr. Bowman has faced embarrassment after he illegally pulled a fire alarm in the Capitol in what he said was an accident. As the Sun previously reported, the Congressman triggered the alarm on September 30 as the House was debating an 11th hour short-term funding bill, known as a continuing resolution, in an effort to avoid a government shutdown.  

Video surveillance footage of the incident shows the former school principal removing emergency exit signs before pulling the alarm.

Prior to the video’s release, the Congressmen had disputed that his action was premeditated. “I was trying to get to a door. I thought the alarm would open the door, and I pulled the fire alarm to open the door by accident,” the New York Post reported that Mr. Bowman said shortly after the incident occurred.

The embattled Congressman was eventually charged with a misdemeanor by Washington D.C.’s district attorney. He pleaded guilty.

Mr. Bowman was elected to New York’s 16th congressional district after defeating a ranking member of the House’s foreign affairs committee and a staunch supporter of Israel, Elliot Engel, in the 2020 Democratic primaries in the district. At the time, Mr. Bowman was supported by the progressive political organization, Justice Democrats. The Daily Beast has reported that the group, along with other progressive political organizations, has been suffering from diminished fundraising. Justice Democrats has been forced to lay off half of its staff. 

According to recent filings viewed by the New York Times, Mr. Bowman has only $185,000 left in his campaign account. In contrast, the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee, which is expected to bankroll Mr. Latimer, is gearing up to spend up to $100 million dollars in this election cycle to defeat anti-Israel candidates such as Mr. Bowman.