Gavin Newsom Goes to War — Against Israel

Governor Gavin Newsom’s suggestion that Israel is an “apartheid state,” made as Jerusalem joins with Washington to battle Iran, is a grim indicator of the direction the winds are blowing for the Democrats — due left against the Jewish state. Mr. Newsom attacked America’s ally, in wartime, in a conversation promoting his new memoir with the host of “Pod Save America,” Jon Favreau. He’s a former aide to President Obama who has also turned on Israel.Mr. Newsom badly wants his party’s nomination for president, and has evidently concluded that wheeling on Israel is the way to nab the nod. His use of “apartheid” comes days after he declared at a press briefing that “We have to reconcile why our bombs were used or Israeli bombs were used to kill children, young girls at a school, and what the imminent threat was.” He said this while it is still unknown how the school bombing came to be. Mr. Newsom scoffed at Israel’s and America’s war aims, telling Mr. Favreau that “We’re talking about regime change? For two years, they haven’t even been able to solve the Hamas question in Israel.” That is rich coming from the leader of a state that has for years struggled with basic governance and services. Meanwhile, Israel has prosecuted a seven front war, and now functions as a “model ally” that is a “force multiplier” for American might.At the event with Mr. Favreau, the governor of California, which has lost some 200,000 residents since 2020, also scoffed at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “He’s got his own domestic issues. He’s trying to stay out of jail. He’s got an election coming up. He’s potentially on the ropes.” The truth lies closer to Charles Moore’s reckoning in the Telegraph that Mr. Netanyahu is “perhaps the most remarkable leader the state of Israel has ever produced.”Mr. Newsom, in contrast, is merely keeping pace with his party. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, increasingly seen as the standard bearer of Senator Bernie Sanders’s faction, went to the Munich Security Conference and accused Israel of “genocide.” A secret Democratic autopsy on the 2024 election reckoned that the Biden Administration’s support for Israel — as fitful as it was at times — infuriated Democratic voters. Mr. Newsom’s bellicose tone signals that he is intent on staying on the side of the anti-Israel sentiment. He even entertained what Mr. Favreau called “rethinking our military support for Israel?” Mr. Newsom responded that “It breaks my heart, because the current leadership in Israel is walking us down that path where I don’t think you have a choice about that consideration.” All of this as the Israel Defense Forces and American military work hand in glove.The Coast governor calls Operation Epic Fury “an illegal, dangerous war that will risk the lives of our American service members and our friends without justification to the American people.” That mirrors the line taken by his fellow Californian, Vice President Harris. The war aims of Democrats, we have written, “run to appeasement.” Mr. Newsom is gambling that betting against Israel and America is a winning political strategy for what is left of the party of Truman.

Gavin Newsom Goes to War — Against Israel

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