This week, I submitted testimony on Israel/Palestine to the Democratic Party’s Platform Committee. This is my 11th convention and the ninth time I’ve been engaged in discussions regarding the platform, either as a member of the drafting committee, negotiating language with the campaigns, or simply presenting testimony, as I am doing this year.
During these many interventions, I’ve seen some changes made, but all too few on how the platforms address the issue of Palestinian rights. Friends often ask me why I keep coming back—like Sisyphus.
I do so for two reasons. In the first place, it is because Palestinian rights continue to be ignored. Despite the language in our last platform regarding the equal worth of Israeli and Palestinian lives, we continue to demonstrate that we do not see them as equal at all—and so their suffering continues.
Secondly, it is because I want Democrats to win. And what I am seeing is that unless Democrats change direction in the way they deal with Palestinian rights, they are risking losing a sufficient enough number of their voters that it could cost them victory in November.
It is important to consider today’s fraught political environment. The magnitude of the suffering Israel has inflicted on Gaza is horrifying: 38,000 dead, 70% of buildings demolished, infrastructure and medical facilities gone, famine looming, and an entire generation of children traumatized.
We are also seeing mass intersectional mobilization of what are largely Democratic voters who are deeply opposed to the Biden administration’s policies on this issue—this includes a substantial number of Arab Americans and a not inconsequential number of young people, progressive Jews, Blacks, Asians, and Latinos.
Most Americans, and actually most Democrats, never read the platform. However, this year the constituent groups noted above will be watching what language the party puts forward in the platform. In this context it is vitally important to consider their concerns and the consequences of failing to do so.
With this as a backdrop and knowing the process as I do, I offered a few recommendations for language changes as guidance for the platform drafters:
I’m sure the platform will speak about our ironclad commitment to Israel’s security and will be passionate in our condemnation of Hamas terror. But you will fail if you do not passionately acknowledge the immense suffering experienced by Palestinians and our role in fostering Israel’s sense of impunity as they continue to grind up Palestinian hopes and lives and property.
I urge you to recognize the urgency of the moment and the rawness of the feelings of those deeply pained by this tragedy, I ask you to avoid language that seeks to placate without substance—in other words, don’t say things you don’t mean, as you did in 2020 when you included the following quotes in the platform:
- Democrats recognize the worth of every Israeli and Palestinian,’ or
- ‘We support a negotiated two-state solution,’ or
- ‘We oppose any unilateral steps by either side’ (including annexation and settlement expansion).
The same platform that said these things went on to support Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel (when it has been annexed and is a unilateral action; is home to over 200,000 settlers; and is the site in which there continues to be confiscation and demolition, and blocks the creation of a viable Palestinian state).
If you oppose something, it’s important that you mean it. And if you state that something mustn’t be done, there should be consequences when it happens. When red lines are crossed, settlements get built, hospitals get bombed, humanitarian aid is blocked, and our response is nil, we look weak and insincere.
And if we say we want aid to reach Palestinians but then block aid to UNWRA, the only entity that can efficiently administer, protect, and deliver the aid—then we have failed.
With all this in mind, here are some suggestions: be firm in calling for an immediate permanent ceasefire, but add real consequences if either party violates its terms; demand the unimpeded delivery of aid to Gaza; demand an end to settlement expansion, and an immediate end to settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, with consequences if they continue; and if you are going to condemn Palestinian incitement and terror, you must also condemn Israeli incitement and terror— whether perpetrated by individuals or the state.
One final note: I first engaged in these platform discussions 40 years ago. At that time, I was warned that the “P” word (meaning Palestinians) couldn’t be in the platform. During the next three decades I tried to get opposition to settlements in the platform.
Well, the “P” word made it a decade later and the 2020 platform for the first-time mentioned our opposition to settlements.
So here’s my challenge for 2024’s platform: call for an end to the occupation; for the adoption of President Clinton’s language “the right of the Palestinian people to live free and independent on their own land”; and make clear that there will be consequences for Israel’s continued violations of Palestinian human rights and international law and conventions.
Those were my suggestions. The ball is now in their court.
