Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, thinks that criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu does not make one anti-Israel and that the prime minister’s response to Oct. 7 is making the Jewish state less safe.
“I have spoken directly to Mr. Netanyahu twice since Oct. 7 and said, ‘Of course, you had every responsibility to declare war on Hamas,’” Dean told JNS. “‘But you also have a responsibility to do it justly.’”
“I’m critical of how he has done it,” Dean said. “I remember when I was just getting to go to Israel for the first time, the words always were understandably ‘security,’ ‘security.’ I believe, sadly, Mr. Netanyahu has made it less secure.”
Dean was in Dallas on Thursday with other House Democrats to respond to the Republican midterm convention
A fellow House Foreign Affairs Committee member, Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.), said that far-left Democrats, who oppose the Jewish state, tend to blame Netanyahu.
“The sad thing is this is what the Democrats have latched onto is, just say ‘Bibi,’ and think that absolves them of Jew-hatred and antisemitism,” Lawler told JNS. “Unfortunately, too many of my Democratic colleagues are more concerned about their radical leftist base than they are standing up for our greatest ally in the world.”
Lawler took aim at far-left, anti-Israel candidates who have won Democratic primaries, some of whom are running as democratic socialists.
“You have people running for office on the Democratic Party line that believe the Jewish state should not exist,” Lawler said. “It’s a sharp departure from where the Democrats were just two years ago.”
Dean supported an amendment cutting off aid to Israel in July. The proposal was defeated. So was a Senate proposal in April limiting sales of products to Israel’s military. But a majority of Democrats backed both measures.
She described herself as “very pro-Israel” and said that it is incorrect to say that if “you vote anything that is actually against Mr. Netanyahu and the atrocities he has committed with his coalition, West Bank, Gaza, that you are anti-Israel.”
“I think it reveals that I’m even more pro-Israel, and I compare it to this country,” she told JNS. “I am very critical of Mr. Trump. That doesn’t mean I don’t love my country. It actually means I love my country more.”
