Leaders of the Washington State Democratic Party added anti-Israel statements, including blaming the Jewish state for rising antisemitism, in the party’s newly adopted platform without consulting with the California Legislative Jewish Caucus, Democratic state senator Jesse Salomon, co-chair of the caucus, told JNS.
The platform states that “there has been a dramatic resurgence in antisemitism in recent years on all sides of the political spectrum, due in part to actions taken by the Israeli government.”
“As co-chair of the Jewish legislative caucus, I heard nothing about this from the state party,” Salomon told JNS. “It is very disappointing that they would speak for us without including us.”
Salomon, who represents the state’s 32nd Legislative District, said that he has been trying for two years to pass a bill, which the Anti-Defamation League supports and which would protect houses of worship. “The same wing of the so-called progressive community has blocked those bills,” he told JNS.
“It’s like you can’t win,” he said. “I don’t understand the failure to recognize this.”
The anti-Israel language in the party platform “is not surprising and far from an isolated incident,” the state senator said. “It is clear that unless one is willing to denounce all affinity for the Jewish state, we are not welcome in many progressive spaces. No other identity group is subjected to that.”
“That is in itself antisemitic and creates an atmosphere of intolerance and lack of safety,” he said.
The state’s Human Rights Commission took a position denouncing Jew-hatred, “but it was a tortured definition that definitely didn’t get input from the mainstream Jewish community,” Salomon told JNS. “I found it to be quite offensive the way they stated it, and others I talked to did as well. This seems to be another one of those situations.”
“I don’t understand why the first principle of DEI—'nothing about us without us'—does not apply to the Jewish community,” he said.
A representative of the party’s Jewish caucus told JNS that when the caucus was alerted about the language, it was too late to make changes. Anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian activists attend party events wearing keffiyehs regularly and meet with lawmakers to share personal stories, according to the caucus.
Pro-Israel Jewish Democrats in the state, where Democrats control the legislative bodies, are not as active or have given up on trying to lobby the party, and those who support Israel must be more rather than less engaged, the representative told JNS.
“Some draft language from the Democratic Party Platform was shared with us in advance of the convention by party leadership,” Solly Kane, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, told JNS. “As we expressed at that time, and reiterate now, there are numerous problematic elements in the language.”
The nonprofit has “limited capacity to engage in partisan politics,” according to Kane, which “means that Jewish community members-at-large must step in and advocate for changes in the party platform and at the local level.”
“Unfortunately, we know of far too many Jewish Democrats in Washington state who are no longer engaged in the Democratic Party,” Kane told JNS.
“For years, and in the face of record levels of anti-Jewish harm, these community members have tried to ensure their legislative districts and the party platform focuses on issues core to our state and takes positions that uphold the safety and belonging of all Washingtonians, including Jews,” he said. “Sadly, after advocating with compassion and respect, sharing lived experiences and being met time and time again with ignorance, gaslighting and obstinance, many Jews no longer feel safe to voice their concerns or perspectives.”
Kane said that there are “many shared values between the Washington State Democratic Party and members of the Jewish community—economic opportunity, justice and equality among them.”
Sam Markstein, political director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, told JNS that the “Washington state Democrats made it official. When antisemitism surges on the left, they outrageously blame the Jewish state.”
“Don’t forget, Washington state’s congressional delegation includes Pramila Jayapal, who smears Israel with the ‘genocide’ libel, voted against the Antisemitism Awareness Act and pushed to cut off critical arms to Israel as it defends itself,” Markstein said, “and whose senators, Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, voted to choke off military aid to a wartime ally in a fight for its very survival.”
“Every Washington Democrat in Congress, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries should answer for a state party that scapegoats Israel instead of confronting Jew-hatred in its own ranks,” he told JNS. “Rather than shamefully directing their ire at Israel, Washington Democrats should look in the mirror.”
The platform’s language also drew condemnation from other Jewish organizations.
“Any attempt to justify antisemitism is not only offensive but dangerous,” Regina Sassoon Friedland, regional director of the American Jewish Committee’s Seattle office, told JNS.
“Blaming Israel and the Jewish people for surging Jewish-hatred is victim-blaming and gives cover to those who demonize Jews in Washington state and around the world,” she said.
Jim Berk, CEO of the Simon Wiesenthal center, called the platform’s wording “dangerously wrong.”
“The Washington State Democratic Party gets one thing right: antisemitism is rising,” Berk said. “But it gets one thing dangerously wrong by suggesting that this resurgence is ‘due in part to actions taken by the Israeli government.’ That is victim-blaming. Antisemitism is not caused by Jews or by the policies of the world’s only Jewish state. It is caused by antisemites.”
“When antisemitism is framed as an understandable response to Israeli policy, responsibility shifts away from those who choose to hate and toward those who become its victims,” he told JNS. “If we are serious about confronting antisemitism, we must reject every attempt to rationalize or explain it away.”
Morton Klein, national president of the Zionist Organization of America, told JNS that the platform contributes to anti-Jewish hostility.
“The Washington State Democratic Platform foments antisemitism by promoting and spreading numerous antisemitic blood libels about Israel, Zionism and Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria,” Klein said. “Then the platform has the gall to blame Israel, the victim of these lies, for part of the dramatic resurgence in antisemitism.”
Robert Spitzer, president of B’nai B’rith International, told JNS that “it is unfortunate that while the Democratic Party of Washington stands for many important values, to suggest in its party platform that Washington schools should be teaching children what amounts to a ‘blood libel’ against Israel is disappointing and ill advised.”
Jim Walsh, chair of the Washington State Republican Party, previously told JNS that “blaming Israel for the rise in antisemitism on the political left and in the Democratic Party specifically is classic narcissistic behavior.”
“It’s what abusive husbands do to battered wives,” he told JNS. “It’s weak and shameful.”
A spokesman for Shasti Conrad, chair of the state party, told JNS that the language “was submitted by the delegation from Legislative District 23 as an addition to the platform committee before it was fully passed by the delegates to the state convention.”
“Washington Democrats’ Jewish Caucus leadership and the Greater Seattle Jewish Federation were looped on this language when it was proposed,” the spokesman said. “Convention delegates passed the language contained in the platform.”
