At their 2017 convention, the left-wing political organization Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) passed an endorsement of boycotts of Israel by a nine-to-one margin; the resolution’s success met with enthusiastic chants of “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” The DSA also saw the electoral victories of three charismatic, young female candidates in November who beat out competition from the Democratic establishment: Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York will join the House of Representatives, and Julia Salazar the New York state senate. Of these, Tlaib is an all-out Israel hater, Salazar also seems to be one, and Ocasio-Cortez made some vague anti-Israel statements and then backtracked. Emily Benedek examines the new direction the organization is taking when it comes to the Jewish state:

Olivia Katbi Smith and Emily Rose Golden are the co-chairs of the Portland chapter of DSA. Before a . . . concert last March, they took the stage together to welcome their comrades and talk to them about a very important issue: “Palestine.” Olivia . . . took hold of the mike and introduced herself as “an Arab.” She then handed the microphone, relay-race style, to Emily, . . . who said, “And I’m Jewish.” Now that their bona fides had been established, Emily continued, reading from a script, . . . “So we want to debunk any myths surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that paint it as a complicated conflict, something that has always been around and is unsolvable and we can just let them fight it out over there. . . . Don’t let anyone fool you into thinking that there is anything other than an illegal and brutal occupation, designed and bankrolled by Western imperialist powers.” Cheers and whistles. . . .

Membership [in the DSA] ballooned to 32,000 in 2017 (from a mere 5,000 at its founding in 1982) on the coattails of Bernie Sanders’ [presidential] campaign, and boasted 50,000 members in 2018 after Trump’s election. The average age of a dues-paying DSA member has plummeted from sixty-eight years old to thirty-three between 2013 and now. The new members are a mishmash, unclear about what exactly “democratic socialism” means and entails, but unified by the belief that capitalism and conventional politics have failed their generation. They are also unified in the belief that Israel is the enemy of the righteous. . . .

But I wonder how Democratic voters and officials would respond if they knew that on August 30, 2018, Katbi Smith published on Facebook a drawing of Leila Khaled, a member of the [terrorist group] the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, with a red heart and the date August 29, 1969, in honor of the 49th anniversary of Khaled’s hijacking of TWA flight 840 on its way from Rome to Tel Aviv. After the passengers were removed from the aircraft in Damascus, Khaled and her fellow hijackers blew up the plane’s nose cone. [Khaled also participated in an attempted hijacking the following year, in which her collaborator shot a flight attendant.] Today, Katbi Smith’s Twitter cover photo is a likeness of Leila Khaled.

For some time, opponents of U.S support for Israel have been urging the White House to end the war in Gaza, or simply calling for a ceasefire. Douglas Feith and Lewis Libby consider what such a result would actually entail:

Ending the war immediately would allow Hamas to survive and retain military and governing power. Leaving it in the area containing the Sinai-Gaza smuggling routes would ensure that Hamas can rearm. This is why Hamas leaders now plead for a ceasefire. A ceasefire will provide some relief for Gazans today, but a prolonged ceasefire will preserve Hamas’s bloody oppression of Gaza and make future wars with Israel inevitable.

For most Gazans, even when there is no hot war, Hamas’s dictatorship is a nightmarish tyranny. Hamas rule features the torture and murder of regime opponents, official corruption, extremist indoctrination of children, and misery for the population in general. Hamas diverts foreign aid and other resources from proper uses; instead of improving life for the mass of the people, it uses the funds to fight against Palestinians and Israelis.

Moreover, a Hamas-affiliated website warned Gazans last month against cooperating with Israel in securing and delivering the truckloads of aid flowing into the Strip. It promised to deal with those who do with “an iron fist.” In other words, if Hamas remains in power, it will begin torturing, imprisoning, or murdering those it deems collaborators the moment the war ends. Thereafter, Hamas will begin planning its next attack on Israel:

Hamas’s goals are to overshadow the Palestinian Authority, win control of the West Bank, and establish Hamas leadership over the Palestinian revolution. Hamas’s ultimate aim is to spark a regional war to obliterate Israel and, as Hamas leaders steadfastly maintain, fulfill a Quranic vision of killing all Jews.

Hamas planned for corpses of Palestinian babies and mothers to serve as the mainspring of its October 7 war plan. Hamas calculated it could survive a war against a superior Israeli force and energize enemies of Israel around the world. The key to both aims was arranging for grievous Palestinian civilian losses. . . . That element of Hamas’s war plan is working impressively.