On July 23, the House of Representatives passed a bill condemning boycotts of Israel. Only seventeen congressmen—sixteen Democrats and one Republican—voted against the measure. Unsurprisingly, the nays included the dedicated Israel-haters Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, along with their reliable ally Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. But they also included less well-known figures, like the Maine congresswoman Chellie Pingree. K.C. Johnson argues that politicians like Pingree—who once expressed entirely run-of-the-mill, moderately pro-Israel attitudes—are exactly whom allies of the Jewish state should worry about the most:
[In 2015], Pingree joined a fringe of House Democrats in signing onto a letter denouncing “Israel’s military detention system targeting children,” including seventeen-year-olds. That many of these teenagers were accused or convicted of serious crimes, including murder, did not seem to concern the signatories who based their complaints solely on the perpetrators’ age. Pingree and her colleagues urged the Obama administration to give the issue “priority status” in the U.S.-Israel relationship.
By early 2017, the former backer of a “secure and democratic Israel” voted against a resolution condemning the Obama administration’s abstention from UN Security Council Resolution 2334, which reversed a decades-long tradition of the United States vetoing resolutions that deemed Israeli control over eastern Jerusalem as contrary to international law. . . . Earlier this year, Pingree was one of only 21 House Democrats to sign on to a bill to create a $19 million fund to monitor alleged abuses of Palestinian children held in Israeli jails.
[T]here’s scant evidence Pingree has given much thought to Israel at all. [Her] opposition to Israel, instead, seems to be more tribal, caused by her fellow progressives coming to view the Jewish state skeptically. . . . Pingree’s transformation . . . illustrates how a generic legislator lacking deep concerns about Israel could shift to accommodate the newfound support for [its enemies] among some quarters of the Democratic base. For all the attention people like Omar and Tlaib receive, most electorates aren’t going to choose figures who openly traffic in anti-Semitism. But legislators like Chellie Pingree, from districts like Maine’s 1st? They’ll be much of the House Democratic caucus in coming years.
Read more on Tablet: https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/288806/chellie-pingree-real-threat-to-israel