What is Israel? An embattled democracy nobly waging a defensive war against genocidal enemies? Or a bullying regional power indiscriminately slaughtering innocent Arabs? Like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the 2024 Democrats are saying, “Both!”

In the Harris presidential campaign’s Pennsylvania TV ads, Israel is waging a noble defense of its security. But in her Michigan campaign ads, Israel is the agent of Gazan suffering that must be stopped.

Connecticut voters witnessed a similar pattern in recent statements by New Haven congresswoman Rosa DeLauro. Her doublespeak about Israel in its hour of maximum danger offers a sobering portrait of the Democrats’ failings on this critical issue of global security.

On October 7, 2024, the Greater New Haven Jewish Community Center hosted a tearful memorial observance, one year since Hamas perpetrated its invasion, mass rapes, and horrific slaughters of innocent Israelis. Before this solemn audience DeLauro pledged her support for “Israel’s right to defend itself.”

Yet it has now been revealed that during that same week, DeLauro sent an e-mail to a Jewish constituent, apparently intended not for that constituent, but rather for a harsh critic of Israel. The e-mail hypocritically contradicted and hence rendered hollow, the congresswoman’s high-minded declaration of support for Israel at the prior memorial. It was filled with false slanders of Israel, such as: 

• The claim that “Israel has “indiscriminately bombed... schools, hospitals, and refugee camps.”
• The accusation that “[n]ot enough is being done to protect innocent Palestinians caught in the crosshairs...”
• An expression of “outrage about an Israeli airstrike that killed seven World Central Kitchen aid workers . . . .”
• An indictment of “Israel’s military forces” for having “put millions at risk of starvation.”

All those charges of Israeli perfidy are demonstrably false. DeLauro’s apparent ignorance of this reality reflects inexcusable factual illiteracy on this critically important issue.

In fact, and more than any other nation in history, Israel has repeatedly notified Gazan civilians over various media -- by literally millions of phone, text, and leaflet-dropped messages -- of impending military action. Israel also has opened and protected humanitarian escape corridors for Gazan civilians before each major military action.

Such warnings put Israel’s own troops at greater risk. And because of these selfless efforts -- as confirmed by a leading expert on urban warfare, West Point professor John Spencer -- Israel has achieved one of the lowest rates of civilian-to-combatant deaths in the history of warfare.

As for the tragic deaths of World Central Kitchen (WCK) aid workers, the documented reality is this: The WCK truck in question was hijacked by armed Hamas terrorists. The IDF had repeatedly sought to contact WCK before attacking the hijackers, but WCK never responded.

And contrary to allegations of “millions at risk of starvation,” Israel has made sure that thousands of pounds of food are delivered into Gaza daily. But as confirmed by many Gazan civilians, it is Hamas that hijacks the aid trucks, hoarding the food for their own terrorist cadres. Hence Israel’s humanitarian efforts for Gazan civilians have in fact kept its genocidal enemy well-fed and thus able to fight harder. Yet Israel still keeps the aid coming.

Shockingly absent from DeLauro’s vilification of Israel was any mention of the fact that Hamas uses Gazan civilians as human shields, by attacking Israeli troops from inside schools, mosques, and hospitals. Nowhere did DeLauro acknowledge that when Israel opens escape corridors, Hamas sends trucks to block their own people’s flight from harm; nor did she mention the witness accounts that show Hamas snipers shooting their own people seeking to enter the corridors.

Instead, DeLauro’s e-message portrayed Israel -- and not Hamas -- as a mass-murdering pariah state. It invites the question whether DeLauro’s public statements of support for Israel -- this small, besieged, yet noble democratic ally of America -- are just opportune political rhetoric. Which version reflects the real DeLauro: The pretty words that invite Jewish support? Or the defamatory condemnation of Israel, which emboldens Israel’s enemies and hence endangers its survival?

Both the Connecticut Jewish community and Americans concerned for Israel’s and America’s national security await an answer. Amid the clear morality of both Isreal’s cause and its supremely ethical military tactics, this should not be a difficult question.

Henry Kopel is a former federal prosecutor and the author of War on Hate: How to Stop Genocide, Fight Terrorism, and Defend Freedom (Lexington Books, 2021).

Image: Pixabay