The Democratic Party Can Have Both: Young Voters and Israel
A familiar warning is now being thrown at Democrats: accept the Democratic Socialists of America, with its anti-Israel and antisemitic elements, exactly as it is, or lose young voters, lose Gen Z, lose the midterms, lose 2028, and perhaps lose American democracy itself.
That warning is not only wrong. It is politically dangerous.
Democrats absolutely need young voters. We need organizers, idealists, labor activists, people demanding affordable housing, accessible health care, higher wages, student-debt relief, and an economy that works for ordinary Americans. We should not dismiss the anger many younger Americans feel toward a system that has left them struggling to buy a home, start a family, or believe that hard work will lead to a better life.
There is a great deal Democrats can and should learn from that energy.
But we do not have to accept the false choice that says the Democratic Party must either surrender to the DSA’s most extreme positions or abandon an entire generation.
That is not a coalition. That is a ransom note.
The Democratic Party is bigger than any one faction. It is a coalition of Black voters, Jewish voters, Latino voters, labor voters, suburban voters, working-class voters, young voters, seniors, LGBTQ Americans, immigrants, progressives, moderates, independents, and people who do not fit neatly into any ideological box.
That coalition does not survive by demanding that everyone agree on every issue. It survives because we recognize that democracy requires us to work together even when we disagree.
The DSA itself was not always what it has become.
The democratic-socialist tradition in America once had room for labor rights, civil rights, economic justice, Jewish identity, Zionism, Israel, and the belief that Israelis and Palestinians both deserved peace and security. Michael Harrington, one of the central figures in the founding of the modern DSA, came out of a democratic-socialist tradition that understood Israel’s legitimacy and its importance to Jewish survival.
Criticism of Israeli governments is legitimate, necessary, and common within Israel itself.
But there is a profound difference between criticizing a government and calling for the end of the Jewish state.
That is where much of today’s DSA has gone wrong.
Too many DSA chapters and leaders have embraced an ideology that treats Zionism as uniquely evil, Israel as uniquely illegitimate, and Jews who believe in Israel’s right to exist as politically suspect. Too often, Jewish Democrats who support Israel are told, directly or indirectly, that they must choose between their Jewish identity and their place in progressive politics.
That is not justice. It is exclusion.
The problem is not that DSA members care about Palestinian rights. They should. I care about Palestinian rights. Palestinians deserve dignity, opportunity, safety, accountable leadership, and a future free from Hamas, Islamic Jihad, corruption, and endless war.
DSA members can criticize Netanyahu. Many Israelis do so more fiercely than American activists ever could.
The problem is the anti-Zionist litmus test.
When support for Israel’s existence becomes disqualifying, when Jews are expected to renounce Zionism to be accepted, when the world’s only Jewish state is held to standards demanded of no other nation, and when the trauma of October 7 is minimized or excused, something has gone terribly wrong.
A movement that claims to fight oppression cannot make Jewish people feel unwelcome because they believe their people deserve self-determination in their ancestral homeland.
And a Democratic Party that claims to be a home for minorities cannot look away while one of its most loyal constituencies is told that its identity is negotiable.
The answer is not to ban every democratic socialist. It is not to insult young people. It is not to pretend that people worried about rent, health care, wages, or corporate power are somehow foolish or un-American.
The answer is to draw a line.
Democrats can embrace economic justice without embracing antisemitism. We can fight for workers without treating Israel as a pariah state. We can advocate for Palestinian dignity without denying Jewish history, Jewish trauma, or Jewish national rights.
Zohran Mamdani and other DSA-aligned figures may be popular with some younger voters. Democrats should pay attention to what they are doing right: organizing, communicating clearly, talking about everyday economic pain, and making people feel that their voices matter.
But popularity in a particular city or among one ideological group does not entitle anyone to redefine the Democratic Party for the entire country.
Winning national elections requires a broad coalition. Democrats cannot defeat the Republican Party by driving away Jewish voters, pro-Israel voters, moderates, independents, or Americans who may support progressive economic policies but reject ideological extremism.
The Republican Party would love nothing more than for Democrats to become a party that appears hostile to Israel, indifferent to antisemitism, contemptuous of mainstream Jewish concerns, and controlled by activists who view ideological purity as more important than winning elections or governing responsibly.
The Democratic Party can have both: young voters and Israel.
It can have both economic justice and Jewish safety, Palestinian dignity and Israel’s legitimacy, and a broad coalition without ideological surrender.
I would welcome the opportunity for DSA leaders to accept an invitation from AIPAC to spend even a brief time in Israel, to see the country as it is: a diverse democracy with strong labor traditions, universal health care, active unions, social protections, LGBTQ rights, and roughly two million Palestinian Muslim citizens of Israel, who possess the same legal citizenship and democratic voting rights as other Israeli citizens. They might find that Israel has already achieved many of the goals the DSA says it wants for America.
That would help unify our party.
We need young people. We need progressive energy. But we also need a party where Jewish Democrats do not have to apologize for being Jewish, where pro-Israel Democrats do not have to hide their convictions, and where no faction can use the language of justice to excuse hatred or exclusion.
That is not a rejection of the Democratic coalition.
It is a defense of it.
