Democratic critics of Israel are courting challengers eyeing AIPAC help

Tim Peterson, a bald and burly Air Force veteran running for Congress in Minnesota’s Fifth District, wants to discuss the “existential” problem facing Minneapolis as mass police officer retirements loom on the horizon. But first he has to say something else: Hamas is fascist.

Sarah Gad, a young criminal lawyer running for the same seat, is passionate about criminal justice reform, but she acknowledged that everyone wants to know her feelings about the conflict in Gaza.

Don Samuels, another candidate, has a lifetime of public service to promote as a retired city councilman from North Minneapolis. But, he noted, “there is of course the international question” hanging over the race: Israel and Palestine.

All three are challenging Representative Ilhan Omar, one of Israel’s fiercest critics in Congress, in next August’s Democratic primaries. But only one of them is likely to benefit from a flood of campaign cash from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, its super PAC and other pro-Israel allies, outraged by the Democratic Left’s criticism of the Jewish state after Hamas’ Oct. 1 attacks . 7 and the subsequent war in Gaza.

A preliminary primary has begun eight months before Democratic voters decide. Call it the AIPAC primaries, with all of Ms. Omar’s opponents making the case for why they deserve a boost.

“Four million would be more than enough to do what we need to do,” suggested Joe Radinovich, the Democratic operative running Mr. Samuels led.

It is unclear how much AIPAC, its super PAC, the United Democracy Project, or another pro-Israel group, the Democratic Majority for Israel, will spend in this race or at the national level. The United Democracy Project has spent nearly $36 million in 2022, while DMFI has raised $9 million. Liberal groups like Justice Democrats and the Working Families Party have discussed around $100 million in their counter-fundraising campaigns.

AIPAC and its allies decline to release a number but say the total is likely to dwarf previous cycles.

Haim Saban, one of the Democrats’ biggest donors, said Thursday that the group of Israeli critics in his party was “small and vocal” but that it would be “a dangerous development, and against American security interests, if the Democratic Party would allow more members” of that group in.

“God bless AIPAC for taking this initiative,” he said.

Ms. Omar responded: “We know that organized people beat organized money. And I am confident that I will once again earn the trust my voters have given me.”

AIPAC’s other likely targets in Congress are no secret. At the top is Rep. Cori Bush, an activist voice from St. Louis whose Democratic challenger, Wesley Bell, investigated the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and has already won Jewish support in the city. Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York will face off against Westchester County Executive George Latimer, who was recruited by the pro-Israel groups.

Pittsburgh Rep. Summer Lee, a freshman, is also high on the target list. In Detroit, two candidates have come forward saying they received $20 million to challenge Representative Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian American in Congress and one of two Muslim women.

Ms Omar, the other Muslim woman in the House of Representatives, will be difficult to dethrone, but she is too tempting a target to be left off the list. Donors have asked her by name and her challengers have been open about their quest for that money. Ms. Gad, an Egyptian-American Muslim, said she had two interlocutors, including an Israeli filmmaker, Jonathan Baruch, who argued her case at AIPAC.

Mr. Samuels, who came within two percentage points of defeating Ms. Omar in the 2022 primaries, was in New York on Thursday for a fundraiser organized by hedge fund manager Brian Eizenstat, son of Stuart E. Eizenstat, a former diplomat. and Deputy Minister of Finance.

Mr. Peterson, a gym owner and former deep-sea captain, argued he has the stamina to knock on doors in every quadrant of the district.

Pro-Israel groups “have to be very careful about giving that money to someone who is going to be here and get the job done,” he said in a dingy campaign office in a vacant apartment building in Minneapolis’s Uptown neighborhood.

The group’s push for the Democratic primaries has not gone unnoticed.

“Anywhere AIPAC’s Republican billionaires can find a warm body to regurgitate their right-wing talking points and progressive Democrats’ primary, they will do so,” said Usamah Andrabi, a spokesman for the Justice Democrats, which was formed to fight Democratic primary challenges from the left to encourage.

AIPAC critics argue that its unconditional support for the Israeli government and its willingness to spend money on opponents in Congress could distract from critical domestic issues.

“It’s not where most American voters come to vote,” said Tali deGroot, who heads the political action committee of J Street, a pro-Israel group critical of the Israeli government. J Street has endorsed some of AIPAC’s goals, including Ms. Lee.

AIPAC and its affiliates support many Democrats, including centrists like Rep. Abigail Spanberger, who is now running for governor in Virginia, and Rep. Jared Golden of Maine, who recently called for gun restrictions after a mass shooting in his district. But AIPAC’s skeptics note that the organization’s singular focus has led to its decline more than 100 members of Congress objected to certifying the 2020 election results.

Even more galling to critics is that much of AIPAC’s own funding comes from Republicans.

So far this cycle, the United Democracy Project has received $1 million from Bernard Marcus, the billionaire co-founder of Home Depot, who primarily supports Republican candidates and groups. It received $500,000 from Michael Leffell, an investor who also supports Republicans. Past donors include WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum, who gave the group $2 million in 2022, and hedge fund manager Paul Singer, who gave $1 million that year.

Jews in Greater Minneapolis are sensitive to the accusation that outside money will influence a race with special local dynamics. Avi Olitzky, a former rabbi of one of the region’s largest synagogues, dismissed the “AIPAC Primary” label as a “diversion.”

“This race should not be about money, funding or support,” he said, adding: “We need a member of Congress in this district who represents the pro-Israel mainstream as represented by President Biden.”

But Jewish leaders say the division over Ms. Omar has increased interest in the primaries.

After the Oct. 7 massacre, Rabbi Alexander Davis of the Beth El Synagogue in the heavily Jewish suburb of St. Louis Park, Minnesota’s Democratic Governor Tim Walz and Nadia Mohamed, a Muslim just elected the next mayor of St. .Louis Park. , extended his condolences. Mrs Omar did not do that. a solidarity service on October 10 drew more than 2,000 people, including Mr. Walz and Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota. Mrs. Omar was not one of them. (An aide said she had votes in Washington that evening.)

“She is an extreme figure, far outside the mainstream of the Jewish community,” Rabbi Davis said.

Ms Omar pushed back on the suggestion that she has withdrawn.

“Amid the horrific carnage in Israel and Gaza, we worked day and night to secure the evacuation of several voters from Israel and the Gaza Strip,” she said in a statement. “We have worked with regional partners to push for the release of all hostages and are leading an international parliamentary push for a ceasefire.”

She has her Jewish supporters, especially in the extremely liberal city of Minneapolis last month a left-wing majority voted into power in the city council, led by a slate of the Democratic Socialists of America. David Brauer, a journalist in Minneapolis for 30 years and a Jewish member of Ms. Omar’s informal “kitchen cabinet,” said the congressman is taking the primary fight seriously.

Rabbi Jessica Rosenbergwho leads a flock of what she calls “anti-Zionist and non-Zionist” Jews in the city, has had extensive personal contact with Ms. Omar since October 7. “Her leadership for a ceasefire has made me so proud to have her represent me,” she said over an oat milk latte at a vegan cafe.

The upcoming primary season will be intense not only for the district’s Jews, but also for the Palestinian, Somali and broader Muslim populations, said Steve Hunegs, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas.

Ms. Omar, who came to the country as a Somali refugee, is probably the most popular and most maligned Democrat in the state, he said, adored by many, deeply opposed by many, and leaving few Minnesotans indifferent.

“We will see activism at all levels,” Mr. Hunegs said.