US midterms 2026: Will Democrats rethink US support for Israel? | This Is America

This is America, a country that's grappling with a new political reality, with the Democrats in control of both chambers of Congress. And one of the big questions that's circling around Washington is what to do about the country's relationship with Israel. It was a major issue in the midterm elections for voters last week, and one that several Democrat candidates seized on. It's also a big question for Israel itself. One of America's most consequential allies and for the conflicts that both countries are involved in. But first, here's Alex Marquardt in our DC studio. Thank you, John. America has long been Israel's most reliable ally in the Middle East. And in the past few years, that relationship has increasingly been tested as Israel's favorability is now declining in the United States. Now, President Donald Trump announced on Election Day that he plans to end billions of dollars of military aid to Israel. The bombs being supplied by Washington have been used in the killing of tens of thousands of civilians in Gaza. as well as Israel's attacks in Lebanon and on Iran. Now, Vice President J.D. Vance, he took to social media to say that the U.S. needed to change its relationship with Israel. The next Congress will include progressive Democrats whose campaigns were deeply critical of Israeli policies. For example, Michigan's new senator, Abdel El-Sayed, says that he doesn't consider Israel to be an ally and that arms sales should be halted completely. I think a lot of the issue was more about the government of Israel and our posture toward that government. But I want to ask us this. We spend billions of dollars subsidizing a foreign government unconditionally, buying bombs and tanks that have been used to do genocide and apartheid and make war. We have no business fighting. In fact, I don't know that we should be continuing to sell weapons to a country that is again using our weapons to do awful things. So what could this mean for the future of American military and diplomatic support for Israel? Al Jazeera's John Holman now reports from Washington. It was a low-key announcement, snuck into a Fox News phone-in by President Trump on the morning of the midterms themselves. The U.S., he said, would stop providing military aid for Israel. They're fine with it, because, you know, they've become a very successful country. They don't need it. Israel and the entire Middle East... Spun very positively, but after a big midterm defeat, it seems something had become clear to the president. There's a great... Dislike, incredibly, for Israel. His vice president echoed that. J.D. Vance signalled that to win voters back, Republicans had to change our relationship to Israel. A poll from Pew this April bears that out to some degree. 60% of people surveyed viewed Israel unfavorably, up from 42% in 2022. It's not across the board. The majority of older Republicans continued to support the country, younger ones less so, and Democrats were much more critical. 80% of them viewed Israel unfavorably. But even within that party, there are splits. Some progressives are in rare agreement with Trump over the military aid cuts and want more. We want our taxes spent here for schools here and health care here and infrastructure here. We don't want our money sent to do apartheid or genocide or war. Others in the party establishment, like Chuck Schumer, have been longstanding supporters of military assistance. All the aid that Israel needs, I will continue to fight for it. And we delivered more security assistance to Israel, our ally, under my leadership than ever, ever before. That's led to tension within the Democrat Party. But the general trend is inescapable. Less support for a country which has killed more than 74,000 people in Gaza in the last three years, according to Gaza's health ministry. So what does it mean for Israel? Well, with President Trump's announcement about $7.6 billion of military aid that the country thought it would have in the next two years is now in question. But perhaps also significantly, a warning bell appears to be sounding for a country that depends on the US having its back, that this is no longer unconditional or eternal. John Holman, Al Jazeera, Washington DC. Now let's dig into the future of the U.S.-Israeli relationship with our guest. Today we are joined by Adam Arelli, who is a former U.S. ambassador to Bahrain, and by Eric Hamm, who is a former Democratic Senate staffer. Thank you both for being with me. Adam, you spend a lot of time in the Middle East. Ambassador, does this feel to you like a historic shift in the relationship? It does. I mean, there was, like, one constant in American foreign policy and in, I think, American politics, and that was broad-based, bipartisan support for Israel and for Israel's security. Thank you very much. You know, it was the only democracy in the Middle East, and they were under attack. They were constantly under attack. We'll be right back. Dad. That rock-solid consensus has fractured, clearly. I mean, your reporter talked about 60% having an unfavorable view of Israel. I mean, that's incredible. Here's another figure he didn't talk about, which was... 58% of younger Americans have a favorable view of the Palestinians. So that's the other side of the coin. It's not just being critical of Israel, but it's seeing the Palestinians as maybe, you know, more the victims. Then the then the problem. Well, certainly far more sympathy for Palestinians these days in general because of what we've seen them go through in Gaza and now the West Bank. Eric, we just heard that soundbite from El-Sayed. The shift, you know, some of these numbers that we've been talking about is certainly more significant among Democrats than Republicans. There are shifts in the Republican Party as well. But how much do you think the question of Israel amid all of the other issues is going to be a factor in the next Congress? Well, it's going to be huge. And I think we're going to see very intense conversations playing out, not just between Democrat and Republican, but between Democrat and Democrat. Now, Israel has always been a third rail of politics here in Washington. It's always been an area, a topic that has never been in question in terms of the aid that the United States provides. But what What we're seeing now is the United States and lawmakers, both Democrats and Republicans, They aren't as willing to just provide blank checks to Israel anymore, and I think what we're seeing here is it's not so much that the United States is going to no longer be seen as an indispensable ally of Israel. It's now that aid, that support comes with both questions as well as more attachments How it's used, how it's spent, and more importantly, what it means for U.S. authority and credibility in the region. Eric, as a former congressional staffer, what else could a Democratic Congress do? I think we focus so much on the military aid. There's also a question about the Pentagon budget. But what are some other instruments that progressive Democrats could use to change this relationship with Israel? Well, in terms of where progressive Democrats are right now, it's not so much, it's about Israel, but it's also about Israel's relationship to the Palestinians and what we're seeing play out there. And so I think what many progressives are looking for, and we've got to remember also too, with this new Congress, you're going to have far less progressives, both in the House and the Senate. We have to remember, Abdul El-Sayed is just one of 50 senators, and now he's only going to be one of 100, not just one. And so I think the question is, is that aid now going to be more equitable in terms of what the United States provides to the Palestinians in relationship to Israel? I recently spoke with Congressman Jason Crow of Colorado, who's on the Intelligence Committee, among others, and he talked about the need for a major reset with Israel. Here's a bit more of what he said. We have to figure out a pathway to peace where both people can live with security and dignity. Israel can have a right to self-determination and safety, and so can the Palestinians as well. Netanyahu has undermined that every single turn, every single chance that he has been given over his entire career, actually. So we'll see what happens with that coalition, but Americans definitely want a reset of that relationship. I want it to look and be very, very different. And I think you're right. Donald Trump is reading the room for the first time in a while, and he sees that's where Americans want to go to. My vote against aid a couple of months ago before we left for the campaign break, as well as my vote against that collaboration, is based on my very strong belief that we need a massive reset with that relationship, that the amount of civilian casualties in Thank you. the war in the last couple of years are not aligned with our values, not aligned with the laws of war and desperately need to needs to change in the United States and American taxpayers. The American people cannot be funding that is something that is not consistent with our own standards, actually. I mean, these are these are standards that follow the conventional arms transfer policy. They follow a national security memorandum, 20, as it's called, to get really into the weeds here. Leahy vetting. We have rules and laws in place that say how both we as a country and our partners and allies have to conduct themselves in conflict. And I'm going to make sure we follow them. When you heard Congressman Crowe there talking about Donald Trump reading the room, Ambassador, he was referencing this announcement on Election Day by Donald Trump calling into Fox News in a very strange situation to announce that by the end of the year that military aid for Israel would end. How did you read that announcement from Trump? I read it as a desperate play for votes on the eve of an election that he has no intention of following through on. One of the next battles in Congress is going to be the Pentagon budget, the NDAA, $1.5 trillion. dollars and that actually includes a provision that has now passed the House that would actually the Israeli and American militaries more closely in a way that could Evade some congressional oversight. How do you think that is going to be affected by this new Democratic Congress? I think it will make it harder to it will make it harder to make aid to Israel easier. Right. Because you're going to have with this new balance of forces in Congress, you're going to have more members taking a more critical view of. What dollars go to Israel and how they are going to be spent? I would have two big, I would add two big footnotes to that, however, when one considers what's going to happen going forward. Number one is, you know, most of the money for the next 12 months has already been appropriated. So we're talking about, you know. Out years, 2028 and beyond, because the budgeting, that's the way the budgeting process is, so far in advance. So for the near term, Israel's not going to be affected a lot in terms of the appropriation of money. Second of all, you know, we've been talking about all the changes in America, right? The changes in America are in large part due to the changes in Israel. In other words, Israel for the past several years has been acting like a rogue state, right, under Netanyahu. And I think one needs to make a distinction, they certainly do in the polls, between views towards the Israeli government and views towards the people and state of Israel. That's still very strong. So here's the question. You've got a new government coming up in Israel. Yeah. Is that government going to take steps to calm the situation down with the United States or to make it or to inflame it? I would think that the new prime minister, one of his top priorities is going to be, having seen what happened in the midterms, is to repair the relationship with the United States. I want to get both of your thoughts on that, Eric. I'll let you jump in in just a second because I think that's a very important point. We've seen a lot of Democrats in particular zero in on Netanyahu as being the issue and really the dividing factor here. Eric, to what extent do you think You know, having covered national security issues, that there has been a shift in Israel itself. And if Gadi Eizenkot is to be the next Israeli prime minister, what does he need to do? What issues does he need to focus on that's going to get the U.S. to back off a little bit? Well, ideologically, in many ways, both he and Netanyahu are similar. However, in the United States, we've got to remember, policy oftentimes is driven by policy. I mean, policy is driven by our politics, and our politics are oftentimes driven by optics. And the optics in the United States now, particularly in Washington on Capitol Hill, is... Is Netanyahu has been a polarizing figure who has attempted to try to place his thumb on the scale of our U.S. politics. That has been seen as a no-go for many Democratic politicians. But also what we have to remember is people like Chuck Schumer and incoming Speaker of the House, Hakeem Jeffries, they both receive enormous support from AIPAC. So, like the ambassador says, what we're going to see over the next year is going to primarily be status quo. But that does give new leadership in Israel a lot of time to be able to not only repair the relationship, but show that they can also operate as an honest broker, meaning they can actually step back from engaging in U.S. politics domestically and try to take their finger off the scale. That will go a long way, I think, in actually helping to rebuild the relationship, at least optically. But the range of the Democratic Party really is quite big. You've got El-Sayed and, say, Bernie Sanders at one end, and you've got Chuck Schumer and John Fetterman at the other. So how much of that is a fracture in the party? Well, also, too, a lot of this is going to be, I think, driven by what we're going to see in just two years. It's very likely that Fetterman will not even be there. I think what we could see in 2028 Is a 60 seat majority of Democrats that's going to, I think, make it even much bigger. But also, I think what we're seeing here is the Democratic Party, at least in Congress, is moving further to the right. Well, which, again, I think will benefit Israel if Israel can show itself to be an honest broker, at least trying to. I think it's important for us to recognize that there is a need to decrease the temperature in the region, particularly with the Palestinians, and also ensuring that they recognize the sanctity of U.S. politics. The drop in favorability for Israel is not as precipitous on the Republican side, but I am curious to hear how you see Republicans, because of course J.D. Vance, one of the most prominent Republicans out there How dramatic is it on the Republican side? I think it depends. Yes, the Republicans are not as divided as the Democrats are, right? But there's still, I think what you're going to see in the Republican Party is a fight for leadership. For 2028, I mean, there's a there's a there is a battle going on and it's already started. Who's going to take the mantle of the MAGA mantle? Who's going to succeed? Donald Trump. J.D. Vance is staking his claim to that right by taking on Israel. What's the problem for Republicans with Israel? I'll tell you what it is. It's not Gaza. Yeah. And it's not the Palestinians. I don't care about either one of those. It's the wars. It's Iran and the war. Israel. Netanyahu dragged us into this failed war with Iran. We have got to have a divorce, from J.D. Vance's point of view. We've got to have a divorce. We cannot let Israel lead us by the nose to fight its fights. And that's what I think you're seeing with J.D. Vance. Here's what I would tell the Israelis, the Israeli government. If you want to improve the relationship with the United States, you're going to have to do two things. Number one, you're going to have to... Get these crazy religious extremists under control, particularly in the West Bank, where they are running riot and killing. People at will, Palestinians at will, that has to stop. Often with the support of the Israeli military. Often with the support. That has to stop. And number two, you've got to get serious about some degree of Palestinian self-determination. And I think there is some recognition from Eisenkot, from Naftali Bennett, and others. I want to play an ad that ran in Michigan during the campaign. This is an anti-Israel ad that was produced by a PAC called Rebellion. Take a listen. I mean, don't we give Israel $4 billion a year anyways? Yeah, and now we're giving them another $26 billion. Do you know how much that is per American taxpayer? No. It's like $161 per person. Apparently it's costing us a lot of money to drop bombs on Gaza. That's terrible. Don't they get universal health care too? Yeah, they do. We're paying for that too, probably. Might as well put the bananas back. So that ran in Michigan. It was hugely controversial. It was widely panned as anti-Semitic. It was not connected to the al-Sayed campaign, but people were calling for al-Sayed to denounce that. Those feelings expressed, Eric, in, you know, this ran in your home state of Michigan. How pervasive do you think those are in that America is not only giving Israel too much money for weapons, but, you know, they've got all this societal support that we don't have? You know, this is an issue also that many believe sank the Harris campaign. And we also have to remember there's a large Muslim population in Michigan. So that, of course, was driving a lot of the internal politics in that state. But again, I think what we're seeing here is this is a massive battle, ideological battle that is playing out, like I said, within both parties, and also it's playing out between the parties here in Washington. And right now, it's anyone's guess where that is headed. And this is going to continue to play out, I think, over these two years in terms of funding, in terms of strategy, in terms of what our policy looks like. You mentioned that NDAA, the $1.5 trillion, that is going to be a massive, massive fight because Democrats are going to want to claw some of that back, and so I think we're going to see those conversations play out there. But we're also going to see this fight come to a massive head in 2028 when both parties actually decide. Who will be the titular head of those parties and who they will put forward to lead to be the next president of the United States? There's another data point here that I want to point out. State and local governments are facing pressure to divest from Israel. Many of these local governments hold bonds that fund Israel's sovereign debt, including defense spending. So Palm Beach, Florida, for example, that's Trump's home county. That has by far the biggest investment in Israel bonds anywhere in the world at $1 billion. But on election night, they voted not to reinvest $67 million after months of pressure from local activists. And then Florida's next biggest investor is Miami-Dade County at $130 million. And other states also have large investments in Israel bonds, like Texas at $280 million, Ohio at more than $260 million. Now, in Providence, Rhode Island, they voted on election night to become the second city in the U.S. After Somerville in Massachusetts to divest from Israel, Providence voted overwhelmingly not to invest in countries that profit from, quote, genocide, apartheid, ethnic cleansing, and prolonged military occupation. Now, I want to have you listen to one of the organizers of this campaign. He told Al Jazeera that they worked on this move for over a year. Take a listen. We started by collecting a total of over 10,000 signatures from Providence voters to place this ordinance on the ballot. It's absolutely enforceable. We drafted this ordinance ourselves very carefully with the guidance of experts who have done this in other cities to make sure that it was both legally binding and allowed for the city to Divest in a step-by-step process. The city of Providence has divested before from both specifically the genocide in Darfur and from fossil fuel companies. So we've talked about the top-down from Congress that's bottom-up from from the grassroots Ambassador how much of this is a crisis for Israel? I don't know if I'd use the word crisis at this point and it certainly is a very bright flashing red light that tells them you need to pay attention to this because Providence, that's a real city, right? Somerville's a little town, but Providence is the capital of one of the 50 states, right? So that's no joke. And again, when you have Here's, here's, you know, Eric talked about 2028. Here's what I would be looking for if I were the Israelis. Okay. So you got the red flashing light warning, pay attention. What I would be looking at is as this, as the race for leadership of each party comes, gets, you know, accelerates and run up to 2028, what are the leading candidates? Saying about Israel, you know, think about the Democrats. For example, you got Josh Shapiro, governor of Pennsylvania, angling for the nomination. Yeah, he's Jewish. Yeah. So is Rahm Emanuel from California and potentially John Ossoff, John Ossoff, John Ossoff, Jewish. What about Alyssa Slotkin from Michigan, the senator? She her name is in the thing. So what? Here's here's an interesting thought experiment. What are these leading politicians? Who are Jewish and support Israel going to say in order to win votes. Right. But when you look at when you look at what we just saw on that graphic there, Texas, Ohio, those are. Deeply red states. And we saw massive Democratic changes in those two states, flipping from red to blue. In Texas, not only do you have a Democratic governor, Democratic senator, a senator you haven't seen either one in like four decades, and also they broke the supermajority in the legislature. So they can make massive change. And those are just three states that we saw there. That number could actually grow, particularly when you look at what happened in places like Kansas. And also in other states, Mississippi, so in terms, so we're not only, as you mentioned, we're not only seeing a top-down impact on Israel, but a bottom-up, and I think that is only going to continue to grow. And these politicians, they don't necessarily come up with these ideas themselves. They take their cues from what's actually happening on the ground, because now they recognize they can win in a place like Texas. I think a lot of those decisions will be dictated by what they see happening on the ground. Eric, you mentioned Kamala Harris and her loss in 2024, and that was a huge factor. The war in Gaza was a huge factor for her. It felt like less of a factor during these midterms. But I wonder, to the ambassador's point, when you look at the field, beyond just the Jewish candidates, whether it's Newsom, Pritzker, Bashir, Westmore, on and on and on, none of them are using the G word, genocide. And I wonder to what extent you think That's going to be a litmus test for Democratic voters in the primary process in 2028. Well, this is what this is what makes this so exciting, is that this is going to be so combustible because the ambassador just named several particular candidates who could come down on one side. But then you just named several others who could come down on the other. And I think this is going to be the ideological fight that is not going to just begin to play out in 2028. We're going to see those ideological battles. Beginning in January, a play out and they're going to play through until the 2028 presidential election. And a lot of that is going to, I think, be the the the landscape. That these candidates are going to find themselves in. And they're going to have to actually figure out a way to navigate that minefield. And who can do it best is likely who will be successful in 2028. We only have about 20 seconds left, Ambassador. But I want to ask you, how much of an outlier will this traditional position on Israel, let's call it the Haley-Stevens position, how much of that is going to be an outlier in 2028? I think you'll see the pendulum swing back towards Haley Stevens as more of a center of gravity than she was in this last election, but I don't think it'll go back as far as it was before, just because, you know, too much has changed. It's not going to go back to what it was. It's not going to stay where it is, somewhere in between. Watch that space. All right. Adam Morelli, the former U.S. Ambassador to Bahrain, and Eric Hamm, former Democratic Senate staffer, thank you both very much for joining me today. And that is all from the team here in Washington. I want to hand it back to John Holman and Al Jazeera's global headquarters in Doha. That's it for this edition of This Is America, but we'll be back on Friday with a brand new episode at 18.30 GMT, that's 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time. We'll see you then.