It’s been almost a year since the Hamas terrorist organization attacked Israel on Oct. 7. The massacre left over 1,200 people dead and over 200 kidnapped—including women, men, and children. Since the attack, the Biden administration has made its support for a two-state solution clear. And now, with Vice President Kamala Harris running as the 2024 Democratic presidential nominee, it appears nothing has changed.
During Tuesday’s debate between the vice president and the Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, Harris restated her support for a cease-fire and two-state solution, which, as Family Research Council President Tony Perkins explained on Thursday’s episode of “Washington Watch,” would ultimately “transfer the geographical heart of the state of Israel, Judea and Samaria, to the Palestinians.”
Harris declared, “We must chart a course for a two-state solution, and in that solution, there must be security for the Israeli people and Israel and an equal measure for the Palestinians.” But experts on the ground in Israel like Caroline Glick say that a two-state solution is not a viable option.
First, Glick emphasized on “Washington Watch” how Harris’ comments during Tuesday’s debate are likely to “lower her level of support” in Israel. As a senior contributing editor at the Jewish News Syndicate, Glick and her colleagues have been conducting polls “of Israeli sentiments regarding the presidential race.” As she stated, after their most recent update shortly before the presidential debate, “Trump was leading by more than two-thirds of Israelis supporting him over Kamala Harris.” She added, “I assume that next week when we poll that question,” the results will be similar.
Glick further noted that Harris made potentially “the most hostile statement ever made by a major presidential candidate, by a nominee of one of the major parties, regarding Israel in history. … Her hostility toward Israel was stunning.”
Glick explained how the attack on Oct. 7 was the “most sadistic” slaughter Israel has seen, and yet, Harris’ stance seems to reflect that she sees a cease-fire as a way to “pay the Palestinians.” And while it is true that many Palestinian civilians have died over this past year, Glick asserted that this was still “very much an invasion of Palestinian society into Israel, not just Hamas.”
According to Glick, some military estimates found that out of the 10,000 people that entered Israel from Gaza during the attack, 5,000 to 6,000 were Hamas members, and the rest were Palestinian civilians. And so, Perkins noted, when considering the fact that Harris wants a solution that’s in “equal measure for the Palestinians,” it becomes even clearer how the Biden-Harris administration’s “support of Israel has been tepid at best.” Moving forward, he asked, is it possible policies under a potential Harris-Walz administration would be “even more indifferent toward Israel or outright hostile?”
In response, Glick emphasized how, should Harris get elected, America could expect to see more hostility toward Israel. “I think that what Kamala Harris showed at the debate … is that an America under her presidency will not allow Israel to do anything beyond intercepting missiles en route to Israel” and will not allow the Jewish state to take “offensive actions against our enemies, whether it’s Iran or the Palestinians or Hezbollah.”
Glick pointed out how Harris said she “will always support Israel’s right to defend itself,” but that doesn’t change the fact that “the United States right now continues to embargo 2,000-pound bunker buster bombs to Israel, because they don’t want us to take offensive action that will effectively diminish the capacities of our enemies.”
Returning to the topic of the two-state solution, Perkins addressed how the land in question includes a “small strip of the Gaza Strip,” the home of the people attacking Israel. Considering this, he asked, how would Israel be able to defend itself if its land “is given away to a hostile entity?”
“It can’t,” Glick said somberly. “It manifestly cannot do so.” Which is “the problem,” she added, because “people talk about the two-state solution as if this is some sort of responsible policy, but it’s not.” Rather, it establishes “a Palestinian state, causing Israel to renounce our rights to our biblical homeland” and paves the way for “Israel to be defeated.”
Glick concluded, “[G]iving people whose goal in life is to annihilate the Jewish state and the Jewish people … sovereignty over the West Bank of the Jordan of Judea and Samaria” means “giving them the keys to the realm. You are telling them, ‘Go ahead, wipe Israel off the map.’”
Reprinted with permission from The Daily Signal by Sarah Holliday.
The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.