Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D., Fla.) insisted Thursday that her party’s platform has the strongest pro-Israel language in Democratic history, without mentioning the fierce divisions within the party over the Jewish state.
After Sen. Cory Booker (D., N.J.) defended Hillary Clinton and the Iran nuclear deal from New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s criticism this week as something to be celebrated, Schultz said Christie should ask Donald Trump why he said he would be neutral "when it came to the U.S.-Israel relationship," although she likely meant the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"In this campaign, when it comes to which party and which candidate will make sure that we remain solidly behind the U.S.-Israel relationship, it’s the Democratic Party which has adopted the strongest pro-Israel plank, including adding anti-BDS language to our platform, in our party’s history," she said.
Schultz’s party is not taking a pro-Israel stance with great enthusiasm. Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) tried to get anti-Israel language about the "occupations and illegal settlements" in Palestinian territories into the Democratic platform, but Clinton supporters successfully stopped them to not undercut future negotiations. The rejection of the platform led to the loudest boos of the day during the July 9 negotiations in Florida, according to CNN.
Wall Street Journal columnist William Galston recently wrote about the Democratic Party’s "sharp left turn" with the overall big-government platform it agreed upon:
Instead, this year’s platform will be suffused with proposals to expand the government’s reach and cost—and with confidence that today’s government is up to the job. As long as Americans don’t regard their national institutions as effective instruments of public purpose, many of these proposals—not all—will be a hard sell.