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As Anti-Israel Protesters Cause Chaos Outside DNC, Their Allies Tell Kamala: Get in Line or Lose

Anti-Israel protesters stand off with police after removing part of a DNC security fence outside of the United Center.
Collin Anderson and Jessica Costescu
August 19, 2024

CHICAGO—Anti-Israel activists assembled at an official Democratic National Convention panel on Monday and delivered a message to presidential nominee Kamala Harris: heed our demands or lose in November. As they issued those threats, their allies, protesting the Biden-Harris administration’s policy toward Israel, faced off with police as they marched through the streets of Chicago.

The panel included the co-chairwoman of the Uncommitted National Movement, Layla Elabed, sister of Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D., Mich.). It was moderated by Minnesota’s Democratic attorney general, Keith Ellison, a close ally of Harris running mate Tim Walz. He is notorious for his relationship with Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan. The anti-Semitic activist Linda Sarsour, whom President Joe Biden denounced before hosting her at the White House, sat in the audience.

With a Harris staffer watching on, Elabed called on Harris to unite the Democratic Party by endorsing an arms embargo on Israel.

"If we stand up and demand action—an arms embargo, a ceasefire, an end to war—we may have an opportunity to restore the soul of the Democratic Party and unite us under a big tent," Elabed said. "Listen to Michigan and the uncommitted movement."

Elabed’s presence inside the United Center underscores the extent to which anti-Israel forces have gained a foothold in the Democratic Party and the pressures Harris will face from the left to turn on the Jewish state.

In fact, Elabed went on to urge Democratic delegates to defect from the Harris-Walz ticket. "To those of you who are delegates: join us, the uncommitted movement, in growing our movement demanding that we have a policy change that saves Palestinian lives."

Just miles away, outside of the security fencing that surrounded the convention center, thousands of anti-Israel protesters marched through the streets of Chicago. They began chanting and rattling a Secret Service security fence before dozens poured through, leading to a standoff with police officers. They were stopped before they breached the final barrier that kept them outside of the United Center.

Police arrested at least three protesters as others carried dismantled portions of the security fence away to prevent law enforcement from re-erecting them. Officers in riot gear gathered en masse to fill the gaps.

Panel attendees may have marched in the protest had they not found themselves on the inside of the convention. Elabed asked audience members to stand if they had "attended a protest or a rally for Palestinian human rights." Nearly all attendees stood, including Sarsour.

Approached by the Washington Free Beacon after the panel and asked if she would vote for Harris, Sarsour declined to comment.

The panel was organized by Elabed's Uncommitted National Movement, and attendees were encouraged to go to the group's "Not Another Bomb" website and sign a petition titled, "Kamala Harris, Pledge to Enact an Arms Embargo."

Elabed pressed Harris to endorse such a policy during a recent rally in Detroit and said Harris responded positively, though her national security adviser, Phil Gordon, issued a statement the following day indicating the vice president "does not support an arms embargo in Israel."

The panel also included the anti-Israel activists Hala Hijazi and Jim Zogby, as well as former Michigan Democratic representative Andy Levin, who argued that Harris could not take Michigan—and the White House—without winning over "uncommitted" voters.

"We have a lot of students in Michigan who are traumatized by this," Levin said. "We must elect Kamala Harris, but I don't see a path to winning the electoral college without winning Michigan. So both because we must have justice for Palestinians in Gaza … and also for political reasons, we need the vice president to keep pushing the envelope."

Earlier in the day, protest leaders listed their own demands for Harris, which also included an arms embargo on Israel. Others in the crowd held signs encouraging violence against Israel.

"Kamala=Terrorist Hamas=Counter-terrorist," one read. "Armed resistance is the only answer," read another. "End Israel. Stand with Hamas." When the march began, a demonstrator at the front held a Hamas flag that pictured a militant. Another wore camouflage and a Hezbollah patch.

A Students for Justice in Palestine representative, meanwhile, teased further protests on college campuses this fall, pledging that the "student intifada" would continue.

"The student intifada lives on. We are returning stronger than ever before as we head into the fall semester," the representative said. "As long as our administrators are going to continue profiting off the genocide of our people, of the Palestinians, we will continue to confront them, just as we’re confronting the complicit Democratic Party today."

Other speakers made similar demands. "We will not be casting any ballots for anybody who oversees the genocide, the indiscriminate murder of Palestinian children, families, and futures," one speaker said before the afternoon march. The United States must let "all humanitarian aid into Gaza, stop arming Israel, and stop all aid to the racist, settler-colonial terrorist state of Israel," said another.

"We will continue to march and show up and show out until we have made all of our demands clear and until we have ended the genocide and achieved total and complete liberation of Palestine and all colonized Arab lands," the speaker continued. She then led a "From the river to the sea" chant.

There was also a heavy socialist presence, including a hammer and sickle flag and a booth for the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, which sported a banner that read "Victory to the Palestinian Resistance." The organization provided hundreds of pickets with the same message.

Convention protests are far from over, with another official march scheduled for Thursday and smaller protests scheduled throughout the week.

Published under: Anti-Semitism , Democratic National Convention , Hamas , Israel , Kamala Harris

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