Anti-Israel radicals who resigned their government posts over President Joe Biden's support for Israel are betting on Vice President Kamala Harris to adopt more hardline policies toward the Jewish state. It's a good bet: Harris throughout her vice presidency touted her public opposition to Israel's war on Hamas and praised campus protesters who have violently harassed Jews.
Harris, who is on track to be the Democratic Party's presidential nominee following Joe Biden's departure from the race, was among the first administration officials to chastise Israel for its conduct during the war. In December, just two months after Hamas slaughtered more than 1,200 Jews, Harris publicly broke with Biden's support for Israel, saying the Jewish state had killed "too many innocent Palestinians" and "must do more to protect innocent civilians."
Since that time, the vice president has repeatedly thrown her support behind anti-Israel protesters in America, saying they show "exactly what the human emotion should be, as a response to Gaza." Such comments are driving "optimism" among anti-Israel elements in the Democratic Party, according to reports, with several administration officials who resigned over Biden's support for Israel expressing hope that a Harris presidency will bring about a break in U.S. relations with the Jewish state.
"I've worked for Kamala, and I know she'll do the right thing," Lily Greenberg Call, an Interior Department appointee who resigned her post earlier this year, told Politico on Sunday. "Harris must listen to the majority of American voters and use all of the administration's leverage—including by halting offensive weapons transfers—to push for a lasting ceasefire and hostage exchange."
Josh Paul, a former State Department employee who resigned over opposition to the Biden administration's arms shipments to Israel, described Biden as "fixed and intransigent" on the issue. By contrast, he said, Harris can be swayed into severing America's historically close alliance with Israel.
"I would say I have cautious and limited optimism—but also a deep sense of relief that the Democratic Party will not be nominating for the presidency of the United States a man who has made us all complicit in so much and such unnecessary harm," Paul told Politico.
Harris has repeatedly drawn headlines for her public criticism of Israel's war effort and support for anti-Israel demonstrators, stances that cut against Biden's repeated condemnations of growing anti-Semitism in America.
Anti-Israel college students, Harris said in July, "are showing exactly what the human emotion should be, as a response to Gaza."
"There are things some of the protesters are saying that I absolutely reject, so I don't mean to wholesale endorse their points. But we have to navigate it," she said, adding that "I understand the emotion behind it."
During an event in October 2023, shortly after Hamas's unprecedented terror attack, Harris lauded the "leadership" of an audience member who accused Israel of "genocide" and of intentionally targeting civilians.
"I am deeply, deeply affected, as I think we all are, by what we have seen in terms of the loss of life and the violence," Harris said. "I appreciate you raising the subject and I appreciate your leadership."
Prior to the war, in 2021, Harris was videotaped nodding along as a student accused Israel of "ethnic genocide" against the Palestinians and condemned American funding to the Jewish state.
Harris thanked the student for raising the issue and said, "This is about the fact that your voice, your perspective, your experience, your truth cannot be suppressed."
Following a June raid in Gaza that freed four Israeli hostages, meanwhile, Harris mourned for the Palestinian kidnappers killed in the operation.
"We mourn all of the innocent lives that have been lost in Gaza, including those tragically killed today," Harris said, saying the issue "weighs heavily on all of our hearts."
The vice president has repeatedly accused Israel of withholding humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, even as unprecedented amounts of food and other goods make their way into the territory.
Harris in March described the situation as a "humanitarian catastrophe" and claimed that "people in Gaza are starving" as a result of Israel's policies. "The Israeli government must do more to significantly increase the flow of aid. No excuses."
During that same month, Harris called for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, a diplomatic push that increased pressure on the Jewish state to let the Iran-backed terror group survive.
"What we are seeing every day in Gaza is devastating. We have seen reports of families eating leaves or animal feed, women giving birth to malnourished babies with little or no medical care, and children dying from malnutrition and dehydration," Harris said at the time. "Too many innocent Palestinians have been killed."
NPR described her remarks as "some of the strongest made by a senior U.S. official regarding the protection of civilians in Gaza."
Harris's stance on Israel and its war conduct is already generating concerns in the Jewish political world, with the Republican Jewish Coalition painting the likely Democratic nominee as "far worse" than Biden.
"If you thought Joe Biden was bad on the issues of top concern to the Jewish community, Kamala Harris is far worse," Sam Markstein, the coalition's national political director, told the Washington Free Beacon. "Kamala Harris owns the disastrous and failed policies of the Biden-Harris administration, which has overseen a shocking spike in antisemitism and an unprecedented degradation of the U.S.-Israel relationship."
"This month, nine months after the horrific Hamas attacks against Israel, Kamala Harris expressed sympathy for the Hamas-sympathizing protesters," Markstein added. "This isn't the first time she's sympathized with Israel-haters."
The Republican Jewish Coalition also panned Harris's reported decision to decline to preside over Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's upcoming congressional address, which is set to take place Wednesday. Israeli sources are said to have learned of the decision—which raised further speculation about how Harris would treat the Jewish state as president—on July 15, prior to Biden's withdrawal from the presidential election.
"Kamala Harris' first official act as the presumptive Democratic nominee for president of the United States is to snub the leader of America's key strategic ally, the Jewish state," the coalition said in response to the news.
Update 4:00 p.m.: This piece has been updated with additional information.