Steps Toward Decency

I've thought for a long time that, short-term, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is running not for President but for the United States Senate. Senator Chuck Schumer's term is up in January of 2019, and Ocasio-Cortez proably would have a glide path to the nomination if the Minority Leader were to bow out gracefully. Schumer, a supporter of Israel but critic of Netanyahu, would be more likely to call it quits if he weren't being opposed for a fifth term by a strongly anti-Israel candidate. And so:

AOC: I personally do not trust somebody like Marjorie Taylor Greene—a proven bigot and anti-semite—on the issues of what is good for Gazans and Israelis. I don’t think it benefits our movement to align with white nationalists. pic.twitter.com/ufGwW6q6Mv

— Acyn (@Acyn) May 8, 2026

 An outraged Cenk Uygure of The Young Turks tweets

This is just terrible. She sounds just like the establishment. She's attacking an opponent of Israel as an antisemite. This is exactly what israeli supporters want- split the anti-war movement and the critics of Israel's genocide. Deeply counterproductive. And selfish.

Marjorie Taylor Greene is an anti-Semite.  If a member of Congress came out and said "I hate Jews,"  Uygur would claim that he or she was talking only about Israelis. If the individual stated that Israel is no worse than Nazi Germany, he probably would agree. You know the type: Israel is nothing but evil and it doesn't matter whether it's the Prime Minister, one of Netanyahu's Cabinet members, a settler on the Wesst Bank, or a resident of Israel itself; they're all the same.

Ocasio-Cortez has herself accused Israel of genocide, a strange charge to level against a country whose military could wipe out Gazan Palestinians if it chose to do so, though it still would have to contend against Palestinians in Jordan and elsewhere, with whom it has no quarrel. In May of 2021, the New York congresswoman accused Israel of "apartheid," though Arabs and Muslims in Israel proper have rights exceeding those in several Arabic and Persian nations. Nine months later, she voted "present" on an amendment to provide funding for Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system, though evidently she opposed the outlay.

Representative Ocasio-Cortez has had a change of heart, at least outwardly, toward Israel, while remaining one of its critics. In July of 2024, she earned the scorn of Democratic Socialists of America when she hosted a panel on anti-semitism. (Oh, the humanity!) A year later, she voted against an amendment, co-sponsored by Greene, which would have cut drastically the funding for Iron Dome.

This may have been a conversion of convenience, behavior common among politicians and not unknown across the professions. And she still rejects funding from AIPAC, let alone not joining the Netanyahu Can Do No Wrong Caucus headed by President Donald Trump. 

Rejecting collaboration with Marjorie Taylor Greene may or may not prove wise in advancing Ocasio-Cortez's preference for a significan change in Israeli policy. Nor is it certain to last; the hostility toward "Zionism" and "Zionists" on the far left is gaining steam weekly and pressuring Democratic politicians. But the congresswoman appears to have learned from the fictional Martin Dooley of "trust everybody but count the cards".and from the Russian proverb,  "trust, but verify" And that not everything should be blamed on Jews.

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