The Obnoxious ‘Genocide Joe’ Protesters Biden may be in for a rerun of 1968, with a ruinous Democratic Chicago convention. By William McGurn
Progressive activists met Saturday in Chicago to discuss their plans to march on the Democratic National Convention in August. While they were meeting, Hatem Abudayyeh, national chairman for the U.S. Palestinian Community Network, announced that Iran had just launched its attack on Israel.
The crowd cheered.
So much for the idea that the protests taking place all across America are antiwar. These people cheer drones and missiles directed at Israel, chant “Death to America,” and never blame Tehran or Hamas for anything. In Chicago this weekend, the progressive organizations meeting under the banner of Palestinian liberation made clear that Joe Biden is their enemy and they plan to bring the fight to him. Their website puts it this way:
“On August 19th and 22nd, 2024, we will march on the Democratic National Convention in Chicago first and foremost to demand an end to the genocide in Gaza, stand in solidarity with Palestine, and call for an end to US aid to Israel, and bring the people’s agenda to within sight and sound of the Democratic Party leadership.”
Notwithstanding their alleged goals—say, cutting off American aid to Israel—these people are less about changing policy than spreading chaos. They don’t even try to appeal to the hearts and minds of their fellow Americans. Instead, they choose the most obnoxious way to push their message: menacing Jewish students on college campuses, interrupting congressional hearings, targeting a Christmas tree lighting. On Monday protesters stopped traffic on the Golden Gate bridge, blocked an entrance to Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, and shut down roads to blockade the San Antonio headquarters of energy giant Valero.
To these people, President Biden is “Genocide Joe.” The irony is that although Mr. Biden’s initial response to the Hamas butcheries of Oct. 7 was firm and unambiguous, he has been sliding away from his own words ever since and moving closer to what the protesters want.
The Biden administration today opposes Israel’s strategy to defeat Hamas, in particular the Israel Defense Forces plan to go into Rafah to wipe out the remaining Hamas fighters. At the United Nations, the U.S. didn’t veto a Security Council resolution that called for an immediate cease-fire without demanding Hamas first release the hostages. The next day President Biden himself said of protesters who disrupted a speech he was giving in Raleigh, N.C., “They have a point.”
That they certainly do, and it is this:
They consider all the president’s criticisms of Israel empty and cynical so long as the Biden administration keeps supplying Israel with bombs and fighter jets. Mr. Biden must know this. Even so, he continues to indulge them.
Sen. John Fetterman suggests another option. The Pennsylvania Democrat was elected in 2022 as a true-blue progressive. But since Oct. 7 he has emerged as one of Israel’s most stalwart and forceful defenders.
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This hasn’t gone over well with some who helped elect him. But rather than appease the anti-Israel protesters, he takes them head on. On Sunday Mr. Fetterman told CNN’s Jake Tapper that Mr. Biden shouldn’t “capitulate to the fringe.” While some members of his staff have resigned and he’s lost some former allies, a January Quinnipiac poll noted more people now think more favorably of him.
That isn’t really surprising, given that the protesters represent only a small fraction of the American people. The smarter bet for the president would be to appeal to the pro-Israel majority by taking on the far left.
Iran’s weekend strike on Israel was an opportunity for Mr. Biden to recalibrate. The U.S. military assistance in taking down some of the Iranian drones made the president look strong and resolute . . . for a moment. It offered a way to address a key vulnerability that has plagued Mr. Biden since his humiliating exit from Afghanistan: a perception of weakness compounded by his obvious mental feebleness.
The anti-Israel protests in Chicago this summer will make him look even weaker. At Saturday’s conference, a speaker drew direct parallels between what protesters intend to do to “Genocide Joe Biden, Killer Kamala, and their cabal” and what anti-Vietnam War protesters did in Chicago in 1968 to Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey. That convention ending up highlighting a deeply divided Democratic Party.
“The Democrats learned in 1968 that the unrest at their convention in Chicago over Vietnam may well have cost them the presidency,” says Democratic strategist Doug Schoen. “Biden’s failure to move to the center and forthrightly defend Israel could well likewise cost the president and the Democrats a victory in November.”
Like Mr. Biden on Israel, Humphrey was split on Vietnam, having defended the war as Lyndon Johnson’s vice president even though his inclination ran the other way. The result was that Humphrey was perceived as the candidate of more war, leaving Republican Richard Nixon free to run as the man who would bring it to “an honorable end.”
Sound familiar?
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