Financing the Gaza War and American Elections

As primaries across the US tallied vote counts on June 25, many headlines did not focus on a particular candidate but rather the pro-Israel lobby American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Spending $14.7 million on the most expensive House of Representatives primary election in US history, AIPAC effectively unseated incumbent progressive Jamaal Bowman, one of the few consistent critics of Israel’s war in Gaza, in favor of pro-Israel centrist George Latimer. As a result, Latimer will face a relatively easy general election, where he is expected to win the House seat for New York’s 16th District (NY-16) and carry his pro-Israel stance to Washington.

The campaign contribution came as part of AIPAC’s mission to strengthen “bipartisan support for the US-Israel relationship.” But AIPAC’s record investment in primaries reflects growing partisan views on the relationship due to Israel’s costly war in Gaza. Nowhere is this trend more apparent than among American youth, reflected in increasingly negative polling, widespread calls for a ceasefire, and demands for universities to divest from Israel. In light of these demands centering financial accountability, AIPAC’s multi-million-dollar strategy to unseat Bowman could prove fatally shortsighted, providing yet another item to American youth’s list of grievances and further shattering the pro-Israel consensus the lobby seeks to restore.

Youth Discontent and Unaccountable Money

News of Israel’s waning support among American youth emerged early into the country’s invasion of Gaza. Shibley Telhami, Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, noted the phenomenon within the first month after the October 7 attack. In the weeks following the attack, Telhami’s poll found that around 20.6 percent of Democrats under the age of 35 described President Biden as “too pro-Israel,” but this number had more than doubled to 41.5 percent by early November.

While these findings could merely reflect discontent with Biden policy as opposed to grievance with Israel specifically, a February 2024 Pew Research Center study indicates otherwise. The study found that 46 percent of Americans ages 18 to 29 believe the way Israel has responded to Hamas’ October 7 attack is “unacceptable.” In contrast, 35 percent of US adults ages 30 to 49 found Israel’s actions unacceptable, while only 29 percent of Americans ages 50 and older agreed with the statement.

The division between age groups is exhibited in the overwhelmingly youth-led movement protesting the war. Lauren Gambino, political correspondent for The Guardian, addressed this generational divide, arguing that young Americans’ activism is largely responsible for “shifting the terms of the foreign policy debate in Washington” in relation to support for Israel. Though her article was published in December of 2023, Gambino’s observations only became more relevant throughout the spring of 2024.

During this period, college campus protests over the war went from a frequent occurrence to an international movement. In reaction to a Columbia encampment protesting the university’s “financial ties with Israel and the companies supporting the conflict,” the university’s president called in New York City police to disband the protestors, resulting in over 100 arrests. The move sparked protests on over 130 campuses, both in the United States and around the world, according to the BBC.

However, unlike earlier youth protests calling for a ceasefire, student demands took on an explicitly financial angle. Modeling the Columbia encampment’s list of demands, protests nationwide began calling for financial divestment “from companies and institutions that profit from Israeli apartheid, genocide and occupation in Palestine” as well as “increasing transparency around financial investments” to ensure accountability. These demands have roots in the controversial Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement, which started in 2005 and draws inspiration from the South African anti-apartheid movement “to pressure Israel to comply with international law.”

The movement’s premise holds that money can either enable a regime’s abuses or compel accountability. In this way, American students from across the country have tapped into a notion of financial accountability as a means to legal, moral, and political accountability. Therefore, AIPAC’s involvement in the NY-16 Democratic primary runs counter to American youth’s growing perception of the conflict and concomitant avenues toward improving conditions and accountability in the region.

AIPAC’s New Strategy

To be sure, AIPAC is not the sole reason for Bowman’s stunning primary defeat. A new district map, political scandals, neglect of the district’s Jewish residents, and a relative absence while campaigning all contributed to Bowman’s 17.2 percent election deficit. Likewise, AIPAC’s actions are neither illegal nor unique, contrary to some antisemitic conspiracy theories that rely on tropes of influential Jewish financiers sinisterly influencing global politics. But AIPAC’s contribution to over half of the race’s staggering $24.8 million price tag nevertheless became headlines and undoubtedly deserves further scrutiny given students’ particular financial demands related to Israel’s war in Gaza.

Lobbying for specific political platforms is nothing new in American politics. Indeed, lobbyists have long sought to influence American politicians on a wide range of issues since the country’s founding. In 1944, this tradition adopted a distinct financial component through the Congress of Industrial Organization’s innovative Political Action Committee (PAC) approach to funding President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s re-election bid. The move effectively introduced a new form of campaign finance wherein PACs receive donations from individuals and spend the contributions on individual candidates, party committees, and independent expenditures, such as mailing campaigns or television ads. Notably, PACs can only receive up to $5,000 a year from any individual and have restrictions on campaign and party committee spending, though they can spend an unlimited amount on independent expenditures.

By 2009, this form of campaign finance had been rising steadily, with politically active organizations reporting an increase of $2.03 billion in spending over the prior decade. But far from regulating the increase of money in politics, court rulings in 2010 on Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (FEC) and Speehnow.org v. FEC paved the way for virtually unlimited campaign spending through a new finance mechanism dubbed the “super PAC.” In contrast to PACs, super PACs can receive unlimited contributions from individuals, corporations, and unions for the purpose of independent expenditures, though super PACs cannot contribute to nor coordinate with a campaign directly.

While the nuances of campaign finance history and legal rulings are complicated, American feelings on the rulings’ effects are not. Pew Research Center polling from July of 2023 revealed that approximately 72 percent of US adults believe “there should be limits on the amount of money individuals and organizations can spend” on political campaigns, while 73 percent believe lobbyists and special interest groups have too much influence over Congressional representatives’ decision making. In contrast, 70 percent of US adults believe representatives’ constituents have too little influence over such decision making.

Against this backdrop of general discontent crosscutting American generations, AIPAC, itself a lobby organization and not an actual PAC, decided to enter the campaign finance scene in 2022 with the AIPAC PAC. That same year, AIPAC doubled down on this approach, establishing the United Democracy Project super PAC, which currently constitutes the third largest super PAC in American politics and was responsible for the $14.7 million in spending on the NY-16 Democratic primary race.

In the short term, this strategy appears to have worked for the lobby, with the organization boasting a flawless record for AIPAC-endorsed Democratic candidates in the 2024 primaries. But in the long run, the strategy may prove pyrrhic. Increased youth consciousness around financial accountability and Israel-Palestine likewise heightens scrutiny of money in politics generally. And as AIPAC continues to spend millions of dollars to unseat progressive candidates willing to criticize US complicity in harmful Israeli policies, the organization only provides further fodder for growing ranks of Israel critics.

PS: The views and opinions expressed in the article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of PSI.