Annual Assessment of the Jewish People 2025 | 5785

This report is traditionally presented to the Government of Israel and major Jewish organizations worldwide. It offers decision makers trenchant analysis and policy recommendations across six dimensions of the Jewish people’s well-being: geopolitics, cohesion, resilience, identity, demography, and U.S.-Israel relations.

Project Head: Yaakov Katz

Contributors: Elliott Abrams, Ita Alcalay, Nadia Beider, Shlomi Bereznik, Shlomo Fischer, Shuki Friedman, Yehonatan Givati, Amos Harel, Eli Kannai, Dov Maimon, Robert Neufeld, Shmuel Rosner, Amit Shoval, Noah Slepkov, Yedidia Stern, Gil Troy.

Editor: Barry Geltman

Annual Assessment of the Jewish People 2025 | 5785

Annual Assessment of the Jewish People 2025 | 5785

Transactional Alliance and/or Shared Destiny? The U.S.-Israel Relationship in a Post-October 7 World

On June 21, 2025, the United States joined Israel in war. That move catapults the U.S.-Israel partnership to unprecedented, yet possibly dangerous, heights. On the bright side, many thought the seamless systems integration achieved during the two Iranian missile attacks of mid-April this year and October 1, 2024, marked the peak of the two countries’ cooperation. The fact that in 2024, Joe Biden was president and a year later Donald Trump was president reconfirms an enduring truth: the state of the union between Israel and the U.S. is incredibly strong.

That conclusion defies many premature eulogies lamenting how one Israeli action or another irreparably damaged this partnership. In May 2025, opposition leader Yair Lapid denounced Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying: “relations have never reached such a low point. You lost Trump….”

More concerning, the Iran war forged a growing “horseshoe alliance” of the far left and the far right claiming Israel will drag America into World War III. Then, shortly after greenlighting the Iran attack, Trump forced Israel to turn planes around instead of punishing Iran for violating the ceasefire. That made Israel look like a vassal state. These tensions reveal a second enduring truth: worry over the state of this union is constant and not unreasonable. True, the speed with which the media escalates inevitable agenda differences into “break-up” scenarios makes the two countries’ enduring, multi-dimensional bond cemented by overlapping values and interests, sound like a college fling. But, as in healthy marriages, tensions recur, and arguments risk escalation unless both partners keep nurturing the relationship.

This seeming contradiction provides an analytical framework for understanding the past year – and planning for the future. It’s essential to understand the fundamentals motivating America’s extraordinary support – and the great dividends it reaps. And it’s essential to understand the ongoing tensions and warning signs that lead even sober-minded analysts to sound hysterical.

The Fundamentals: Shared Values, Shared Interests, Shared Challenges… and Common Enemies

The AIPAC framing, emphasizing the two countries’ “shared values” and “shared interests,” still holds. The rhetoric of Ambassador Mike Huckabee and Congressman Ritchie Torres captures much of American sentiment toward Israel, offering a rare bipartisan rallying point in a divided America. Huckabee articulates red state sensibilities, celebrating Israel as “a very special place on Earth,” recognizing Jews’ biblical “connection to this land,” and saying “America has friends. It has allies. It only has one partner. And by partner, I mean the relationship is like a marriage. It is so tight. And that’s Israel.”¹ Torres roots Israel in blue state values by insisting: “none of us is free until all of us are free. And so I see my freedom as a Black Latino from the Bronx as inextricably bound to the freedom of the Jewish people… I am pro-Israel, not despite my progressive values, but because of my progressive values.”²

Moreover, during a presidential election campaign when both major party nominees once again vied over who supported Israel the most,3 both the Republican and Democratic conventions featured tear-stained moments showing broad, wall-to-wall support for Israel’s hostages.

When Israel attacked Iran, those “shared interests” were reinforced by “common enemies.” Headlines claimed MAGA was fragmenting as Tucker Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene united with leftists like Bernie Sanders and Ilhan Omar to oppose American intervention in “Israel’s war.”

Polls that week, before America’s military action, found 57% of Americans supporting Israel’s attacks. More than 80% wanted Iran blocked from having nuclear weapons – because they would, given Tehran’s constant anti-American rhetoric, threaten America too.⁴ And in defiance of the loud MAGA rebels, 83% of Trump voters supported Israel’s airstrikes.⁵ In short, most Americans agreed with General Michael Kurilla, CENTCOM’s commander, that “there has rarely been a time with greater opportunity to protect [our] national interests” in the Middle East.⁶

Simultaneously, Israel and America face “shared challenges,” internal crises of political polarization, government dysfunction, cynicism about institutions, and suspicion of others – from different religions, political parties, and ethnic tribes.

These dynamics lead to three important conclusions:

1. Israel’s government must not only speak what we could call “Jerusalem language” to “red America” but have representatives who speak “Tel Aviv talk” to blue America too.

2. Leading Jewish organizations must be sensitive to the growing red-blue divisions within the Diaspora, especially within American Jewry, and the need to frame Israel in terms that resonate broadly.

3. Even as politicians dismiss “bipartisanship” as cowardly, American bipartisan support for Israel remains a gift for Americans too – healthy democracies need some issues on which left and right agree.

A “Transactional Analysis” of Israel’s Post-October 7th War

Especially since October 7, both the Democratic and Republican administrations have been extraordinarily generous. Israel receives $3.3 billion in American aid annually via the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program and $500 million for cooperative missile defense programs. Israel must spend most of the money on U.S.-produced military equipment and services. By June 2025, the U.S. had shipped over 90,000 tons of military equipment, delivered via more than 800 air and 140 maritime shipments since October 7. American aid since 1948 exceeds $130 billion. ⁷ Still, a popular takeaway from the tug-of-war between Biden and Netanyahu over Israel’s tactics, is that Israel must re-evaluate its dependence on America, especially regarding ammunition. An expanded Israeli arms industry could give Israel greater – but not complete – independence.

America’s growing “neo-isolationists” wonder what America gets in return – besides Arab enmity and the risk of another “forever war.” When President Trump returned home from visiting Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates in mid-May, with four trillion dollars in investments, business deals for the Trump family, and a 747-jet gifted by Qatar’s rulers, Israel seemed to be on the losing side of this new “transactional” approach to foreign policy. Stunningly, few Jewish or Israeli leaders responded by trumpeting the many dividends America keeps reaping from Israel. Not knowing them, let alone emphasizing them, is political malpractice.

The historical piece is beyond this assessment’s scope – but it ranges from the strategic bonanza regarding Soviet weaponry and tactics Israel delivered to America after 1973, to decades of intelligence sharing, to the destruction of nuclear weapons programs in Iraq, Syria, and now, probably Iran. Since October 7, there have been four major categories of war-based gains, beyond generally supporting “Start Up Nation” with all its benefits for humanity: diplomatic gamechangers, military breakthroughs, AI advances, and medical innovations.

Diplomatic Gamechangers

On January 15, 2025, President Joe Biden gave his farewell foreign policy address at the State Department. He boasted that “Iran’s air defenses are in shambles. Their main proxy, Hezbollah, is badly wounded…. And if you want more evidence that we’ve seriously weakened Iran and Russia, just take a look at Syria.” Biden did acknowledge in ten words that “Israel did plenty of damage to Iran and its proxies.”⁸ But Biden told Israel to “take the win” after Iran’s April 13 barrage and not eviscerate “Iran’s air defenses.”⁹ Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin reportedly yelled at Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for only giving minimal advance notice of Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination. The Jerusalem Post reported: “The U.S. has urged Israel multiple times to act less aggressively or to avoid taking certain actions against Hezbollah to prevent… a regional war.”¹⁰

Six months later, the conventional wisdom explained Israel’s successes in Iran – and Trump’s willingness to intervene – by linking Israel’s success in degrading Hamas, crushing Hezbollah, triggering Assad’s collapse, and stripping Iran’s air defenses. By exposing the Iranian regime as dangerous, weak, and bent on going nuclear, even if it doesn’t collapse, little Israel has done the United States and the world “monumental” favors, to use one of Trump’s favorite adjectives.

Military Breakthroughs

Although Israel faced unprecedented battlefield conditions, its innovations are already being adopted by the U.S. and other NATO member state armies. Western troops are likely to face urban warfare, drone warfare, and three-dimensional fighting on land and sea, and in tunnels, while, like the IDF, remaining within the ethical limits all democratic armies respect.

Battlefield breakthroughs include:

New TTPs (tactics, techniques, procedures) coordinating efforts above and below ground.¹¹

Updating the Trophy Active Protection System (APS), a “layered defense” sensing rocket, anti-tank, and now, thanks to Israel’s latest innovations, drone assaults.¹²

Debuting the Arrow 2 and Arrow 3 missile defense, the C-Dome sea-launched missile defense, the Iron Beam laser defense, and the Maoz or Spike Firefly, a “loitering munition,” ideal for urban warfare, the Jerusalem Post reports, helping “to strike enemies who might be hiding behind walls or alleys.”¹³

Drone innovations, from repurposing M113 APCs – armored personnel carriers – as unmanned vehicles useful in tunnel warfare, to integrating drones with other weapons, to building

To building secret drone production lines in Iran to create weapons that can be used to neutralize Iranian surface-to-air missile systems.¹⁴

Soldiers from the Cyber Defense Division’s Spectrum Warfare Battalion 5114 using electronic warfare to neutralize Iranian drones.¹⁵

AI Advances

Israel’s post-October 7 efforts may be the first Artificial Intelligence (AI) war, using audio recognition, facial recognition, mass language analysis, and other Big Data searches to locate terrorists and their hideouts, coordinate efforts, and save soldiers’ lives. Israel’s intelligence unit, 8200, established an AI innovation hub, “the Studio.” “Where’s Daddy?” tracks a target’s phones. Ten years ago, “you needed a team of around 20 intelligence officers to work for around 250 days to gather something between 200 to 250 targets,” Tal Mimran, a former IDF legal adviser, told Time. “Today, the AI will do that in a week.”¹⁶

Medical Breakthroughs

Already, lives are being saved in American hospitals by Israel’s battlefield breakthroughs. In Sheba Medical Center-Tel Hashomer alone, 85 start-ups responded to a post-October 7 call for useful innovations, launching many productive partnerships.¹⁷ The Kemtai personal trainer app was repurposed to assess patients’ movements with AI to diagnose rehabilitation needs, freeing physiotherapists to work on patients. “Every technology that we talk about is not just valuable for war injuries, but has long-term civilian applications,” says Avner Halperin, CEO of Sheba Impact.¹⁸

Remarkably, some of these innovations contributed to Israel’s halving the death rate among wounded soldiers from the Second Lebanon War, to today’s 6.7% rate.¹⁹ With so many more wounded soldiers surviving, Israel is improving rehabilitation methods and post-trauma treatment. The New York Post marveled in December 2024: “From surgical robots that remove bullets and shrapnel to 3D-printed prosthetics tailored for rapid deployment, to a battlefield burn treatment developed from pineapples, these technologies are redefining modern medicine and saving lives.”²⁰

Israel’s ten-year Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the United States is slated to run out in 2028. It specifies the amount of aid the U.S. provides. The next Congressional election is in 2026, and the next presidential election is in 2028. Potential roadblocks could come from Isolationist Trump-appointees especially and the committed minority of Republican legislators skeptical of military aid overall. Major bones of contention will include the length of the new MOU and the percentage of U.S.-manufactured aid.

The pending negotiations and changing dynamics lead to these conclusions:

That Israel and the Jewish community must learn, specify, and publicize the many dividends America has received from investing in Israel.

Start using “transactional” language such as “investment,” “dividends,” “payoffs,” along with traditional “shared values” and “shared interest” and “common enemy” rhetoric.

With more anti-Israel voices gaining traction in both parties, Israel should consider both hastening the negotiation timetable and extending the MOU to 25 years.

Warning Signs

Saturday, President Trump greenlights bombing Iran. Sunday, he imposes a cease-fire. And Monday, he’s already fuming, dropping f-bombs while saying: “I’m not happy with Israel.” Israel’s aborted bombing run, wherein Netanyahu turned most planes around but launched one symbolic strike, illustrated Israel’s dependence on America – and on its mercurial, vengeful, but generally pro-Israel President.

Meanwhile, few Democratic Senators, including pro-Israel stalwarts like Jacky Rosen and Chuck Schumer, could even praise America’s bold and precise strike, let alone the hated Trump. Schumer insisted: “No president should be allowed to unilaterally march this nation into something as consequential as war with erratic threats and no strategy.” One pro-Israel Democrat lamented to Jewish Insider, JI reported, that “There were notably more Democrats putting out statements cheering anti-Israel activist Mahmoud Khalil being released from immigration detention than those expressing solidarity with Israel in its time of great need.”²¹

Finally, rather than being chastened by their hysterical warnings of Iranian retaliation bogging America down in another “forever war,” the Yahoo-Wokester alliance felt strengthened. Joe Rogan’s influential MAGA podcast welcomed Senator Bernie Sanders to criticize the war. In another warning sign, 62% of college-educated New Yorkers supported an anti-Israel mayoral candidate, Zohran Mamdani with only 38% preferring his pro-Israel opponent Andrew Cuomo.²² Twenty percent of Jews voting in the primary chose Mamdani and an estimated 30% of New Yorkers found his support of BDS a positive reason to choose him. Mamdani’s primary win in the city with the largest Jewish population in the world reflected the long-term effects the “Academic Intifada” will have on Democratic politics: Israel is becoming a polarizing issue even in local elections, with many college-educated Democratic activists simply being knee-jerk anti-Zionists. Future leaders will look back on their anti-Israel activism gratefully as their formative political experience, and, even now, taboos about mainstream politicians calling to “Globalize the Intifada” and bash Israel as “genocidal” are being broken.

Those four days in June explain why, despite such a foundation, a certain volatility haunts the U.S.-Israel relationship too – and panic quickly spreads. Since George W. Bush embraced Israel and many Democrats decided they hated him and therefore must hate Israel too, pro-Israel activists started warning about Israel becoming a wedge issue. The Republican Party emerged as America’s unambiguously pro-Israel Party in the 2000s and 2010s. The Democrats, while still mostly pro-Israel, replaced the pre-Ronald Reagan Republican Party as the major party hosting a vocal, influential, anti-Israel and borderline antisemitic wing. The “horseshoe” Yahoo-Wokester alliance, against Trump’s bombing, uniting antisemitic anti-Israel Republicans such as Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, and Marjorie Taylor Greene with antisemitic, anti-Israel Democrats such as Ilhan Omar and Rashid Tlaib, culminated in a new and worrying phenomenon that October 7, the Academic Intifada, and MAGA ideology accelerated. Now, both Parties host powerful anti-Israel voices firmly within their tents.

REPUBLICAN FACTIONS

The overwhelming majority are Ronald Reagan Zionists, including Evangelicals, National Security Hawks, and most Trump voters. They cheer Donald Trump’s pro-Israel accomplishments, from recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital to brokering the Abraham Accords, to now, bombing Iran. Calling them “Ronald Reagan Zionists” acknowledging the Republican Party that emerged in the 1980s as an enthusiastically pro-Israel party, while reminding us of Reagan-era clashes over America’s AWACS sales to Saudi Arabia, Israel’s bombing Iraq’s nuclear reactor, and Israel’s supposed aggressiveness during the Lebanon War. “Sister democracies” are not twins: some clashes are inevitable, not necessarily catastrophic.

Some Reagan Zionists, and some Republicans less enthusiastic about Israel, are “Forever Trumpers,” supporting President Trump no matter what. That occasionally requires the mental gymnastics Vice President JD Vance has mastered. “Forever Trumpers” include “Only Israelites.” Generally hostile to foreign aid, especially for Ukraine, they have an Israel exception because it’s a bulwark against jihadism.

“Forever-War Avoiders” sound increasingly suspicious about bankrolling Israel but are not anti-Israel, just dubious of any foreign war. They heard President Trump’s repeated promises to avoid foreign entanglements while ignoring Trump’s repeated vows that Iran will never get a nuclear weapon.

Conclusion: These Republicans especially need to hear more about Israel’s military independence and how supporting Israel helps America overall, including avoiding foreign entanglements. Memories of 9/11 and Israel’s extraordinary successes against Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran before America intervened, can calm some of these skeptics.

The small but vocal and influential “MAGA antisemites” also resent America’s “forever wars,” but their orthodox isolationism is often greased with antisemitism. With some, like Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, an openness to anti-Jewish conspiracy theories fed her isolationism and anti-Zionism. Others, most prominently Tucker Carlson, seem to have become increasingly hostile to Israel and to Jews, the more isolationist they become. Earlier in his career he was neutral. Since Fox fired him in October 2023, he’s become more rabid.

Nevertheless, 83% of Trump voters supported Israel over Iran.²³ On June 18, 2025, the Network Contagion Research Institute report, “False Flags and Fake MAGA: How Foreign and Inauthentic Networks Use Fake Speech to Destabilize the Right from Within,” warned that “pro-Iran, pro-Kremlin and Iranian state-linked propaganda nodes” – bots – flooded American social media while masquerading as MAGA loyalists.”²⁴ Abe Greenwald of Commentary concluded: “That explains why polls show a strong majority of Republicans supporting the American strikes on Iran, while dominant right-wing X accounts would lead you to believe that MAGA was generally opposed.”²⁵

DEMOCRATIC FACTIONS

The vitriolic progressive backlash against Israel’s war in Gaza, and the surge in anti-Zionist antisemitism has influenced the Democratic Party’s base, which increasingly attracts college graduates. The numbers of pro-Israel young people and pro-Israel liberals had been sagging; since October 7, it’s cratering.

Most Democrats remain pro-Israel. Many are Zionist Liberals, in the tradition of Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Bill Clinton, are represented by the Democratic Majority for Israel, and stalwarts like John Fetterman and Ritchie Torres. They see the joint values and interlocking interests uniting Israel and the United States.

More and more Democrats are Joe Biden Zionists. They cheered when President Biden supported Israel after October 7. But, like Biden, they grew increasingly frustrated with what they called Israel’s stubborn and aggressive approach to the Gaza War. They supported Biden’s on-off pressure tactics, and also took credit when Israel smashed Hezbollah, Syria collapsed, and when Israel weakened Iran. These Democrats condemn Israel’s hostility to the Palestinians and still believe in a two-state solution. They fear Israel is becoming more “red state” culturally, and believe in “social justice,” which to them means universalism, pacifism, and disdain for nationalism, traditionalism, and military service.

Conclusion: Israel and the Jewish Community must speak the language of “Identity Zionism,” justifying Israel’s existence as a constructive expression of liberal-democratic nationalism that could speak to “blue state” Jews and non-Jews seeking meaning, community, and rootedness.

Clearly, neither Kamala Harris nor Barack Obama were as passionately pro-Israel as Biden. It’s a crude mistake to call them “anti-Israel” or “anti-Zionist.” They are Conditional Zionists. Their support of Israel is contingent on Israel again becoming what Thomas Friedman calls “your grandfather’s Israel.” They need Israel pursuing peace with the Palestinians and looking more like their stereotype of Tel Aviv, less like their stereotype of Jerusalem. And they are disgusted by “settlers,” the “occupation,” “settler violence,” Ben-Gvir, Smotrich, and the Haredim.

On the far left, but growing in power ominously, are anti-Bibi anti-Zionists. True, some, like Ilhan Omar, Rashid Tlaib, and so many pro-Palestinians, reinforce their anti-Zionism with antisemitism. But many, like Bernie Sanders, use their irrational hatred of Benjamin Netanyahu to justify their anti-Zionism – and overlook their allies’ antisemitism. Some Jews are in this alliance, although their numbers are exaggerated. But they have colonized the Democratic Party and intimidated many Biden Zionists into muting their enthusiasm for the Jewish state.

These factions are fluid and may not prove lasting. Americans are in the middle of two “black swan” events battering Israel’s reputation. First, Donald Trump’s polarizing presidency makes whatever bipartisan support Israel enjoys anomalous. But Trump’s aggressive sledgehammer approach to leadership even has made many pro-Israel Democrats, including Jewish Democrats, abhor his antisemitism initiative – despite being the most proactive presidential assault on Jew-hatred in history. Second, the ongoing slog of a bloody Gaza war led by an Israeli government that even many American Jewish Zionists demonize, has made Israel unpopular. Israel’s popularity may bounce back – or a new generation of anti-Zionists may mainstream Israel-bashing. One May 2025 poll had six in ten Republicans seeing Israel’s regional role as positive (60%) compared to just three in ten Independents (29%), and just two in ten Democrats (19%).²⁶ A Pew Research Center poll from the month prior found 69% of Democrats critical of Israel.²⁷ And a Jerusalem Center of Public Affairs poll in May, 2024, found 51% of American Jews supporting Biden’s withholding of arms to Israel and a third believing Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.²⁸

When this war ends, or the Abraham Accords expand, or Donald Trump leaves the political scene, or Israel’s government changes, Israel’s popularity may revive. Gallup polls over the last 30 years reveal more stable support for Israel than volatility, despite the constant barrage of negative headlines. Moreover, Americans’ baseline of support for Israel remains greater than the baseline of support among Canadians, the British, or the French.

Additional Conclusions: For the Jewish People (italicized text repeats last year’s conclusion):

While fighting Jew-hatred boldly, the Jewish community should note how pro-Israel and Jew-positive most Americans are. Jewish leaders should launch a pro-Israel campaign thanking Americans left and right for their ongoing support, still pitching Israel as a rare bipartisan issue in a country desperate for more points of light and fewer flashpoints.

Similarly, we need a political campaign building on the broad American fear of Iran. Desire for a stronger defense posture against Iran, as the weakest link in the chain of evil threatening the world, must be elevated into another bipartisan issue. As with supporting Israel and denouncing antisemitism, the fight against Iran must be framed as Right fighting Wrong, championing American decency, pride, and survival, not another Left-Right divider. The recent war highlighted the Iranian regime’s investment and progress in going nuclear, its willingness to target civilians, its harshness toward its own citizens, and its under-reported but deadly ballistic missile program. The Islamic Republic of Iran has bombarded Israeli civilians with over 800 ICBMs, a mind-boggling assault on international norms and law. Each of these points should be hammered home publicly.

The enduring American support for Israel and disdain for Jew-hatred should embolden the American Jewish community – and the Jewish organizations – to stop talking to itself and do more outreach to the Silenced Majority. The pro-Israel rally of November 2023 should have had 580,000 attendees – each of the 290,000 or so Jewish protesters should have brought a non-Jewish “date.”

Democratic fury at Donald Trump risks undermining the Jewish community’s strong consensus against antisemitism, campus Jew-hatred, and the Iranian dictatorship. Jewish leaders must figure out how to get more Jews – and Americans – focusing on the substance of issues, rather than reasoning backwards and deciding what stance they take based on whether they love or hate Trump. Similarly, pro-Israel Republicans need to address the neo-Isolationist antisemites within their camp – and pro-Israel Democrats need to address the anti-Zionists within their camp.

The primary win of Zohran Mamdani in New York City proves that the Jewish community has to work harder to fight campus anti-Zionism because it is raising generations of Democratic voters and leaders who either hate Israel, or who don’t see hating Israel as disqualifying in a leader. It’s the mainstreaming of anti-Zionism within the liberal world.

The Jewish community needs to speak a new language of Israel support that is more TikTok friendly, more visual and emotional than verbal and logical. And it needs to have more initiatives like the push to free TikTok from Chinese ownership, that examines the many structural ways social media has become a platform for Israel-bashing and Jew-hatred.

Finally, the Jewish community should challenge America’s leaders to anticipate the next hostage crisis. Despite its rhetoric, America keeps negotiating with terrorists, encouraging more kidnappings. And sifting the victims based on their passports is offensive. Perhaps, in the future, anytime even one American is kidnapped, every fellow hostage should automatically get American citizenship, at least ending that farce.

Conclusions: For the Israeli Government

No Israeli official should underestimate how fraught this period will be for Israel and the U.S.-Israel alliance. It is essential, therefore, that Israel continually thank Republicans and Democrats for their support, celebrate bipartisanship, and avoid making Israel a political football.

At the same time, Israel should frame this alliance as embodying shared interests and values, pitching opposition to Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran as good opposing evil in an existential fight for America not just Israel. Speaking to the American people is legitimate – bypassing any administration or disrespecting either party is not.

Finally, Americans want to see Israel thinking about tomorrow and not stuck in October 7. Israel must be as creative politically and diplomatically at this moment, as it has been militarily and entrepreneurially. For example, replacing the tired phrase “two states for two peoples” – which even Kamala Harris avoided29 – by calling for “two democracies for two peoples,” changes the dynamic, pressuring the Palestinians and the international community, while situating Israel as driving the peace train, not being bullied onto it.

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