00:00Today, I'm going to explain why Ro Khanna went from pro-Israel Democrat to anti-Israel
00:06activist. Congressman Ro Khanna has represented Silicon Valley for about a decade, and in that
00:11time, he has established his reputation as a left-wing politician who still represents
00:16business interests. And of course, that makes sense because he has a vast personal fortune
00:21of his own. But in the last few years, Khanna has taken a hard left turn. He came out, for
00:27example,
00:27in favor of the billionaire tax. In addition, Khanna has turned against the state of Israel
00:33in a very vicious way. He has accused AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby group, of being involved in a
00:38kind of conspiracy to control the American government. He has supported Graham Plattner in
00:43Maine. Why is Khanna doing this? Well, Khanna has read the tea leaves and understands that his lane
00:50in the 2028 Democratic presidential primary is the far left-wing lane, which is very excited about
00:57the Israel issue. And ever since October 7th, rather than calling for peace in the Middle East,
01:02this faction of the left has been calling for the increasing isolation and demonization of the
01:07state of Israel. And Khanna has flipped. In fact, in February 2022, Khanna went to Israel with Nancy
01:13Pelosi and several other Democrats and called for stronger ties between the United States and Israel.
01:18He met with politicians, and while he was critical of some Israeli policies and he stood up for
01:22Palestinian rights, he also said that we need a stronger U.S.-Israel alliance, and he'd like to
01:27learn from Israeli companies and expand the commercial lessons of Israel's own high-tech
01:33sector to Silicon Valley and the United States. Doesn't sound like someone who is particularly angry
01:39at Israel. Well, 18 months later, Israel was attacked by Hamas. Hamas murdered over a thousand
01:44Israelis, most of whom were civilians, and the left got very excited, not because they necessarily
01:49supported Hamas, but because the prospect of striking back at what they see as a symbol of
01:54global imperialism was just simply too tantalizing to turn away from. And Khanna is riding that wave.
01:59So he went to the West Bank, the disputed territory on the eastern side of Israel, and Khanna drove into
02:06a conflict zone. And he didn't clear it with authorities beforehand. He didn't tell anybody he was going.
02:10So he was stopped by some local people with machine guns who tend to reserve the right for
02:17themselves to patrol their communities. Now, he says he was detained. He was greeted by violent
02:22thugs. But what happened was they called the army. They called the police. The army came. The army told
02:26the settlers to leave, and the army let Khanna go along his way. He says he was detained. He even
02:31says he was detained because of his skin color. But that, too, is an exaggeration because more than
02:34half of Israelis are, quote-unquote, non-European. Many Israelis have dark skin, including the Ethiopians who
02:40serve in the Israeli army. So the idea that he was singled out because of his race is pretty unlikely
02:44and is
02:45sort of a tell that much of the rest of the story doesn't hold water. It's a legitimate issue, but
02:49he
02:49has hammed it up to make himself seem more heroic in standing up to the Israeli war machine and to
02:56appeal to that left-wing base for whom this is the most important issue. In fact, the organizing
03:02principle of politics at the moment. And that's why Khanna has gone from someone who was somewhat
03:08moderate, especially on the issue of Israel, to someone who is essentially a fire-breathing
03:13extremist on the left. It's all part of aligning himself properly for a 28 presidential run.
03:19Whether it works or not is up to the voters in the Democratic Party.
Comments