This much is indisputable: Democratic voters have changed dramatically when it comes to the US-Israel relationship.
Earlier this year, a national poll from Gallup found that 41 percent of Americans sympathize with the Palestinians and 36 percent with Israelis — the first time since Gallup began tracking the measure in 2001 that Israelis do not have a clear lead in American sympathies. Among Democrats, the gap is a gap: 65 percent side with the Palestinians, only 17 percent with the Israelis.
A Pew survey as of March, meanwhile, it found that 6 in 10 Americans now have a very or somewhat unfavorable opinion of Israel, up 7 percent since last year and nearly 20 points since 2022 — and among Democrats and Democratic-leaners, that number rises to 80 percent.
This change, after Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and Israel’s brutal war in Gaza in response, has increasingly antagonized elected leaders from both sides. Democrats, in particular, seem to be more openly questioning the party’s position when it comes to providing Israel with offensive weapons.
But, beyond policy, the Democrats’ new conundrum on Israel also comes down to a matter of tone. What are the legitimate criticisms of the Israeli government? What goes into anti-Semitism? And which voices should decide what is acceptable within that debate?
Third Way, a Democratic organization that promotes moderate candidates and hard-line policy proposals, was recently weighed in on its thoughts on the topic. In March, the organization’s president, Jonathan Cowan, co-wrote a Wall Street Journal article titled “Democrats Are Too Cool By Hasan Piker,” targeting left-wing extremist Twitch whose pro-Palestinian views have made him extremely popular — with a lightning rod.
“No Democrat should associate with him,” Cowan and his co-author, Lily Cohen, argued. “They should all be looking to push him to the edge, where he belongs.”
In this period of America, ReallyI spoke with Cowan about his opposition to Piker and questioned how much of Third Way’s opposition is about a self-promoter vs. a big swing in Democratic voters, specifically on questions about Israel. I also spoke with Piker himself about his political goals, streaming culture, and whether he’ll apologize for past controversial statements.
Here are three things I learned from that conversation:
1. The Third Way somewhat misrepresents Piker’s past – and his political goals
Cowan’s main argument is electoral: that the association with Piker makes Democrats “more extreme than usual” and clouds the party’s ability to win red and purple seats. “We don’t need two extreme parties in this country,” he told me.
As evidence, he kept returning to the scoreboard. Since 2018, he said, moderate-backed candidates have flipped about 50 seats blue, while the left-wing groups Piker is affiliated with — Mapinduzi Etu and Haki Democrats — by his count, “have flipped zero.”
But, that formulation ignores Piker’s larger goals. His popularity grew out of the problems the Democratic Party will face, whether he is there or not: how to gain attention in the new Internet economy, how to reach young people, how to speak to a base that is increasingly disaffected by the party’s foreign policy. As I put it to Cowan, there is “clearly an audience for Hasan Piker’s political message,” and polls on Israel show that audience is now a majority of the Democratic base, not the fringes.
What is clear after both interviews: Piker is not trying to be selective many Democrats. He’s trying to single them out and drag the party’s center of gravity with them — the way MAGA reshaped the GOP through primaries, rather than swing seats.
“Changing the Democratic Party is not a stupid vanity project,” Piker told me. “Reforming the Democratic Party to make sure we have real fighters … will make a long-term difference in this country.” Even by his own account, the goal is not to pick winners in the traditional red-to-blue sense; is to direct more money, attention, and leverage to his preferred candidates and policies. Measuring him by the stick of Cowan’s overturned chairs misses what he really does.
2. Piker’s aggression is real – and deliberate
Still, the Third Way complaint is not pure innovation. Some of what Piker said is stupid – and he knows it. Confronted with the years-old clip in which he disparaged Miley Cyrus, Piker admitted he was wrong: “It’s very sad. … Of course I’ve apologized for that. It obviously doesn’t reflect my current values.”
But that regret obviously has limits. When he called Orthodox Jews “born,” he did not apologize, and dismissed it as an insult aimed at “nationalists” and “right-wing settlers.” On the term “pig” Third Way flagged as anti-Semitic, he claimed he did not know the history of the term – and then questioned the veracity of his critics. And on the most heated line – “I’d always vote for Hamas over Israel” – he didn’t back down at all. “I’m about to go down four times,” he said, having already gone up three times elsewhere.
That is to say. Piker described the Hamas line not as propaganda but as “inflammatory propaganda” — a Marxist term he insists is neutral — designed to “keep you guessing.” “It’s deliberately provocative,” he said, “but I don’t think it’s worth it.” Whatever you do in politics, provocation is a strategy, not an accident.
3. Elite guards no longer work
Another thing I took away from both talks is that the Third Way of gatekeeping may no longer work, and it may backfire. In a streaming economy driven by controversy, the startup’s campaign to make Piker’s radiation works less like quarantine and more like free advertising.
“Your jokes don’t make sense when I’ve seen what makes you happy,” Piker said of his Democratic critics. “If they want to put themselves on the 10 percent side of the 90-10 issue, that’s fine with me.”
He has an opinion on basic numbers. Polling increasingly describes voters who have moved closer to him – not further. And when Third Way tries to control the boundaries of acceptable criticism of Israel, it draws that line well to the right where its party’s voters already stand. “It was lonelier on October 8, 2023, saying the same things I’m saying right now,” Piker told me. “He doesn’t feel lonely anymore.”
That’s the role of the guardians of the party: The third way of fault that Piker gets – the thing that makes them want him to leave – is, increasingly, the reason for him to keep blowing up.
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