Ro Khanna uses Jewish lives as fodder for presidential ambitions

California Congressman Ro Khanna announced last weekend that “Israeli settlers, brandishing American made M4s, detained me & other Americans on my trip to Palestine.When the IDF arrived, they sided with the settlers & continued our detention.”Khanna was trying to turn 90 minutes on an Israeli road into political capital, asking supporters to imagine what Palestinians endure every day if even a member of Congress could be treated this way.Powerful politics.

But an incomplete story.Khanna’s office says his trip to Israel was financed with campaign funds.Before it began, his staff reportedly told the Israeli Embassy it would be a private visit, with no official meetings.According to a source involved in the planning, Israel nevertheless offered meetings with survivors of the Oct.

7 terror attack and others affected by the conflict.Those offers, the source said, were declined.Apparently, Khanna’s delegation was more interested in reinforcing a conclusion about the Jewish state than testing one.California's top news, sports and entertainment delivered to your inbox every day.

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Never miss a story I’ve assisted in taking members of Congress through Judea and Samaria (West Bank) with the US-Israel Education Association.Serious congressional delegations coordinate these visits carefully. When we visit predominantly Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, we travel with Jewish guides and buses marked with Hebrew lettering.

When the itinerary includes lands with mostly Palestinian Arab populations, we switch to Arab guides and buses clearly marked in Arabic. For Khanna’s delegation to move through an Israeli-populated area relying on a single Palestinian Arab activist as a guide was an invitation to exactly the kind of confrontation that followed. Not because of “Israeli apartheid.” Because of I...