From thefp.com
Last Wednesday, a 31-year-old progressive activist allegedly shot and killed two employees of the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C., in cold blood. As one of them, Sarah Milgrim, a 26-year-old Jew from Kansas, tried to crawl away, the gunman continued shooting at her.
“Free, free Palestine,” he shouted as police took him into custody.
You would think that this would be easy to condemn. Yet when the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America said in a statement released last Thursday that they “reject the violence of last night’s fatal shooting,” some members of the political organization revolted.
Almost immediately, a debate broke out in the national DSA’s internal message board for dues-paying members over how to respond to the killings outside the Capital Jewish Museum.
“Is it good to condemn violence against a genocidal apartheid state?” a DSA member with the username “SebastianFG” said in a post. Other members responded to the post with emojis of a heart and applause.
Other DSA members called the statement “horrific,” “hurtful,” and “irresponsible.”
The Democratic Socialists of America is not just a fringe activist organization. Its national membership has skyrocketed in recent years to more than 90,000, riding the wave of Bernie Sanders’s nearly successful primary challenge of Hillary Clinton in 2016. The political organization has since boasted major electoral success with politicians in Congress’s progressive “Squad,” including Michigan’s Rashida Tlaib and New York City’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The far-left group unendorsed Ocasio-Cortez last year after the congresswoman voted in favor of a resolution affirming Israel’s “right to exist.”
The radical group is deeply fractured over how to respond to last week’s killings of Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky. (The alleged shooter, Elias Rodriguez, was charged with murder of foreign officials, first-degree murder, and other crimes.)
On one side of the fight within the DSA is the group’s so-called “right wing,” as its critics call it, which believes that the DSA should avoid any association with violence—and either condemn the act or not speak of it at all. This camp includes members who described themselves as a 69-year-old “radical,” a union member from Virginia, and a travel writer based in Louisiana, according to messages reviewed by The Free Press.
Then there are the DSA extremists, some of whom argue violence is necessary for revolution and others who openly celebrate it.
“Where is our commitment to non-violent resistance stated?” a DSA member from Seattle with the username “ChrisW” wanted to know. “It’s not in the constitution or bylaws, the closest thing is that we reject ‘brutality and violence in defense of the status quo.’ ”
A DSA member from northern New Jersey with the username “Conordachisen” wrote that “non violent, peaceful action” isn’t the only way to achieve socialism—“there’ll also be comrades who understand that violent revolution is a thing, too.”
This faction of the DSA is best represented by the Liberation Caucus, which describes itself as “a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist caucus in DSA.” On Wednesday, the Liberation Caucus posted on X that it was “proud” to sign onto a statementcalling the recent shooting “a legitimate act of resistance against the zionist state.”
“Free Elias Rodriguez and all political prisoners,” the Liberation Caucus said in a post.
That statement was written by the militant group Unity of Fields, which then-Senator Marco Rubio called upon the Department of Justice to investigate for “domestic terrorism” last October. Unity of Fields members include James “Fergie” Chambers, an heir to the Cox Enterprises media fortune.
“To be clear, what we are asserting is more than a recognition that the violence and oppression meted out by the zionist movement will inevitably give rise to counter-violence, an indisputable truism,” the group wrote Monday on X. “We are saying that such counter-violence is legitimate. It is justice.”
The statement fueled even more infighting among DSA members and is now causing waves in the New York City mayoral race, especially for some top contenders who are facing a dilemma over how to respond. In particular, the pressure is on Zohran Mamdani, a New York state assemblyman and prominent member of the Democratic Socialists of America whose campaign flyers say he is “proudly endorsed” by the group’s New York City chapter, to either condemn the Unity of Fields statement or endorse it.
After last week’s killings, Mamdani said he was “horrified” by the “appalling rise in antisemitic violence.” Last night, Unity of Fields publicly prodded Mamdani to go in the opposite direction. “As a DSA mayoral candidate and self-professed supporter of Palestinian liberation, @ZohranKMamdani must commend the DSA Liberation Caucus for upholding Elias Rodriguez’s righteous action, which is the most anyone in this country has done for Palestine,” Unity of Fields wrote in a post on X. Mamdani and DSA representatives didn’t respond to requests for comment from The Free Press.
Andrew Cuomo, the former New York governor, is leading the mayoral race so far, and Mamdani is in second place, but he has been gaining ground in recent polls. Cuomo, who recently marched in the city’s Israel Day Parade, denounced the Unity of Fields’ statement. He wrotethat his opponents “are either members of the Democratic Socialists of America or are supported by/have supported DSA members.”
“I call on them to denounce this inflammatory position which is abhorrent to the Jewish community and all law abiding Americans,” he wrote Wednesday.
Brad Lander, the New York City comptroller who is polling in third placein the mayoral race, called himself a “Brooklyn Jewish Democratic Socialist” in 2016. He didn’t respond to a request for comment.
A dozen other far-left groups have signed onto the Unity of Fields’ statement, including Masar Badil, a group linked to Samidoun, a promoter of anti-Israeli sentiment on college campuses. The group’s leader has been sanctioned by the U.S. for his “fundraising and recruitment efforts” that “support the PFLP’s terrorist activity against Israel.” The Unity of Fields’ statement, which also expressed support for Iran, called for supporters to “rally to defend Elias Rodriguez” and even donate funds to his jail commissary account.
On Wednesday, Unity of Fields called the Liberation Caucus “the most principled DSA members in the country” but Unity of Fields is no fan of the national chapter. On Wednesday, Unity of Fields accused the DSA’s national leadership of promoting “liberal zionism and traitorous collaborationism with the ruling class.”
On the national DSA’s internal message board, some members expressed concern about the public endorsement of violence. “It is going to be read as an endorsement of indiscriminate murder,” wrote “Wbreeves2002,” the 69-year-old self-described “radical,” in the online discussion. “By signing on to this, the so-called ‘Liberation’ caucus has put every member of DSA and the organization itself at risk.”
The national Democratic Socialists of America had urged local chapters to stay quiet about the internal controversy, according to posts on the internal message board. Last night, though, the DSA broke its own silence. “Democratic Socialists of America seek to democratically transform our society and reject vigilante violence,” the group wroteon X after the Liberation Caucus’s post went viral. “We condemn the murder of Israeli embassy workers.”
The statement also tried to separate the national chapter from the Liberation Caucus, saying that “any statement otherwise is not the stance of DSA.”
In an apparent response to the blowback about its earlier comments, the Liberation Caucus tweeted Wednesday night that “we are just one” of “many different ideological tendencies” within the Democratic Socialists of America.
“Right wing news outlets and individuals have chosen to take the statement we signed to portray the entire organization as holding our views—this is wrong,” the Liberation Caucus posted.
Some DSA members who described themselves as members of the Liberation Caucus aren’t backing down. “Signing a statement in support of a political prisoner is not wrong,” a DSA member from St. Louis with the username “Blackredguard” wrote on the DSA’s message board, “and I frankly don’t think we have anything to apologize for.”
“You wonder why people call DSA a bunch of useless liberals scared of their own shadow,” he continued. “This is why.”