Abdul El-Sayed’s victory has laid bare a truth about America's view on Israel

In Michigan, support for Israel was a kind of political hologram. But the media often made it seem real

Among the things that Abdul El-Sayed’s victory last night in the Michigan Senate race revealed is this: the debate over US policy toward Israel does not primarily pit the left versus the right. It pits the top versus the bottom.

There was no grassroots enthusiasm in the state for maintaining US military aid and weapons sales to Israel. That view no longer commands support even among ordinary Republicans. There was instead a massive infusion of pro-Israel money, mostly from extremely wealthy people.

Abdul El-Sayed’s opponents –Haley Stevens and Mike Rogers– were vehicles for that infusion, and for other corporate interests, which is why they came off as so hollow. El-Sayed poked fun at how few people attended Rogers’ rallies because it illustrated the lack of popular energy in his campaign.

In Michigan, support for Israel was a kind of political hologram. But the media often made it seem real. Commentators tended to depict El-Sayed’s criticism of Israel as a liability when the polls actually showed him winning voters who cared about the issue by an even larger margin than he won overall.

Why did so much coverage get this wrong? Because in the media, the divisions over Israel are top versus bottom as well. While many journalists support Palestinian rights or at least recognize that most Americans no longer favor Israel, networks like CBS and now CNN are owned by pro-Israel billionaires who share the same perspective as Stevens’ and Rogers’ donors. So, they amplify voices who depict pro-Palestinian perspectives as extreme, if not hateful.

Over the past two years, the same top versus bottom dynamic has played out in universities. Students organized encampments to protest the destruction of Gaza; university presidents called in the police to break them up. Students voted overwhelmingly to divest university funds from companies involved in Israeli oppression; boards of trustees rejected divestment out of hand.

You can see this split even among American Jews. Support for Israel is concentrated among the older, the wealthier and the more institutionally affiliated, among the people who populate synagogue boards and fund the local Federations and Jewish Community Centers. It’s at the bottom – among younger people, who have fewer resources, that anti-Zionism has become a rising force.

In 2024, Democrats were on the wrong side of that elite versus mass divide. One of Joe Biden’s top political consultants had helped found a consulting firm that after October 7 went to work for Aipac. Kamala Harris campaigned with Liz Cheney because she believed that a pro-war establishment Republican would help her appeal to swing voters.

The gambit failed because while Cheney’s views were popular with donors, they were unpopular with ordinary voters in both parties. Harris massively outraised Trump but her refusal to break with Biden’s support for Israel depressed her base. And he deployed his America First, anti-war message to win over voters who had never supported him before.

Now the dynamic has flipped. It is Republicans who enjoy a financial advantage but are burdened by an unpopular war. Democrats are running against Aipac and other big money special interests that corrupt American democracy. But the mass versus elite divide over Israel still runs through both parties.

In 2028, it’s likely that both parties will feature populists who denounce Aipac running against establishment-favorites who enjoy its support. By saying that the Iran war and support for Israel helped torpedo Republicans in the midterms, JD Vance is already positioning himself for that debate inside the Republicans in 2028.

Democrats now have an opportunity. El-Sayed and some other winning Democrats have created a progressive version of the anti-interventionist energy that propelled Trump in 2024.

El-Sayed even ran an ad declaring himself the candidate of “America First.” He has shown how Democrats in 2028 can integrate US policy toward Israel into a populist message that resonates across party lines. But given how much support Israel retains among the elites who fund Democratic candidates, and help shape the media narrative, Michigan’s bruising senate race is likely a small taste of what is to come.

Peter Beinart is a contributing opinion writer at the New York Times, editor at large at Jewish Currents, a professor at the Newmark School of Journalism at the City University of New York, and the author of The Beinart Notebook, a weekly newsletter. His most recent book is Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza