Chuck Schumer's demise is well-deserved

In the past 24 hours, Chuck Schumer went from being Senate Majority Leader to being persona non grata in Israel. He has only himself to blame for that. Forner U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman is so upset with Sen. Schumer that he wrote this op-ed to express his outrage.

Apparently, Coleman and Schumer have a great deal of familiarity with each other that extends past their time in the U.S. Senate together. According to Sen. Coleman's op-ed, "I’ve known Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) since we were schoolmates at PS 197 and James Madison High School in Brooklyn. The high school boasts an impressive number of Jewish graduates who went on to become leaders in their fields of endeavor, from entertainers and sports stars to Nobel Prize winning scientists and well-known public officials, including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg."

The reason behind Sen. Coleman's outrage is Sen. Schumer's speech on the Senate floor from Thursday. That's when Sen. Schumer said "The fourth major obstacle to peace is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has all too frequently bowed to the demands of extremists like Ministers Smotrich and Ben Gvir, and the settlers in the West Bank."

Then Schumer dropped this bombshell:

The Netanyahu coalition no longer fits the needs of Israel after October 7. The world has changed — radically — since then, and the Israeli people are being stifled right now by a governing vision that is stuck in the past. Nobody expects Prime Minister Netanyahu to do the things that must be done to break the cycle of violence, preserve Israel’s credibility on the world stage, and work towards a two-state solution.

If he were to disavow Ministers Smotrich and Ben Gvir, and kick them out of his governing coalition, that would be a real meaningful step forward. But regrettably, there is no reason to believe Prime Minister Netanyahu would do that.

Sen. Schumer insisted that Russia interfered in the U.S. elections in 2016 to the point of him accusing Trump's presidency of being illegitimate. He was totally wrong then. Now he's interfering with Israel's elections:

The fact that Sen. Schumer still insists on a 2-state solution between Israelis and Palestinians is frightening. He said this right after saying that Israel "is getting stifled" by "a governing vision that's stuck in the past." The 2-state solution was first introduced in the 1990s. And Sen. Schumer insists that Israel is stuck in the past? Seriously?

From Sen. Coleman's op-ed:

Sen. Schumer said that the elected Israeli government led by Benjamin Netanyahu "no longer fits the needs of Israel." He called the government "an obstacle to peace," and demanded new elections. He threatened that if the Netanyahu-led coalition remains in power, "then the United States will have no choice but to play a more active role in shaping Israeli policy by using our leverage to change the present course."

Then there's this:

It’s hard to believe that the smart Brooklyn boy I knew 60 years ago has so completely missed the mark. Israel’s conduct of the war in Gaza is determined by a War Cabinet agreed upon in October, which includes some of Netanyahu’s toughest critics. Moreover, the vast majority of Israelis approve of the government’s conduct of the war. Israel has done more than any nation in history to protect innocent civilians in wartime, while taking down a terrorist infrastructure in Gaza that has been decades in the making.

That Sen. Schumer would instruct Israelis to dump PM Netanyahu speaks more to Sen. Schumer's lack of character than it speaks to PM Netanyahu's character. Further, it's obvious that Sen. Schumer is still anti-Palestinian despite his misguided policies. Sen. Schumer isn't Israel's guardian any more than Biden is.