Once a backer, not always one: 'Israel' losing support of US unions
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Since the outbreak of the war on Gaza, arguments have erupted over how unions can balance political campaigning with professional repercussions.
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A screengrab from an NYC City Workers for Palestine rally in Foley Square on December 14, 2023 (@probablyreadit, X photo)
According to The New York Times, the decades-long support from US labor organizations for Israel" may have come to an end.
Some activists are successfully pressing their unions to call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, reflecting a larger generational shift, and many unions are split on which stance to adopt or whether to take any stance at all.
President of the Jewish Labor Committee and head of the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union, Stuart Appelbaum, expressed that this shift is evident in society and "every place else."
The American Federation of Labor passed a resolution in 1917 supporting the Balfour Declaration, and unions gave millions to Histadrut, "Israel's" main labor organization, throughout the 1920s and '30s, and American labor unions began participating in "Israel's" bond program.
Jeff Schuhrke, a labor historian at Empire State University, noted that about 1,700 American trade unions had invested $1 billion in the bonds by 1994, helping "construct the state of Israel."
Union support for "Israel" has occasionally caused internal strife, with some union rank-and-file members criticizing the alliance. In 1949, the same year that the International Ladies Garment Workers organization purchased a $1 million Israeli bond, a number of its members petitioned the organization to help Palestinian refugees.
Thousands of Arab American auto workers in Detroit briefly walked off the job in 1973 to protest the United Auto Workers' financial support for "Israel". Following John J. Sweeney's speech at the "National Rally for Israel" in 2002, several union members published a petition denouncing his support for the nation.
Since the outbreak of the war on Gaza, arguments have erupted over how unions can represent their varied membership and how to balance political campaigning with professional repercussions.
The Writers Guild faced an outpouring of frustration from more than 300 members when the Union didn’t immediately condemn Hamas for Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7, while Starbucks Workers United, the Amazon Labor Union, and the New Yorker's Union faced backlash over pro-Palestine images on social media posts.
When a ceasefire resolution was offered in early November by the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, a U.A.W. sub-union of over 3,000 public defenders and legal professionals, some members objected to the resolution while others filed a lawsuit to prevent the Union from voting.
Support for Palestine comes at a cost
Another New York public defense agency, the Bronx Defenders, was threatened with defunding after its Union took a pro-Palestine position.
The parent organization of The New York Times' union, NewsGuild-CWA, which represents over 26,000 members as part of the Communications Workers of America, heard from some of its members who wanted the union to support a ceasefire.
Concerned that this might harm coverage of the war, a group of journalists at The New York Times organized the Independence Caucus, which, according to one of its leaders, wishes to "avoid public positions that compromise the journalistic independence required of many members and could undermine our work."
Google's parent company Alphabet's union, The Alphabet Workers, has not voted on a call for a ceasefire since it fears alienating Israeli tech workers in the occupied territories.
Many activists are now keen to see their unions capitalize on this period's momentum by adopting bold views on progressive causes, which they see as part of a long tradition of American labor's engagement in national and international politics.
According to long-time labor experts, the desire to demand a ceasefire from American unions reflects a generational shift in which a new breed of leadership emerged from young activists who grew up after the Oslo process collapsed in the 1990s.
Poll: Why young Americans are more pro-Palestine than their elders?
According to a YouGov survey conducted in late October, in the current war on Gaza, Americans aged 18-29 sympathized with Palestine more than with Israelis, the only age group with such feelings. Twenty-eight percent had more compassion with Palestinians, whereas 20% had more compassion for Israelis, and 31% sympathized with both equally.
Older groups, particularly those 65 and older, were more inclined to empathize with Israelis than Palestinians or both. Fourteen percent of those aged 18 to 29 believed it was "very important" for the US to safeguard "Israel", compared to two-thirds of those aged 65 and over.
In a recent poll by Harvard-Harris, a majority of young Americans said they believe that "Israel" should "be ended" and that the Palestinian land should be given back to "Hamas and the Palestinians."
According to experts, there are several reasons why Americans' attitudes toward "Israel" and its relationship with Palestinians may be influenced by their age.
Whereas older generations were convinced by their governments that the formation of "Israel" was a homeland for holocaust survivors, younger generations recall a much more violent image of "Israel".
This generation built its perception of "Israel" based on accounts of Palestinians being denied access to water, freedom of movement, and fair trials while under the military authority of a comparatively prosperous, nuclear-armed nation.
