From the Liveblog of
Saturday, August 3, 2024
Josh Shapiro seeks to downplay his time as IDF volunteer after college op-ed resurfaces
Jacob Magid is The Times of Israel's US bureau chief
Pennsylvania Governor and potential vice presidential nominee Josh Shapiro tries to distance himself from a recently uncovered op-ed he wrote in college in which he identified as a former volunteer in the IDF and argued that the Palestinians are too “battle-minded” to pursue peace with Israel.
“While he was in high school, Josh Shapiro was required to do a service project, which he and several classmates completed through a program that took them to a kibbutz in Israel where he worked on a farm and at a fishery,” Shapiro’s spokesperson Manuel Bonder tells The Times of Israel.
“The program also included volunteering on service projects on an Israeli army base. At no time was he engaged in any military activities,” Bonder adds in a statement responding to an inquiry regarding the nature of his volunteer work.
In the 1993 op-ed, which dismissed the recently signed Oslo Accords, Shapiro wrote, “Despite my skepticism as a Jew and a past volunteer in the Israeli army, I strongly hope and pray that this ‘peace plan’ will be successful.”
While Shapiro’s Jewish roots are well established — including his enrollment at the Akiba Hebrew Academy in Philadelphia — the op-ed from his time at the University of Rochester appeared to be the first revelation of such direct ties to the IDF.
“Palestinians will not coexist peacefully,” Shapiro also wrote in the op-ed titled “Peace Not Possible.”
“They do not have the capabilities to establish their own homeland and make it successful even with the aid of Israel and the United States. They are too battle-minded to be able to establish a peaceful homeland of their own,” added the then-20-year-old.
The article resurfaces days before Vice President and presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris is slated to announce her running mate. Shapiro has faced an aggressive campaign from far-left and anti-Israel activists, who have branded him “Genocide Josh” and warned Harris against picking him. Those critics have also faced charges of antisemitism, as Shapiro’s more recent views are no less critical of Israel than others on the shortlist who are not Jewish.
Asked about the op-ed at a press conference earlier Friday, Shapiro said, “I was 20.”
“I have said for years, years before October 7, that I favor a two-state solution — Israelis and Palestinians living peacefully side-by-side, being able to determine their own futures and their own destiny,” he added.
Earlier this year Shapiro called Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, “one of the worst leaders of all time and has steered Israel in a wrong direction.”
In a separate statement to the Inquirer responding to backlash over Shapiro’s views on Palestinians when he was in college, his spokesperson said, the governor “has built close, meaningful, informative relationships with many Muslim-American, Arab-American, Palestinian Christian, and Jewish community leaders all across Pennsylvania.
“The governor greatly values their perspectives and the experiences he has learned from over the years — and as a result, as with many issues, his views on the Middle East have evolved into the position he holds today,” the spokesperson added.
