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    Harris Must Persuade Gaza Protesters, Not Dismiss Them

    At a campaign rally in the Detroit area on Wednesday, Kamala Harris was speaking about the threat of Project 2025 and the Trump agenda when a small group of protesters interrupted her. I couldn’t make out their words, but it was reported that they were shouting something about Gaza. Harris reacted with her trademark “I am speaking now.” The protesters persisted. Harris’s tone grew stern. “You know what?” she said. “If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that. Otherwise, I’m speaking.” She continued, to cheers from the crowd. The protesters were escorted out.When I watched a video of this scene, my heart sank. It reminded me of another interruption, at a Democratic fund-raiser at a nightclub in New York, 32 years ago. Bill Clinton was speaking when Bob Rafsky, a member of the AIDS activist group ACT UP, stood up to challenge him on his plans to deal with the AIDS epidemic. “We’re dying,” Rafsky said. Clinton engaged at first, saying he was running for president “to do something about it.” Rafsky continued to shout. Clinton became angry. “Would you just calm down?” he said.I knew Rafsky. I was a member of ACT UP, and a journalist covering AIDS in the gay press. When Clinton said, “Calm down,” I heard, Some things are more important than your life. In campaign math, this was probably true: Only a fraction of a percent of Americans were living with AIDS. Clinton had statistically bigger issues to address.Yes, before her Detroit speech, Harris met very briefly with a group of pro-Palestinian activists. But at the rally, I heard the same steely political calculus in Harris’s admonition to the protesters: She has to focus on beating Trump, not on a genocide occurring 6,000 miles away and affecting about two million people, some of whom are related to or have close ties with a small fraction of the American electorate for which the war in Gaza is a decisive issue in this election. And, like people confronting AIDS in 1992, Palestinian Americans and others who want an end to Israel’s war should know that the other candidate would be even worse.Such reasoning is as statistically sound as it is tone-deaf and emotionally blind. It appears that at least one of the protesters at the rally is of Palestinian descent. And given the demographics of the Detroit area, it is quite likely that others in the crowd were Palestinian Americans, very possibly with family and friends in Gaza who are at risk of being killed, whether by bombing, disease or starvation in the coming months, if they are not dead already.Rafsky died in February 1993, one month into the first Clinton administration. In November 1992, on the eve of the presidential election, he gave a speech standing by the coffin of another ACT UP member, Mark Fisher, who had asked that his body be carried through the streets of New York in protest.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Israel Launches Another Offensive in Gaza’s South Amid Push for Truce

    The United States, Egypt and Qatar are trying to restart peace talks between Hamas and Israel, while Israel carries on its operation in Gaza and braces for attacks by Iran and Hezbollah.An Israeli ground assault in the southern Gaza Strip on Friday forced tens of thousands of Palestinians to flee their homes and shelters, many for a third time or more, even as the United States and some Arab allies pressed both Israel and Hamas to restart peace talks.Between 60,000 and 70,000 people had fled by Thursday evening after the Israeli military ordered people in the city of Khan Younis to leave, according to UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees. More continued to flee into the night and into Friday.The Israeli military said its troops were “engaged in combat both above and below-ground” in the Khan Younis area, in an attack involving ground troops, fighter jets, helicopter gunships and paratroopers, and that the air force had struck more than 30 targets. The assault, the military said, was “part of the effort to degrade” Hamas’ capabilities “as they attempt to regroup.”Under a blazing sun, women carrying babies and blankets, men pushing carts and wheelchairs over sandy roads and young children carrying suitcases and backpacks have walked away from homes and shelters and toward unknown destinations. Some were in tears.“People are sleeping in the streets. Children and women are on the ground without mattresses,” Yafa Abu Aker, a resident of Khan Younis and an independent journalist, told The New York Times in a text message.“Death is better,” an older woman said on Thursday, in video from the Reuters news agency. “We’re fed up. We’ve already died. We’re dead.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Uncommitted voters respond to Harris-Walz ticket with hope and reservations

    Leaders of the “uncommitted” campaign spoke with Kamala Harris and her newly announced running mate, the Minnesota governor, Tim Walz, before a rally in Detroit on Wednesday to discuss their calls for a ceasefire in Gaza and an arms embargo on Israel.Harris “shared her sympathies and expressed an openness to a meeting with the Uncommitted leaders to discuss an arms embargo”, the organization said in a statement.But a Harris aide said on Thursday that while the vice-president did say she wanted to engage more with members of the Muslim and Palestinian communities about the Israel-Gaza war, she did not agree to discuss an arms embargo, according to Reuters.Phil Gordon, Harris’s national security adviser, also said on Twitter/X that the vice-president did not support an embargo on Israel but “will continue to work to protect civilians in Gaza and to uphold international humanitarian law”. A spokesperson for Harris’s campaign confirmed she does not support an arms embargo on Israel.The uncommitted movement, a protest vote against Joe Biden that started during the presidential primary season to send a message to the Democratic party about the US’s role in the Israel-Gaza conflict, began in Michigan and spread to several states. In Walz’s Minnesota, it captured 20% of the Democratic votes.Harris’s announcement of Walz as her running mate on Tuesday was met with celebration and even hope by many different parts of the Democratic electorate. But those in the uncommitted movement are still weighing their response, and hoping for a presidential campaign that will comprehensively address the mounting death toll in Gaza.“[Walz] is not someone who has been pro-Palestine in any way. That’s really important here. But he is also someone who’s shown a willingness to change on different issues,” said Asma Mohammed, the campaign manager for Vote Uncommitted Minnesota, and one of 35 delegates nationwide representing the uncommitted movement.Walz, a former schoolteacher, has been described by some as a progressive and open-minded candidate, who made school lunches free for children and enshrined reproductive rights such as abortion into law. He said he listened to his then-teenage daughter on gun reform and went from an A rating from the National Rifle Association to an F after championing gun control legislation.On Israel’s war in Gaza, Walz is considered by others, like Mohammed, to be a moderate, and it is not yet clear if that is another issue on which he is willing to change his position. In February, protesters gathered on Walz’s lawn to call on the governor to divest state funds from Israel, which he has not responded to.When he was serving as a congressman representing Minnesota’s first district, Walz traveled to Israel, the West Bank, Syria and Turkey on a diplomatic trip in 2009 and met with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. He also voted to allocate foreign aid to Israel and condemn a United Nations resolution declaring that Israeli settlements in the West Bank were illegal.But Walz has not been silent, or resistant, when it comes to the uncommitted platform. When addressing the Palestinian supporters who voted uncommitted in March, he told CNN: “The situation in Gaza is intolerable. And I think trying to find a solution, a lasting two-state solution, certainly the president’s move towards humanitarian aid and asking us to get to a ceasefire, that’s what they’re asking to be heard. And that’s what they should be doing.”He continued: “Their message is clear that they think this is an intolerable situation and that we can do more.”Elianne Farhat, a senior adviser for the Uncommitted national campaign and the executive director of Take Action Minnesota, said in a statement on Tuesday: “Governor Walz has demonstrated a remarkable ability to evolve as a public leader, uniting Democrats diverse coalition to achieve significant milestones for Minnesota families of all backgrounds.”Meanwhile, after a private meeting with Netanyahu during the Israeli leader’s visit to Washington in July, Harris also publicly echoed calls for a ceasefire and said she would not be silent about the high number of civilian deaths in Gaza – a move which seemed like a rhetorical departure from Biden.Harris said she told the Israeli prime minister she “will always ensure that Israel is able to defend itself, including from Iran and Iran-backed militias, such as Hamas and Hezbollah”, and added: “Israel has a right to defend itself, and how it does so matters.”Some of the uncommitted delegates and activists are also supporting Walz because they prefer him over Harris’s other top choice for running mate, Josh Shapiro, the Pennsylvania governor who took a more hardline stance on pro-Palestine protesters.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“I think the biggest issue there was that [Shapiro] became such a controversial figure that I think Kamala Harris probably saw him as a liability,” Mohammed, 32, said. “And Tim Walz, while, yes, is still supportive of Israel, didn’t have these very public scandals and very public support of Israel in the same way.”Now Mohammed and other uncommitted voters are pushing for representation at the Democratic national convention later this month in Chicago, hoping to be allotted time to speak about the violence committed against Palestinians in Gaza. But many who support the movement will face their November ballot with mixed emotions.Key Muslim groups have found overlap with uncommitted voters in their support for Palestinians, but have more forcefully thrown their weight behind Harris, including the Muslim Civic Coalition and the Black Muslim Leadership Council Fund.Salima Suswell, the founder and chief executive of the Black Muslim Leadership Council Fund, told NBC: “[Harris] has shown more sympathy towards the people of Gaza than both President Biden and former president Donald Trump.”Muslim Americans, like Suswell and Rolla Alaydi, voted overwhelmingly for Biden in 2020, a decision Alaydi said she now regretted and felt guilty about. But when Biden stepped aside and made way for Harris, Alaydi said she had “1% of hope”.“I’m really numb when it comes to the election,” Alaydi added. “I don’t know which direction to go. The only option I see is Harris, but if there’s someone way better tomorrow who says ‘this will end immediately’, I’ll go and vote for that person.”Alaydi, from California, said she was also “torn” in this election because nearly all of her family is in Gaza. Alaydi said she had just received news that her cousin was bombed for the second time by the IDF. One of his legs was amputated earlier. Alaydi’s niece, who has epilepsy, has been going without medication for months. Alaydi also said she had not heard from her brother since November, when he was taken captive by the IDF.“Inshallah, he will survive,” Alaydi, 44, said through tears. She said she can only hope the new administration, whoever it may be, will allow refugees from Gaza, such as her family, to enter the US.She plans on casting a ballot for the Harris-Walz ticket – for now – because she has “no other other option”. More

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    Cori Bush warns pro-Israel lobby ‘to be afraid’ after primary loss

    Representative Cori Bush has warned the pro-Israel lobby “to be afraid” after it poured millions of dollars into defeating the prominent member of the “Squad” of progressive Democrats in Tuesday’s primary election in St Louis.Bush said her loss to St Louis county prosecutor Wesley Bell after the hardline American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) targeted her for opposition to Israel’s attack on Gaza had freed her to openly challenge the powerful pressure group, which has vowed to spend $100m to influence US elections this year in favour of Israel.“They’re about to see this other Cori, this other side,” she told supporters. “Aipac, I’m coming to tear your kingdom down.”Bush, who will continue to serve in Congress until January, added: “All they did was radicalise me, so now they need to be afraid.”Bush did not say how she now intends to take on Aipac but critics of the lobby group, which has previously boasted of its ability to round up congressional support, have said that it should be obliged to register as an agent of a foreign government because it pushes Israel’s interests over those of the US.Aipac spent $8.5m to defeat Bush, mostly on negative advertising through its campaign financing arm, the United Democracy Project (UDP), in the second most expensive primary race in the US this year.Aipac celebrated Bell’s win, a second major victory after the UDP played a leading role in unseating New York representative Jamaal Bowman, another member of the Squad critical of Israel, with a tweet proclaiming: “Being pro-Israel is good policy and good politics.”But groups supporting Bush noted that, as in other congressional races targeted by pro-Israel groups, almost none of the campaign advertising by the UDP addressed the Gaza war or Bush’s call for a ceasefire. Instead, the UDP went after her on unrelated issues, particularly her voting record in Congress.Similarly, the UDP spent $15m to defeat Bowman in the most expensive primary in US history with a barrage of negative advertising that had little to do with his criticisms of Israel. Much of the UDP’s money comes from billionaires who fund hardline pro-Israel causes and Republicans in other races, including some who have given to Donald Trump’s campaign.Jews for Cori, a coalition of progressive Jewish organisations, blamed Bush’s loss on “Aipac’s interference” on behalf of Israel and the Republicans.“While Aipac targeted both Bowman and Bush because of their support for Palestinian human rights, the group did not highlight or even mention this issue in their smear campaigns. While Aipac will claim their positions are ‘good policy and good politics’ it is clear that they are well-aware that they are losing the battle for public opinion,” it said.Justice Democrats, which spent $1.8m on advertising in support of Bush, called her opponent “an empty suit for Aipac and its GOP mega-donors to advance their own interests”.The group’s director, Alexandra Rojas, argued that the huge spending by the pro-Israel lobby to defeat individual members of Congress is a sign of weakness.“As Aipac’s influence in Congress wanes and the rightwing network that props it up is exposed, Aipac has to spend historic amounts in Democratic elections to continue advancing their interests at the expense of the Democratic mainstream that overwhelmingly supports a ceasefire and an end to the genocide in Gaza,” she said.Still, if Aipac’s intent in targeting Bush and Bowman was to warn other members of Congress that there will be a price to pay for muscular criticism of Israeli government policies and adopting minority positions, such as opposition to the US’s considerable military aid to Israel, then the strategy may have the desired effect of encouraging other politicians to keep their criticisms of Israel to themselves out of fear of a challenge from a well financed opponent.But Aipac is known to intervene when their congressional foes are already vulnerable. A number of the group’s former targets – other “Squad” members known for their criticisms of Israel – have been spared the onslaught, insulated by their popularity within their districts.The UDP spent heavily to try and oust Pennsylvania congresswoman Summer Lee in the 2022 Democratic primaries. She won that race by less than 1% of the vote.This year, the lobby largely steered clear of Lee’s race despite the emergence of a pro-Israel challenger. Lee won the primary by a margin of more than 20 points.Similarly, a challenger backed by substantial pro-Israel money came close to unseating Ilhan Omar, another Squad member who has been accused of antisemitism over criticisms of Israel, in the 2022 primaries. Omar is again facing a challenge from the same opponent, Don Samuels, in next week’s Democratic primary, but Aipac and similar groups have not thrown as much money or effort into this year’s race. Opinion polls give Omar a substantial lead.The UDP focused its efforts this year on Bush and Bowman, who were vulnerable to attack on issues other than Israel and Gaza, which many voters agree with them on. Both members of Congress struggled to justify voting against Joe Biden’s trillion-dollar infrastructure bill – a primary line of attack of negative advertising.The redrawing of the boundaries of Bowman’s district reshaped it as a more traditionally Democratic constituency with less voter support for the Squad and progressive policies. Bowman was also open to criticism over an incident when he pulled a fire alarm at the Capitol in Washington DC in order to delay a vote on a government shutdown called by Republicans. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanour over the incident. More

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    US support for Israel is collapsing. And Aipac knows it | Yousef Munayyer

    On Tuesday night, Representative Cori Bush lost in a Democratic primary election to challenger Wesley Bell, whose election campaign was overwhelmingly financed by pro-Israel groups such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac). According the New York Times, the spending by pro-Israel groups “transformed the race into one of the most expensive House primaries in history”. While Bush, an outspoken opponent of Israel’s crimes against Palestinians, is on her way out of Congress because of Aipac’s big spending, the victory for Israel donors is the latest sign of their cause’s decline in the United States and especially in the Democratic party.How could it be that such a powerful flex by pro-Israel donors is a reflection of a weakening cause? It’s simple: it is because such power flexes were never needed before. Now, it has become routine. Recently, Aipac and company spent huge sums to defeat Jamal Bowman in a primary as well. They made similar efforts against Representative Summer Lee, though she was able to survive the onslaught.In the immediate short term, it seems like a reflection of power, but anyone who has been following the politics around this issue in the United States for years knows this is anything but. Pro-Israel interest groups never had to overtly and heavily interject themselves into electoral politics in such a way previously precisely because their cause enjoy a great degree of cultural hegemony. In the US, politicians kissed babies, petted dogs, loved baseball and unequivocally supported Israel. That last part isn’t quite what it used to be. The consensus around supporting Israel, especially in the Democratic party, has collapsed.Over the last two decades, we have seen quite a remarkable shift in opinion on this issue among Democrats in particular. Numerous public opinion polls all provide evidence of the same trend. Democrats especially, but also independents, have grown less sympathetic to Israel over time. A Pew poll from March 2023 found that for the first time, Democrats had more sympathy for Palestinians than Israelis. Importantly, if you look at the charts, the beginning of a clear and steady nose dive that would continue for the next decade is between 2014 and 2015. What happened then? Israel’s horrific month-and-a-half-long war on Gaza which destroyed swaths of civilian infrastructure and killed about 1,500 civilians, most of whom were women and children, is what happened. The barbarity displayed by the Israeli military and the havoc wreaked on Gaza led many Americans to turn away in dismay and ask why their government continues to fund the Israeli military.But as horrific as Israel’s war on Gaza in 2014 was and as clear a turning point in the polls as it turned out to be, its impact will probably pale in comparison with the impact of the genocidal war Israel has been carrying out in Gaza for the last 10 months. This campaign of mass atrocities has gone on for nearly seven times as long as the war in 2014 and killed a far, far greater number of Palestinians in the process with some estimates of more than 186,000 dead. Indeed, polls have already shown that most Democrats believe Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. That is the consensus that is increasingly shared across the world with dozens of states, including Brazil, Spain, Slovenia, Mexico and many more joining South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the international court of justice.Not only is this war so much more destructive than that of 2014, but it has consequently meant that far more imagery of the sadism of Israeli troops committing war crimes in Gaza, often posted by the troops themselves, have riffled around the world on TikTok, Instagram and other social media sites, giving people everywhere a chance to bear witness to their brutality. We saw what the decade after 2014 looked like for public opinion on Israel – can you imagine what the next decade will look like after these horrors? Aipac can, and that is precisely why they are terrified. They are attempting to plug a hole in the proverbial dyke with millions in campaign donations, but their problem isn’t akin to a leak, it is a rising tide of anger and disgust over Israeli crimes that will shape a generation to come.The support for Israel once enjoyed in the US, when people took it to be as normal as the sun rising every day, is gone. Maintaining what support is left will require persuasion – which isn’t easy given they are trying to persuade audiences to support war crimes – and increasingly coercion. That era of coercion and repression is what we are quickly transitioning to and will shape the years to come, but that too comes with reputational costs for pro-Israel forces and will eventually collapse as well. When it does, voices like Cori Bush’s will be commonplace in our political class and she will be remembered for valiantly standing up for the rights of Palestinians when too many still did not have the political courage to do so.

    Yousef Munayyer is head of the Palestine/Israel program at the Arab Center Washington DC More

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    Bob Woodward to Publish ‘War’ This Fall

    Woodward, an author and journalist, has written more than 20 best selling books. His latest will focus on Ukraine, the Middle East, and the battle for the U.S. presidency.The author and journalist Bob Woodward will publish a new book this fall called “War,” his publisher, Simon & Schuster, announced on Wednesday. The book, which will be released on Oct. 15, will focus on Ukraine, the Middle East and the “raw cage-fight of politics” of the 2024 election.“For more than 50 years, Woodward has done groundbreaking reporting on every president, starting with Richard Nixon,” Jonathan Karp, the chief executive of Simon & Schuster and Woodward’s editor, said in a statement. “His work on the power of the presidency is unrivaled. With ‘War,’ Woodward illustrates the dramatic contrast he sees between Donald Trump and his opponents for the presidency — Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, making this a must-read before heading to the polls.”Simon & Schuster said Woodward’s new book would offer a behind the scenes look at President Biden’s efforts to manage the war in Ukraine and contain the conflict between Israel and Hamas in the Middle East, trying to deter the use of nuclear weapons and avoid “a rapid slide into World War III.”Woodward, an associate editor at The Washington Post, has been part of that newsroom for more than 50 years. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes, the first for his coverage of Watergate and the second for coverage of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.Woodward has written more than 20 best selling books, according to the publisher; 15 of them have been No. 1 New York Times best sellers. More

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    Cori Bush loses primary after pro-Israel groups spend millions to oust ‘Squad’ member

    A prominent member of the progressive “Squad” in Congress, Cori Bush, has lost her Democratic primary in St Louis after pro-Israel pressure groups spent millions of dollars to unseat her over criticisms of Israel’s war on Gaza.St Louis prosecutor Wesley Bell defeated Missouri’s first Black female member of Congress with about 51% of the vote. Bush took about 46%.Bell’s win marks a second major victory for the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) after it played a leading role in unseating New York congressman Jamaal Bowman, another progressive Democrat who criticised the scale of Palestinian civilians deaths in Gaza, in a June primary.Aipac pumped $8.5m into the race in Missouri’s first congressional district to support Bell through its campaign funding arm, the United Democracy Project (UDP), after Bush angered some pro-Israel groups as one of the first members of Congress to call for a ceasefire after the 7 October Hamas attack on Israel.Much of the UDP’s money comes from billionaires who fund hardline pro-Israel causes and Republicans in other races, including some who have given to Donald Trump’s campaign.Bush condemned Hamas for the killing of 1,139 people, mostly Israelis, and for abducting hundreds of others in October. But she also infuriated some Jewish and pro-Israel groups by describing Israel’s subsequent attack on Gaza and large scale killing of civilians as “collective punishment against Palestinians” and a war crime.During the campaign, the UDP flooded St Louis with advertising hostile to Bush – although, as in other congressional races targeted by pro-Israel groups, it rarely mentioned the war on Gaza that has claimed nearly 40,000 Palestinian lives, mostly civilians, or her call for a ceasefire.Instead, the campaign focused on Bush’s voting record in Congress, particularly her failure to support Joe Biden’s trillion-dollar infrastructure bill in 2021 and her support for the “defund the police” campaign. Bush struggled to get her message across that the UDP is misrepresenting both situations.The UDP accounted for more than half of all the money spent on the race outside the campaigns themselves.Bell has denied being recruited by pro-Israel groups to run against Bush, but suspicion lingered after he abandoned a challenge for the US Senate and entered the congressional race not long after Jewish organisations in St Louis began to seek a candidate to take on Bush after accusing her of “intentionally fuelling antisemitism”.Bell is expected to win what is one of the safest Democratic congressional seats in November’s general election. More

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    Can Harris Win Back Arab American Voters? The Door May Be Cracked Open.

    Vice President Kamala Harris has not strayed from President Biden on Israel policy, but she has taken a stronger tone on the suffering of Palestinians.In Muna Jondy’s family, every topic is fair game on the WhatsApp thread.The 40-person chat, which includes Ms. Jondy’s brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews, discusses everything: the Drake and Kendrick Lamar rivalry, Ohio State-Michigan football superiority and, of course, politics.The discussion of President Biden’s re-election campaign was a common theme this year as the administration’s support for Israel in the war in Gaza alienated many Muslim and Arab American families, including the Jondys.But the mood shifted when Mr. Biden dropped out of the race and Vice President Kamala Harris became the presumptive Democratic nominee. The family took notice last week when Ms. Harris said she would not look away from images of dead children or be silent about the tragedies in Gaza.“Am I crazy or is this way more than Biden ever was willing to say?” Ms. Jondy’s niece messaged the group. Others in the chat were more skeptical: “Would be nice, but unless I see an explicit change in policy I won’t believe it.”The WhatsApp chat is typical of the conversations happening among Arab Americans across the country who turned away from Mr. Biden over the war in Gaza, which has killed more than 36,000 people over the past 10 months. In crucial battleground states like Michigan, where Ms. Jondy’s family lives, many people who voted for Mr. Biden in 2020 said they felt betrayed and joined protest movements that challenged his campaign.Ms. Harris may have an opportunity to change the conversation. While she has not strayed from Mr. Biden on Israel policy since she began her own campaign for the presidency, she has struck a stronger tone on the suffering of Palestinians.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More