Two days after US President Joe Biden withdrew from the race and, in effect, ended his political career, his vice president, Kamala Harris, emerged as the first candidate for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, especially since Biden immediately supported her.

When reviewing Harris' record of positions regarding Israel, we find that she has been a strong supporter of Israel for many years. In 2017, she addressed the annual conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the powerful Israel lobby, and reminded the audience that the first resolution she co-sponsored as a senator was aimed at combating “anti-Israel bias” at the United Nations.

She said at that conference: “Let me be clear about what I believe in. I stand with Israel because of our shared values, which are very fundamental to the founding of our two countries,” according to the American “Mondowise” website.

In 2018, she gave an informal speech to the same organization, telling the gathering that she had raised money for the Jewish National Fund as a Boy Scout.

“Having grown up in the San Francisco Bay Area, I fondly remember carrying the JNF boxes that we used to collect donations to plant trees in Israel,” she told the audience. “Years later, when I visited Israel for the first time, I saw the fruits of that effort and ingenuity.” "Israelism that made the desert truly flourish."

She later added: “The vast majority of people recognize the importance of the State of Israel, both in terms of its history and its present; in terms of it being an inspiration on many of the issues, which I hope we can talk about, and also what it means in terms of the values of the United States and those values that “They are the values we share with Israel, and the importance of fighting to make sure that we protect and respect a friend, one of the best friends we can have.”

During her run for president in 2019, the lobby group Democracy for Israel (DMFI) praised Harris for being to the right of Obama on the Iran deal.

During the 2019-2020 election campaign, Harris announced that she would rejoin the agreement but would “strengthen it” by “extending sunset provisions, including ballistic missile testing, as well as increasing oversight.”

Harris also condemned the BDS movement and claimed that the movement "is based on the false assumption that Israel is solely responsible for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." However, she voted against an anti-boycott of Israel bill in 2019, citing First Amendment concerns.

After the Hamas attack on October 7, Harris publicly declared that Israel has the right to defend itself.

“Let me be very clear, as I said before: We cannot confuse Hamas with the Palestinian people,” she told reporters. "Hamas is a brutal terrorist organization. Hamas has vowed to repeat October 7 until Israel is eliminated. No country can live with such a threat, which is why we support Israel's legitimate military goals to eliminate the Hamas threat."

Last June, it hosted a screening of Sheryl Sandberg's documentary Screams Before Silence, which was promoted as a "documentary about sexual violence committed by Hamas." On October 7, the film was criticized for relying on information from the ZAKA group. “Israelis are not credible.

“We cannot look away and we will not be silent,” Harris said at the event. “My heart breaks for all these survivors and their families and for all the pain and suffering over the past eight months in Israel and Gaza.”

According to Mondowise, many expect Harris to largely continue Biden's foreign policy. “In practice, we can expect Republicans’ public agenda to be an explicit statement of their racism, while Democrats will be less explicit,” Mitchell Plitnick, a researcher at the site, wrote shortly before Biden’s announcement. “On the ground, there is good reason to believe that Democrats will want to continue the two-state illusion, while Republicans will encourage Israel to kill it once and for all through annexation.”

As much as there may be political differences, some pointed to recent comments Harris made regarding the assault.

In a speech in March, Harris called for a six-week “temporary ceasefire,” the first member of the administration to mention such a move. The Israeli government has also repeatedly called for more efforts to ensure the delivery of humanitarian aid.

In a recent interview with The Nation, Harris expressed sympathy for the campus protesters over Love on Gaza, saying that while she did not "fully endorse their points," she thought they "show exactly what should be done." It is humanitarian sentiment, in response to Gaza.”, although she was quick to point out that she did not “endorse their points wholesale.”

The foreign policy team around Harris is also viewed as more progressive on foreign policy than Biden's team.

Its national security adviser is Phil Gordon, who helped push for the Iran deal when he worked in the Obama administration.

“I think she (Nares) is on the progressive wing of the national security spectrum,” Mark Dubowitz, CEO of the neoconservative Foundation for Defense of Democracies (an arm of the Israel lobby), told Jewish Insider in 2023. “It's the revival of Obama.”

Noncommittal National Movement leader, Leila al-Abd (of Palestinian origin), and other progressive organizers have already issued statements calling on Harris to embrace a policy shift.

Al-Abd said: “For months, we warned that Biden’s support for the Israeli attack on Gaza would harm his (Biden’s) election chances.” “Now, it is important that Vice President Harris takes a clear stand against the weapons used in Israel’s war and occupation against the Palestinians. Providing weapons to the Netanyahu regime makes a mockery of Democrats’ claims to fight the tyranny of Trump’s right-wing MAGA movement.”

“It is time to align our actions with our values,” she added. “Vice President Harris can begin the process to restore trust by turning the page on Biden’s horrific Gaza policies.”