Did Josh Riley Visit Israel To Meet Netanyahu During The Genocide and Famine Of Gaza?
Josh Riley has allied himself with AIPAC, a right wing pro-Israel lobbying organization. AIPAIC is flying freshman members of Congress on an all-expenses-paid trip to Israel to meet Prime Minister Netanyahu.
Is Congressman Josh Riley on that trip?
Podcast Transcript:
A few days ago, I noted the conspicuous absence of Congressman Josh Riley in New York’s 19th congressional district during the August recess. The August recess is traditionally a time for members of Congress to meet with constituents, to hear their concerns so that they can be represented in Washington DC. Nonetheless, Josh Riley’s event calendar shows zero public events for the month of August - not even any opportunities for constituents to meet with Riley’s congressional aides.
The question nagged in my mind: If Josh Riley isn’t meeting with his constituents, where is he, and who is he meeting with? After a weekend of investigation, a sinister possibility has emerged: Josh Riley may have taken time away from his own constituents in order to fly to Israel to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu.
I want to state a clear reminder, here at the beginning of this episode, that the situation in Israel and Palestine is complex. We should know better than to cast the conflict there in simple terms of good guys versus bad guys. That’s how children think. This episode is going to focus on some truly horrific things being done by the government of Israel against the people of Gaza, but it should not be construed as a statement that everyone in Israel is a terrible human being. There are many extremely decent Israelis who oppose what the corrupt cruel government of Benjamin Netanyahu is doing. Nor should anyone interpret what I’m stating as a celebration of Hamas, which has committed its own insane acts of terror against Israelis and has been ruthless in its willingness to subject the people of Gaza to violence and deprivation to further its own small-minded pursuit of power. The fact that Israel is conducting genocide against Gaza does not transform everyone in Gaza into a transcendent innocent.
I also want to remind listeners that antisemitism is a centuries-old threat to social safety that was associated with tyrants long before Adolph Hitler and the Nazis exploited it for their own right wing insanity. Opponents of Donald Trump should remind themselves that he has surrounded himself with people who openly celebrate Hitler and the Third Reich, including Christian Nationalists who call for a new extermination of Jews. Here in Ithaca, not long after Hamas killed, captured, and tortured a huge number of Israelis, unabashed antisemitism began to appear among a small but loud segment of activists centered around Cornell University, where one student threatened to kill Jewish students, and even to slaughter their babies.
I have witnessed firsthand pro-Palestinian activists in Ithaca chant “from the river to the sea,” knowing how that slogan has been used as call for eradication of Jews from the Levant. I will never forget the time I walked past a protest on the Commons that claimed to demand a cease fire, but included chants of “No justice, no peace!” How anyone can fail to see the violent incoherence of such activism is beyond me.
On the other hand, those who try to use the shortcomings of pro-Palestinian activists as a justification for the actions of Israel against Gaza are cynical and sadistic. Politics is not a team sport that needs our partisan fandom. Just as the moral failures of one side in the conflict between Israel and Gaza to not make the other side more noble, the blunders of Americans who have chosen one side in the nationalistic bloodbath do not make geniuses of the other side.
This is a podcast about the political activities of U.S. Representative Josh Riley, and so, I’m going to be focusing on Josh Riley’s part in the atrocities in Israel and Gaza. As Americans, we need to think about role of our own country’s federal government in the violence. US policy on Israel and Gaza has been a failure for decades, and that failure has been founded upon the commitment of massive amounts of American money and weaponry without regard to the sadistic purposes to which they have been applied.
This year, Donald Trump called for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza to create a seaside resort of Israelis. Congressman Josh Riley said nothing, and did nothing, in response. Last week, Netanyahu’s government declared its intention of implementing a version of Donald Trump’s plan, and once again, Josh Riley has not spoken one word of objection to these plans.
In fact, there are some strong clues suggesting that Congressman Josh Riley was part of a group of freshman House Democrats who traveled to Ithaca last week to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. If Josh Riley went on this trip, he didn’t pay a dime of his own money to do so. The trip was a gift from AIPAC, a lobbying and fundraising group affiliated with the government of Israel. AIPAC has paid for the transportation, meals, and lavish accommodations in luxury hotels for members of Congress, a gift that in any decent circumstance would be understood as a bribe.
Consider these facts:
On August 6, Punchbowl News reported: “Roughly 20 Democrats will travel to Israel today led by House Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar and Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.)” According to the article, “These trips are sponsored by AIPAC, the powerful pro-Israel organization.” AIPAC describes itself as the “a political tool to further demonstrate the pro-Israel community’s support for pro-Israel members of Congress”.
An important additional detail comes from a report by CNN a few days before, describing an “AIPAC-funded trip of House Democratic freshmen to Israel, this year led by Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer, the former House majority leader, and Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar of California, leaves later this week. The group is expected to meet with Netanyahu while there.”
There are thirty-three newly-elected Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives. Only six of those thirty-three freshman House Democrats are identified as allies by AIPAC. Josh Riley is one of those six.
AIPAC lists Josh Riley as one of its core allies among freshman US House Democrats, and it’s raising money for Josh Riley to spend in the 2026 congressional election (see the image below from AIPAC’s fundraising page).
During the time of the freshman Democrat trip to Israel to meet Netanyahu, Josh Riley has been nowhere to be seen in New York’s 19th congressional district, or anywhere else in the United States, while his office refuses to share his location.
Add it up, and it looks quite likely that Josh Riley traveled last week to Israel, on a trip fully paid for by a pro-Israel political action committee and has met with Prime Minister Netanyahu. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that the idea that Josh Riley, as one of only six new Democrats in the House of Representatives willing to publicly affiliate with AIPAC, the trip’s financial and organizational sponsor, was not a part of the trip, stretches credulity.
Of course, I don’t know for a fact that Congressman Josh Riley is on this trip to meet Netanyahu in Israel. Steny Hoyer, the leader of the Democratic trip to Israel, has refused to name the members of Congress who are participating, keeping their identities secret. It is possible that Josh Riley has been hiding somewhere else, avoiding his constituents in a place other than Israel, in spite of his concerted efforts to cultivate the support of the most hardcore supporters of Israel’s violence. I’m simply piecing the clues together, finding the most plausible explanation for Josh Riley’s failure to show up in his home district to meet with constituents. I could be wrong.
There is one easy way for Josh Riley to clear this question up. Josh Riley should tell his constituents whether he has been in Israel, and whether he has met with Netanyahu. If he has nothing to hide, it won’t hurt him to communicate his whereabouts with constituents. If Josh Riley went to Israel, and truly believes that sending American weapons to Israel to be used in attacking and starving the people of Gaza is a good idea, he ought to have the courage of his principles and admit it openly. If Josh Riley did not go to Israel, he doesn’t lose anything simply by saying that he didn’t go.
Unfortunately, Josh Riley has chosen not to be open with his constituents about his activities during the August recess. Riley has recently taken action to conceal his whereabouts from the public, directing his employees not to talk about where he has gone.
I can personally confirm that Congressman Josh Riley’s aides have been given instructions to not tell constituents where he has been traveling. I called his office in Washington DC this morning, and asked directly whether Josh Riley went to Israel last week with Steny Hoyer. The aide stated that for the sake of security, it is the office’s policy not to disclose Josh Riley’s location. When I pointed out that I wasn’t asking about Josh Riley’s present location, but only wanted to know where Riley was last week, the aide stated that “He is not in the district,” and then told me, “As much as I’d like to tell you, I can’t comment on the Congressman’s travel outside of the district.”
Here’s what Josh Riley’s August calendar of events looks like:
We know that Josh Riley was at an event in New York State organized by Senator Charles Schumer on August 5. That’s the day before the flight carried a group of pro-Israel freshman Democratic members of the US House to meet Netanyahu, however. Since the time of that flight, there is no trace of Josh Riley being present anywhere in the United States.
Josh Riley’s own aides say that he isn’t in New York’s 19th congressional district, at the very time that he’s supposed to be here, communicating with us, his own constituents. It’s a problem simply that Josh Riley isn’t here in the district working to help the voters he was elected to represent, but if he’s in Israel, talking with Benjamin Netanyahu instead, that’s a whole other level of trouble.
I don’t know for sure that Josh Riley has been in Israel with Netanyahu, but it’s a matter of public record that Josh Riley is allied with AIPAC. AIPAC is an organization that goes far beyond merely advocating for the preservation of the nation of Israel. AIPAC has consistently advocated for the US federal government to send billions of dollars of weapons to the Israeli government, to be used against Palestinians in Gaza and elsewhere. The progressive Action Network has noted that AIPAC is associated with extremist right wing ideology, writing that, “AIPAC is not only anti-Palestinian, but also anti-progressive and anti-democracy. It is out of alignment with the Democratic Party.”
Yet, Democrat US Representative Josh Riley has aligned himself with AIPAC, repeatedly voting on legislation in alignment with AIPAC’s demands. AIPAC writes of Josh Riley: “Josh Riley has been a supporter of the U.S.-Israel relationship. Riley backed a bill to sanction the International Criminal Court for its targeting of Israel. Riley also cosponsored the U.S.-Israel Defense Partnership Act.” AIPAC has established a specific fundraising portal for Josh Riley so that he can receive money from people who support Israel’s human rights atrocities in Gaza.
To make matters worse, while the group of congressional Democrats led by Steny Hoyer has been in Israel and met with Prime Minister Netanyahu, Netanyahu announced that Israel will completely take over all of Gaza through violent means. The travel of freshman members of the US Congress to meet with Netanyahu at the very time the Israeli Prime Minister declared his intentions makes it appear as if they agree with Israel’s new goal of a complete takeover of Gaza.
Congressman Josh Riley has made no public comment about Israel’s new plan for a complete occupation of Gaza. Neither has Riley made any comment about the mass starvation in Gaza imposed by force by the Israeli government. Riley has declined to criticize the Israeli government’s killing of Gazans waiting in line for food, and has said nothing about the Israeli government’s repeated violence against medical teams and journalists.
Josh Riley has refused to oppose widespread, ongoing human rights abuses by the Israeli government. In fact, at the beginning of his term in office, Josh Riley voted for Republican legislation to protect Benjamin Netanyahu by crippling the International Criminal Court. The legislation was created by American allies of Netanyahu, in coordination with AIPAC, in order to punish the Court for its attempt to prosecute Israeli officials for human rights abuses.
When I use the phrase “human rights abuses”, I know it sounds abstract. The reality of Israel’s human rights abuses, however, is specific and horrific. For example, while Americans were sleeping last night, the government of Israel purposefully targeted and killed five journalists in a bombing as punishment for their work reporting on Israel’s violence against Gaza. Two bystanders were also killed. Assassinating news reporters is not about security or antiterrorism. It’s simply a war crime.
A couple of weeks ago, United States Senator Bernie Sanders introduced a measure to stop the United States from sending advanced military weapons to Israel. Explaining his legislation, Sanders described what’s at stake in the matter of American support for Israel’s violence against Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
“Let me begin by stating what the debate we are going to have this evening is about and what it is not about. It is not about whether anyone in this Senate disagrees that Hamas is a terrorist organization which began this war with a brutal terrorist attack on October 7, 2023, that killed 1,200 innocent Israelis and took 250 hostages. Everyone agrees with that. The International Criminal Court was right to indict the leaders of Hamas as war criminals for those atrocities, and I think most of us agree with that. There is also, I believe, no disagreement as to whether or not Israel, like any other country similarly attacked, had a right to defend itself. Clearly, it did.
In a certain sense, this debate is not really about Israel; it is about the United States of America and whether we will abide by U.S. and international law or whether we will continue to contribute billions of dollars to an extremist government in Israel which has caused an unprecedented humanitarian disaster in Gaza. This debate is whether or not the United States of America will have any moral credibility on the international scene, whether or not we will be able, with a straight face, to condemn other countries who commit barbaric acts if we don't stand up tonight. That is what we are debating.
The vast majority of the American people and the world community understand that the Netanyahu government in Israel has gone well beyond defending itself from Hamas. Over the last twenty one months, it has waged an all out, illegal, immoral, and horrific war of annihilation against the Palestinian people. This war has already killed some 60,000 Palestinians and wounded more than 143,000, most of whom are women, children, and the elderly. In a population of just over two million people (that is all that there are in Gaza) more than 200,000 have been killed or wounded since this war began. That is 10 percent of the population of Gaza. Ten percent of the population of Gaza, in the last twenty one months, has either been killed or wounded.
To put that into scale so that we, as Americans, can understand the enormity of what is happening there, if that kind of destruction happened here in the United States, if 10 percent of our population were killed or wounded in a war, it would mean that thirty four million of us would have been killed or wounded. The toll on Gaza's children is unspeakable, and it is literally hard to imagine.
The United Nations reports that more than 18,000 children have been killed since this war began. Just this morning, the Washington Post published a list of all of these children's names. Mr. President, here is the list. These are the names of children published in the Washington Post today that have been killed by the Israeli military in Gaza. I should mention that more than 12,000 of these children were under the age of twelve and more than 3,000 children in Gaza have had one or more limbs amputated. That is how this war has impacted the children in Gaza. But it is not just the horrific loss of life that is taking place there. New satellite imagery shows that Israel's indiscriminate bombardment has destroyed 70 percent of all structures in Gaza. 70 percent of all buildings in Gaza have been destroyed. The U.N. estimates that 92 percent of housing units have been damaged or destroyed. Most of the population is now living in tents or other makeshift structures, and let us not forgot, over the last twenty one months, these people, most of whom are poor, have been displaced time and time again, told to go here, told to go there, told to go there, moved around, and often with no possessions other than the clothing on their backs.
The healthcare system in Gaza has been destroyed. Most of the territory's hospitals and primary care facilities have been bombed. More than 1,500 healthcare workers have been killed as well as 336 U.N. staff. Gaza's civilian infrastructure has been totally devastated, including almost 90 percent of water and sanitation facilities. Raw sewage now runs all over Gaza. Most of the roads have been destroyed. Gaza's educational system has been obliterated. Hundreds of schools have been bombed, and every single one of Gaza's twelve universities has also been bombed. I should mention there has been no electricity in Gaza for twenty one months. All of this is a horror unto itself, but in recent months, the Netanyahu government's extermination of Gaza has made an unspeakable and horrible situation even worse.
From March 2 to May 19, Israel did not allow a single shipment of humanitarian aid to come into Gaza - no food, no water, no fuel, and no medical supplies for a distressed population of two million people over a period of eleven weeks. Since then, Israel has allowed a trickle of aid to get into Gaza, but nowhere near enough to meet the enormous needs of a population besieged for so long. When you cut off all food to a population, what happens is not surprising. People starve to death, and that is exactly what Israeli policy has deliberately done. It is causing mass starvation and famine. Children and other vulnerable people are dying in increasing numbers. In the last two weeks, dozens of young children have died from starvation. Starving mothers cannot breastfeed their infants, and no formula is available and certainly no clean water to make it.”
According to a recent Gallup poll, only 8 percent of Democrats support Israel’s current campaign of violence against Gaza. What’s more, political independents are also overwhelmingly opposed to Israel’s actions. Only 25 percent of independents support Netanyahu’s campaign of terror.
92 percent of Democrats and 75 percent of independents understand that opposing Israel’s genocide against Gaza is not the same thing as supporting the brutal violence of Palestinian militants in organizations such as Hamas. A sane, mature foreign policy is able to grasp the idea that political violence should be opposed, no matter who commits it.
Josh Riley’s foreign policy is neither sane, not mature. Whether or not Josh Riley accepted the bribe from AIPAC of a free trip to Israel to meet with Benjamin Netanyahu, he has embraced the extremist violence of Netanyahu’s government, and the corruption of its lobbying affiliate here in the United States.
Josh Riley is far outside of the American mainstream on this issue. As with too many political issues, Josh Riley has chosen to stand with Donald Trump instead of with the people of Ithaca and New York’s 19th congressional district.
Just how much of this is the Tompkins County Democratic Committee willing to put up with?
