California Gov. Gavin Newsom is under fire from leftists for backtracking on his suggestion made earlier this month that Israel is an “apartheid state.”
Appearing at an event on March 3, Newsom referred to Israel as “sort of an apartheid state” while speaking about the criticism others, including columnist Thomas Friedman, have had about the nation.
“Friedman and others are talking about it appropriately, sort of an apartheid state,” Newsom said.
⚠️@GavinNewsom After blood libel claiming Israel bombed Iranian kids, you double down on hate: Israel is ‘sort of an apartheid state’ & you’ll cut military support: ‘I don’t think you have a choice.’
After insulting Blacks, now Jews. White supremacist? pic.twitter.com/VYax6dE9Gg
— Houman David Hemmati, MD, PhD (@houmanhemmati) March 4, 2026
Newsom eventually backtracked during a discussion earlier this week with Politico’s Jonathan Martin.
“Do you consider yourself a Zionist?” the discussion began with Martin asking.
“I revere the state of Israel,” Newsom replied. “I’m proud to support the state of Israel. I deeply, deeply oppose Bibi Netanyahu’s leadership, his opposition to the two-state solution, and deeply oppose how he is indulging the far right as it relates to what’s going on in the West Bank.”
Martin then asked him whether he regretted his prior use of the word “apartheid” to describe Israel.
Newsom backtracked by focusing on the fact that it was Friedman who’d called Israel an “apartheid state.”
“I used it, I do in this context, that I said it and I referenced why I used it, a Tom Friedman article in that same sentence, where Tom used it in the context of the direction that Bibi is going,” he said. “And that is a legitimate concern I have that I share with Tom, that direction.”
Gavin Newsom clarifies he is a “proud Zionist” who “reveres Israel.”
He said he “regrets” calling Israel an “apartheid state”, only meaning to describe Netanyahu’s leadership.
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— AF Post (@AFpost) March 24, 2026
This tiny bit of backtracking was enough to trigger the rage of leftist, so-called “progressive” commentators Jennifer Welch and Kyle Kulinski.
Speaking on Welch’s podcast this Wednesday, the discussion between the two began with Welch throwing up her hands in anger and frustration in response to listening to Newsom backtrack.
“I’ve heard enough,” she said. “Why are we in this world where you cannot say a fact — that Israel is an apartheid state? Why do we have Democrats that are denying facts in the same way that MAGA does?”
Kulinski responded by pointing to Israeli lobbyists.
“The main reason is the Israel lobby, right?” he said. “That has a stranglehold on the Democratic party in the same way that obviously the entire Republican party is too far gone on this stuff and totally bought by the Israel lobby.”
“And what Newsom is doing there is called the one bad man theory of politics. You know how there’s, like, the one great man theory of politics? It’s the one bad man theory, where they go, look, if we just get rid of Benjamin Netanyahu, everything would be phenomenal with Israel.
But the problem with that is it’s total BS.”
Kulinski continued by basically arguing that all of Israel is bad, including the opposition party, for supporting the now-concluded war in Gaza and the now-ongoing war in Iran.
“It is genuinely a problem with Israeli society,” he said. “I just saw a poll earlier today. Up to 95 percent of Israelis support this illegal and offensive war on Iran, whereas here in the U.S., the average is about 35 percent of people in this country support that stupid war.”
“So we have a real problem here. And we do ourselves no favors by not like accurately describing it,” he concluded.
(Video Credit: IHIP News)
Kulinski later predicted that Newsom is committing “political suicide” by cozying up to Israel instead of throwing it under the bus.
“OK, so at this point, it’s just political suicide to try to still split the difference and somehow take, like, this middle path to the issue of Israel,” he insisted. “Read the room, like the Democratic base. I’ve seen polls anywhere from three percent to a maximum of 15 percent of our base actually supports Israel.”
“And you think you’re going to be the nominee doing this sort of chicken shit nonsense!? There’s no way that’s going to work!” he added.
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V. Saxena is a staff writer with a decade of experience as a professional writer, and a lifetime of experience as an avid news junkie. He holds a degree in computer technology from Purdue University. Saxena also contributes to BizPac Review.
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