Nothing says "I should be president" quite like getting your minibus surrounded by armed settlers in the West Bank for an hour and a half. U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna, the California Democrat who represents Silicon Valley, is now strongly considering a 2028 presidential run after a trip to the West Bank that went sideways in a hurry, as Trending Politics reported.
Here is how the story goes. Khanna and his congressional delegation were visiting the ruins of a Palestinian hamlet called Khirbet Zanuta in the southern West Bank on July 8 when armed Israeli settlers rolled up, blocked the road with vehicles, and surrounded their van. The settlers were carrying American-made M4 rifles, which is a fun detail when you are an American congressman sitting in the van they are surrounding.
"We were at a village that Israeli settlers had destroyed, they had destroyed the school, they had destroyed that village, and we were just looking at it. And these hoodlums come in with machine guns, M4, an American-made machine gun, and they detain us," Khanna told Reuters. "They block off the road. And then they call the IDF and the IDF is on their side, not on the side of the Americans."
According to the New York Times, the settlers also taunted the group, swore at them in Hebrew and Arabic, and kicked the tires of their minibus, because apparently intimidation with assault rifles was not enough and they needed to throw in some tire kicking for good measure. When two Israeli military vehicles showed up, Khanna says the soldiers initially chatted with the settlers and one even moved a vehicle to further block the road. Really rolling out the red carpet for a sitting member of Congress.
The whole ordeal lasted about 90 minutes before Israeli police and the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem got involved and freed the group. An aide had called the embassy during the standoff.
Khanna added that he is "certainly probably the first American politician who's been detained by the IDF and Israeli settlers." That is a campaign talking point you do not hear every cycle.
"If they will do this to an American congressman, imagine what is happening to Palestinian families who are just trying to live," Khanna said. He also stated he expects Israel to prosecute the settlers and any IDF soldiers involved, which is the kind of expectation that could age like milk in the sun.
The Israeli military confirmed troops and police responded to a report of settlers blocking vehicles and said they dispersed the civilians and let the vehicles continue. A slightly more sanitized version of the story, but sure.
As for the presidential ambitions, Khanna told Reuters the trip sealed his thinking. "I'm strongly considering it and I'm more resolved to consider it after this trip," he said. He has framed Israel's conduct toward Palestinians as a "moral test" for Democrats, saying that being unwilling to speak up would leave a person "morally compromised."
So to recap: Khanna went to the West Bank, got detained by settlers with American weapons while the military allegedly sided with the detainers, and came home ready to run for president. Most people would come home ready to sit on the couch for a week, but politicians are built different.
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