Idaho Young Democrats push back on lawmaker’s Israel trip. Is the party divided?
Published at | Updated at
Sarah Cutler, Idaho Statesman
BOISE (Idaho Statesman) — Idaho Rep. Ilana Rubel didn’t anticipate much backlash over a September trip to Israel, she told the Idaho Statesman.
When she was invited by the country’s foreign ministry to join the state-sponsored trip, Rubel, a Boise Democrat and the House minority leader, sought assurance that the Israeli government wouldn’t represent her attendance as an endorsement of the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or its war in Gaza, she wrote in a Statesman op-ed.
But when photos from the trip, where Rubel joined four Republican Idaho lawmakers, showed up online, young liberals in the state voiced outrage.
“We strongly disagree” with Rubel’s choice to participate in the trip, the Idaho Young Democrats said in a statement on their Facebook page. A separate letter signed by about 150 people identifying themselves as Idaho Democrats expressed “extreme disappointment and disgust” with Rubel’s involvement and called for her resignation from her position in the Legislature.
“At a time when Palestinians are facing violence and a disturbing humanitarian crisis — a genocide, her participation in this trip sends the wrong message,” Idaho Young Democrats wrote in its statement on Facebook.
The Republican lawmakers on the trip, including Rep. Barbara Ehardt, R-Idaho Falls; Rep. John Shirts, R-Weiser; Rep. Bruce Skaug, R-Nampa and Josh Tanner, R-Eagle, faced no such public backlash over the trip.
Jaclyn Kettler, a professor of political science at Boise State University, said the pushback reflected a nationwide generational divide in public opinion over Israel and Palestine. In 2025, Pew Research Center found that negative views of Israel rose in the U.S., with higher rates of negative views among Democrats and people under 50. Republicans are much less likely than Democrats to express unfavorable views of Israel, Pew found.
The question remains whether the issue will hold weight with voters, Kettler said, especially in state and local elections.
“If it’s not a top priority, that difference may not come to play very often within state party politics,” she said. “The question is, OK, is it just a disagreement that happens here and there, or are we seeing this play out in more substantive ways as well, beyond just criticism of the party or elected officials?”
Leaders in the state party and Young Democrats both said they didn’t see a division within the party on Israel’s actions in Gaza. But some Democratic elected officials acknowledged that younger generations view the conflict differently. And a 2024 state Democratic Party resolution calling for a ceasefire acknowledged pressure from younger members of the party.
“Dozens of young, Idaho Democratic voters and leaders have called upon the Idaho Democratic Party to call for a ceasefire and stand against the indiscriminate killing, displacement and denial of basic resources to civilians,” it read.
“It’s a disagreement, absolutely, within our party, within our state, and I really think generational,” said Rep. Megan Egbert, a Boise Democrat. “I think that is what we’re seeing, that a younger generation has a lot less tolerance for what is happening in Gaza and doesn’t want to support it in any sort of way.”
Rubel, who is Jewish and the descendant of refugees from the Holocaust, said her background played some role in her desire to participate in the trip. She said she wanted to express her concern over the death toll in Gaza — both for its own sake, and out of concern that Israel’s actions in Gaza are costing it international support.
“Israel was basically founded to be a place where Holocaust survivors could go and where Jews can always be safe and free from persecution in the future,” she said. “But I’m concerned at the rate we’re going, there’s not going to be an Israel in five years, unless it can find a way to win the hearts and minds of the world back.”
Rubel said she thought that her disagreement with those who pushed back against her participation in the trip was a small one.
“It’s ironic that I was hoping to convey the message that I think is very consistent with the message that those who wrote this letter wanted to send,” she told the Statesman by phone. “They’re just mad that I delivered it in person instead of boycotting from afar.”
Rubel said she received mostly positive feedback from constituents about the trip, and that the backlash came from a small minority. Of the 18 emails she received from constituents — which she shared with the Statesman upon request — only two criticized her trip.
Generational divide on Israel and Palestine narrows
At the national level, generational divides over Israel and Palestine are longstanding, Pew found, but have narrowed in recent years as older Democrats adopt increasingly negative views of the Israeli government. From 2022 to 2025, negative views spiked among Democrats over 50, from about 40% to 65%.
In the last few weeks alone, the Economist described “how Israel is losing America,” while Politico warned that “an entire generation of Americans is turning on Israel.” A Times/Siena poll found that Americans’ support for Israel had “dramatically” declined.
Eve Devitt, an organizer for trans rights who signed the letter calling for Rubel’s resignation, said she had observed the gap narrowing in recent years.
“I feel as if, certainly, there used to be more of a generational divide,” she said. “And I’m sure there still is, but it’s definitely closing in.”
Kettler attributed some of the generational divide to differences in historical memory: Older Americans may be more likely to think of Israel’s origins in the aftermath of the Holocaust and have more sympathy for its actions. Many young people, in contrast, have more exposure to Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Younger people are also less likely to have an “ingrained memory” of the U.S. alliance with Israel, Egbert said. And while Americans’ support for Israel was high after Hamas’s attack on Oct. 7, 2023, which killed about 1,200 Israelis, it has waned amid the reaction to Israel’s response, which has been “not at all proportional,” she said.
Israel’s current war against Hamas in Gaza started after Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas fighters attacked Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking hundreds hostage. In the nearly two years since, the Israeli military has killed tens of thousands of people in Gaza, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. More than 18,000 Palestinian children have been killed since the war began, according to a United Nations report.
To some young liberals in the state, Rubel’s decision to visit Israel on a trip sponsored by its government is “giving cover to really bad things,” said Alicia Abbott, a Sandpoint community organizer who has worked for a variety of progressive causes.
A United Nations commission on Sept. 16 found that Israel committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. It found that the Israeli military had targeted Palestinian civilians, including children. By blocking access to humanitarian aid and medical facilities, Israel had inflicted conditions calculated to destroy the population in Gaza, according to the report.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry rejected the report, calling it “distorted and false.”
Many Idaho liberals of all ages were especially affronted by the fact that the Israeli government paid for the lawmakers’ travel, said Olivia Luna, the president of Idaho’s Babe Vote, who signed the letter as an individual calling for Rubel’s resignation.
Rubel told the Statesman it was standard practice for conference hosts, including other countries’ governments, to cover attendees’ costs. Given state lawmakers’ low salaries, it’s a way for organizers to ensure the lawmakers can attend, she said.
Rep. Chris Mathias, a Boise Democrat, said the Democratic caucus in the Legislature had not formally discussed its members’ positions on Israel. But for him, Democrats’ disagreement over Israel “is not a concern,” he said.
“At least those of us in my caucus, we disagree on all kinds of things,” he said. “It’s not distracting us from addressing issues here in Idaho.”