What Kamala Harris says about Israel, Gaza and Palestinians in her new book
In ‘107 Days,’ Harris recounts a clash with Netanyahu, struggles to address Palestinian suffering and why she passed over Josh Shapiro as vice president
Vice President Kamala Harris and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrive for a meeting in the Vice President’s ceremonial office on July 25, 2024. Photo by Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images
By Jacob Kornbluh September 22, 2025
Kamala Harris says Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu undermined President Joe Biden during the war in Gaza in hopes that Donald Trump would return to the White House and ensure his political survival.
In 107 Days, the former vice president’s campaign memoir scheduled for release on Tuesday and obtained by the Forward, Harris writes that Biden’s “loyalty” to Israel was brushed aside by the prime minister. Netanyahu wanted a president willing to embrace “very extreme proposals” for Gaza’s future. “He wanted Trump in the seat opposite him. Not Joe, not me,” she writes.
Harris describes a tense meeting with Netanyahu in July 2024 in which she forcefully pushed back against Netanyahu’s denial of a humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
“Netanyahu’s hooded gaze and disengaged demeanor made it clear to me that he was running out the clock,” she writes. In remarks to the media after the meeting, Harris called it “frank and constructive” yet criticized Israel’s execution of the war. In her book, Harris described it as “unproductive. ”
‘The war in Gaza is not a binary issue’
Harris, who became the Democratic nominee after Biden withdrew from the 2024 race, reflects in the book on how the Israel-Hamas conflict hurt Democrats with younger and more progressive voters.
The war loomed large in the campaign before Biden withdrew from the race. Anxious Democrats pressured Biden to “take a tougher stance on Israel” as one way to recover from his catastrophic debate performance in June 2024. Some pushed for an arms embargo to shift the campaign’s direction and appeal to disaffected progressives and Michigan voters who had cast “uncommitted” ballots in the primary.
Harris writes that Biden often appeared “inadequate and forced” when addressing Palestinian suffering, constrained by his passionate support for Israel.
Harris was more forceful in her call for an immediate ceasefire to address the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza.
“The war in Gaza is not a binary issue, but too often the conversation about it is,” Harris writes. “I wanted to acknowledge the complexity, nuance and history of the region, but it seemed very few people had the appetite for that or the willingness to hold two tragic narratives in their mind at the same time, to grieve for human suffering both Israeli and Palestinian.”
She lost Michigan, a swing state with a substantial Arab American community, by almost 2 points.
Harris recalls the protests that followed her onto the campaign trail and said she wondered why those demonstrators did not target Trump rallies with the same intensity.
“The issue was not binary, but the outcome of this election certainly was,” she writes, adding that she wished that they understood that “sitting out the election or voting for a third candidate would elect Trump and kill any effort for a just peace, any hope for a two-state solution.”
On August 4, the same day Harris interviewed her three finalists for vice president, Israel killed Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, prompting concern about possible Iranian retaliation — a reminder, she writes, of how intertwined foreign policy crises became with her campaign.
A conversation with Shapiro about Israel
In the chapters discussing her rushed vetting of running mates, Harris details her decision to pass over Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro as vice president, despite his popularity as a governor from a key battleground state.
Shapiro came under fire from progressive Democrats for his staunch defense of Israel. His critics noted his refusal to call for a unilateral ceasefire in Gaza, his highlighting expressions of antisemitism at pro-Palestinian protests, and an op-ed in his college newspaper that described the Palestinians as “too battle-minded.” Pro-Palestinian activists and Israel-critical progressives led an aggressive social media campaign to keep Shapiro off the ticket.
Republicans have said the broadsides against Shapiro were antisemitic – there were shortlisted candidates who were as pro-Israel as Shapiro, but who were not targeted – and that the attacks influenced Harris’ decision. Harris and Shapiro have both adamantly denied that his faith had anything to do with the decision.
In her private conversation with Shapiro, Harris writes, she discussed how to manage the fallout from Gaza-related protests if he were a running mate, including the risk of demonstrations at the Democratic National Convention, and “what effect it might have on the enthusiasm we were trying to build.” Shapiro, according to Harris, responded that he felt that he had made clear that his youthful opinion had been misguided and that he was fully committed to a two-state solution.
In a recent interview with the Forward, Shapiro said his defense of Israel was deep-rooted and his approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been “consistent.” He blamed Netanyahu for deepening the crisis.
Harris writes that her husband, Dog Emhoff, who is Jewish, preferred Shapiro. “He had known Josh longer and leaned that way,” she writes. Harris ultimately chose Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
