‘CEASE FIRE’ LOBBY
Third-term Congresswoman Haley Stevens (D-11th District) appears to be getting the lion’s share of blowback from the crowd pushing for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war in the Mideast. Stevens district, which sprawls from Royal Oak through Troy, Auburn Hills and Pontiac into the West Oakland lakes communities, includes Birmingham, Bloomfield Township and Bloomfield Hills, where a sizable share of the Jewish population resides in the state. Hence her strong support for Israel in the past and now during that country’s response to the Hamas terror event last October 7. In a canned response letter from Stevens’ office shared with Oakland Confidential a couple of weeks after Hamas forces invaded Israel, the Congresswoman mentioned her concern for innocent Palestinians caught up in the current war, but she conveniently skated around a constituent’s request that she support a ceasefire. Now it appears there’s an organized effort to call out Stevens on her social media accounts, or at least on Instagram. Name the event that the Congresswoman posts about – be it meetings with Jewish Federation officials, Black History Month Alliance for Auto Innovation, or India League of American happenings – pro-ceasefire posts follow her consistently and incessantly, reminding site visitors that Stevens is ignoring calls for a ceasefire, along with criticism of her for taking election money from the Jewish AIPAC group. An organized effort? Without a doubt. We tracked the names appearing in a host of postings and many of the same names appear repeatedly. Stevens is not the only member of Congress from Michigan getting challenged on the ceasefire issue. We checked the social media sites of other Michigan Democrat House members, like Elissa Slotkin and Debbie Dingell. Once in a blue moon the organized effort of the ceasefire crowd shows up, but not with the frequency and intensity that plagues Stevens.