One activist demanded State Sen. Scott Wiener say “Free Palestine,” before screaming at him inside a San Francisco bar.

By World Israel News Staff

A Jewish Democratic lawmaker from California was twice confronted and harassed by anti-Israel activists last week despite his long record of sharply criticizing Israel, including declaring earlier this year that he believes the Jewish state committed genocide during its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

California State Sen. Scott Wiener, who represents San Francisco and is widely considered the frontrunner to succeed retiring Rep. Nancy Pelosi in Congress, spoke out about the incidents in a media statement.

The confrontations came despite Wiener having repeatedly distanced himself from the Israeli government’s conduct during the war. In January 2026, he stated that he wanted to “clarify that I do believe Israel has committed genocide in Gaza.”

He added that “the Israeli government has tried to destroy Gaza and to push Palestinians out. And that qualifies as genocide.”

Those statements, however, did not appear to satisfy the activists, who have angrily confronted Wiener in public.

In a video filmed inside of a San Francisco bar, an anti-Israel activist is seen approaching Wiener and repeatedly demanding that the senator say, “Free Palestine.”

The activist became increasingly agitated after Wiener declined to repeat the slogan.

Wiener said in a media statement that the individual “screamed abuse at me and our staff before being ejected by the bar’s employees.”

The politician added that the encounter was not the first involving the same activist.

In December 2023, that same man “stalked me on a plane and in an airport, shouting at me about my ‘tainted bloodline,'” in an apparent reference to Wiener’s Jewish heritage.

A second incident occurred later that week in San Francisco’s Dolores Park, shortly before the start of a transgender rights march. Videos circulating on social media showed Wiener being surrounded by a crowd of demonstrators as they shouted accusations over his position on Israel.

“You’ve been terrible, you’ve been terrible on Gaza,” one person in the crowd is heard screaming at Wiener. “You do not belong here anymore, Scott.”

Weiner said the demonstrators “began harassing me, both verbally and physically, including physical contact” and “made statements about my ‘Israeli handlers,’ among many other inaccurate, extreme, and vile statements.”

He reiterated that he respects “anyone disagreeing with me, opposing me, or protesting me,” but “when opposition and disagreement transition to harassment, including cornering me, touching me, or trying to physically bully me out of a public event, that crosses a line.”

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This is the part that should shake every Jewish Democrat still searching for the version of themselves that the progressive base will finally accept.

By JFeed

There is a lesson buried in what happened to California State Sen. Scott Wiener at the San Francisco Trans March, and it is not a complicated one.

It is, in fact, one of the oldest lessons in Jewish history: there is no amount of self-abasement that will make them accept you.

There is no formula. There is no price. The monster, as it turns out, is not actually hungry for your positions. It is hungry for you.

Let us review what Wiener offered on the altar of progressive approval.

Less than a week after October 7, before Israel had set a single boot inside Gaza, while the blood was still wet and the hostages were still being dragged through tunnels, Wiener was already condemning Israel for perpetrating a “civilian disaster” in the Strip.

He was, in other words, condemning Israel’s response to a massacre before there was a response to condemn.

That is not criticism. That is a reflex. That is a man who had already decided which side he was on.

In November 2023, with Israeli babies still in Hamas captivity, Wiener accused Israel of a “moral stain.”

He even reached for Yiddish to express his shame over the Jewish state, as though invoking the language of our grandmothers would make the betrayal feel more authentic.

He supports an embargo on offensive weapons for Israel, which in practice means he is comfortable with Jews having the right to crouch in a safe room and wait.

He crossed the final progressive threshold in January, joining the chorus that calls Israel’s war a genocide.

He calls himself a Zionist. His record calls him something else.

And after all of that, the condemnations, the embargo, the genocide accusation, and the Yiddish performance of collective Jewish guilt, the activists at the Trans March chased him through the streets screaming at him like he was the enemy.

Because he wouldn’t cheer at footage from the October 7 massacre. Because even that, apparently, was too much to ask.

Wiener said nothing and fled.

He did not ask the crowd what they imagined would happen to transgender people in Gaza.

He did not point out that the society they are romanticizing would not extend to them a fraction of the freedoms they enjoy in the state they hate.

He stayed silent and ran. And in that silence was the entire portrait of a certain kind of American Jewish politician: someone who has so thoroughly outsourced his moral compass to the movement that he cannot even defend his own people’s murdered dead without calculating the political cost.

Now contrast Wiener with his opponent in this House race, someone running to his left, someone for whom opposition to Israel is not a position but an identity.

The difference is not really ideological at this point. Wiener has traveled so far from where he started that the policy distance between them is negligible.

The difference is that his opponent gets to be righteous. Wiener just gets to be a Jew who is trying very hard not to be one and failing, because you cannot try your way out of what you are.

This is the part that should shake every Jewish Democrat still searching for the version of themselves that the progressive base will finally accept. There is no such version.

The activists who screamed at Wiener at the Trans March were not reacting to his positions.

They knew his positions. They have been watching him perform ideological loyalty for three years.

They screamed at him because he is Jewish, because his people were murdered, and because he flinched, just once, just slightly, at the demand that he celebrate it.

No matter how many times a Jew twists himself into knots, sells out his community, condemns his own people’s right to defend themselves, and borrows the language of the accusers, the antisemitic monster will always swallow them whole.

Scott Wiener just learned that the hard way. The tragedy is that he still probably hasn’t understood why.

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Despite having claimed that Israel commits genocide in Gaza, heavily progressive California politician and congressional hopeful Scott Wiener was accosted by a Free Palestine protester who urged the Jewish politician to say the slogan on camera. Wiener was speechless.

U.S. Congressional candidate Scott Wiener was harassed by a Free Palestine activist.

Scott, who is Jewish, had changed his stance on Israel, parroting the typical Free Palestine rhetoric, in order to get easy votes.

It turns out, to nobody’s surprise, that he still isn’t… pic.twitter.com/ZDXdpiEqQd

— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) June 25, 2026

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Multiple Jewish groups, including the Jewish Community Relations Council Bay Area, the American Jewish Committee and the Jewish Public Affairs Committee of California, jointly stated that they were “deeply disappointed” in Wiener’s remarks.

By JNS

Scott Wiener, a Democratic state senator running for the congressional seat long held by Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), announced on Thursday that he will step down as co-chair of the California Legislative Jewish Caucus following remarks he made about Israel’s “genocide” in Gaza.

Wiener stated that his resignation will take effect on Feb. 15.

“Last fall, with a demanding congressional campaign looming, I suggested stepping down but was asked to stay to provide continuity of leadership during a difficult time for the Jewish community,” he said.

“Now, my campaign is accelerating, and my recent statements on Israel and Gaza have led to significant controversy in the Jewish community.”

“The time to transition has arrived,” Wiener added.

On Jan. 11, Wiener stated that he believes “Israel has committed genocide in Gaza,” countering comments he had previously made about Israel’s right to defend itself.

“We all have eyes, and we see the absolute devastation and catastrophic death toll in Gaza inflicted by the Israeli government, and we all have ears, and we hear the genocidal statements by certain senior members of the Israeli government,” he said.

“To me, the Israeli government has tried to destroy Gaza and to push Palestinians out, and that qualifies as ‘genocide,’” he added.

Multiple Jewish groups, including the Jewish Community Relations Council Bay Area, the American Jewish Committee, and the Jewish Public Affairs Committee of California, jointly stated that they were “deeply disappointed” in Wiener’s remarks.

Wiener stated on Thursday that since he made those comments, he has “had many in-depth conversations with members of the Jewish community with a range of perspectives.”

“While many in the community strongly disagree with my view, I am grateful for their willingness to engage with me and hear my perspective, showing once again the deep respect for difference in our community,” the California state senator said.

He added that “the American Jewish community is navigating an extremely difficult moment in time, with a severe escalation in antisemitism, horrific anti-Jewish violence, targeting of Jewish institutions and an Israeli government that has fallen too often into anti-democratic extremism and engaged in horrific actions in Gaza and the West Bank.”

“As we move through this moment, it is even more important for Jews here and globally to foster open dialogue and acceptance of disagreement, even on the hardest of issues,” Wiener said.

Seth Brysk, Northern California regional director at the American Jewish Committee, told JNS that “we appreciate Senator Wiener acknowledging that his new position places him out of step with the Jewish community and agree with him that his leadership of the Legislative Jewish Caucus would no longer be appropriate.”

“The characterization of Israel having committed a genocide is false and irresponsible,” Brysk said. “It is especially important that elected leaders use thoughtful and accurate language. Inflammatory statements can create dangerous outcomes.”

Tyler Gregory, CEO of JCRC Bay Area, stated that he hopes that Wiener’s “decision to step down will allow our community, the California Legislative Jewish Caucus and the senator himself the ability to move beyond this painful and divisive moment.”

He added that while the organization maintains concerns about Weiner’s recent statements on Gaza, it recognizes the work the state senator did as co-chair of the Jewish caucus, such as seeking improved nonprofit security grants and championing AB 715, California’s new law addressing antisemitism in K-12 schools that went into effect on Jan. 1.

“JCRC Bay Area is committed to working with the senator to advance these and many other shared priorities in the legislature this year,” Gregory said.

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