Pro-Israel group unveils attack ad against Booker

A conservative pro-Israel group is taking aim at Sen. Cory Booker for voting against a measure to block U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority in a new television ad that says “he’s eyeing a run for president.”

The ad, paid for by the nonprofit Committee for Israel, seeks to undercut a potential 2020 White House run by Booker, and accuses the New Jersey Democrat of “throwing Israel under the bus.”

“Stabbings, shootings, suicide bombings. Israelis and Americans killed by Palestinian terrorists, and we’re paying for it,” a narrator says. “American tax dollars have been going to pay salaries to these jailed killers for decades. Finally, Democrats and Republicans are coming together to stop it.”

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“But not Cory Booker. He ran here as a friend to Israel. Just four years later he’s eyeing a run for president and throwing Israel under the bus. Call Booker. Tell him we noticed.”

The 30-second ad was first reported by Politico. It is set to begin airing in the New York and Philadelphia television markets on Wednesday evening during the Major League Baseball game between the Philadelphia Phillies and the New York Mets.

Booker voted against the Taylor Force Act in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last month. That measure would end State Department funding for the Palestinian Authority until the body ends payments to its Martyrs Fund, which provides money to families of Palestinians who engage in political violence, particularly against Israel.

After his vote against advancing the measure, Booker explained in a statement that he was not entirely convinced that “the bill would achieve its desired ends without worsening the security situation.”

Booker isn’t up for re-election until 2020, and hasn’t ruled out a possible run for the White House, saying in July that he doesn’t yet know “what the future’s going to bring.”