Democrats may have an anti-Semitism problem
“I unequivocally apologize.’’
Oh but she equivocated all right, did Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.
The Minnesota Democrat, after some obvious arm-twisting by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — following a statement by the entire House leadership condemning Omar’s “use of anti-Semitic tropes” and “deeply offensive” comments about Israeli supporters — can hardly be characterized as sincere in her apologia.
“Anti-Semitism is real and I am grateful for Jewish allies and colleagues who are educating me on the painful history of anti-Semitic tropes,” Omar said in a released statement. “My intention is never to offend my constituents or Jewish Americans as a whole.”
Just some Jews. You know, the rich ones, who stand by Israel via the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, via the “Benjamins.”
It is ironic that Omar’s most recent incendiary episode — she is a serial offender — was sparked by a Twitter exchange with journalist Glenn Greenwald, who accused Republican House minority leader Kevin McCarthy of targeting Omar and her Democratic colleague, Rep. Rashida Tlaib. They are the first two Muslim women to serve in Congress. Indeed, House Democrats changed a 181-year-old rule barring head coverings to allow the wearing of hijabs in the House. (A reversal long overdue.)
Omar responded to Greenwald, on Twitter, thusly: “It’s all about the Benjamins baby,” a slang reference to $100 bills.
Asked further on Twitter who she thought was paying members of Congress to support Israel, Omar was declarative: “AIPAC!”
More about that in a moment. But to quote the rest of Omar’s Monday statement: “I reaffirm the problematic role of lobbyists in our politics, whether it be AIPAC, the NRA or the fossil fuel industry. It’s gone on too long and we must be willing to address it.”
So, conflating a pro-Israel registered lobby group with the wacko and all-powerful NRA and an industry that promotes unfettered oil, gas and coal extraction, plumping profits over global climate change alarm.
What is it with this word, “tropes”? Sounds like homogenizing of vicious anti-Semitic rhetoric, refusing to call out Jew-hating palaver for what it essentially is.
Evoking Benjamins was clearly a two-fingered dog whistle linking Jews and money — the ages-old stereotype of Jews using money to control the banks and ergo the world. Hanging the Benjamins on AIPAC plays into the same intrinsic metaphor — dating to the Middle Ages, when Jews were barred from most professions and thus became moneylenders, a profession closed to Christians because of prohibitions against usury.
AIPAC is a registered lobby group, exercising its constitutionally protected rights to advocate on behalf of its agenda, of which it makes no secret. Just like hundreds of other PACs. AIPAC members tend to donate more to Democrats than Republicans, as most Jewish Americans historically have identified more with the Democratic party than the GOP.
AIPAC is barred from directly donating to candidates but can encourage its more than 100,000 members to do so.
According to data from OpenSecrets.org, a non-partisan website that tracks money in politics — AIPAC membership contributed $14.9 million (U.S.) in the 2018 election cycle — 50th biggest spender, well behind the securities and investments industry (No. 1, at $399 million).
Last year, AIPAC members donated just 35 per cent of those funds to candidates.
But Omar is grateful to Jewish colleagues for smartening her up? This is a woman who fled Somalia as a child, with her family, and grew up in America. Yet she didn’t know from hurtful “tropes”? Not like she hasn’t been publicly schooled on it before.
During the congressional campaign, Omar told a synagogue audience that the notoriously anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement was “not helpful” in reaching a two-state solution; that its pressuring “stops the dialogue.” But days after she was elected — part of the blue wave that restored House control to the Democrats — she declared her support for BDS. (In Canada, Parliament officially passed an anti-BDS motion in 2016.)
Clearly, Omar learned nothing from becoming embroiled in the BDS debate and showed herself to be, frankly, talking out of both sides of her month. A month ago, another worrisome tweet by Omar, from 2012, resurfaced, in which she said “Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.” She claimed the use of that antiSemitic “trope” was done unwittingly. Agreed, she’s witless. “It is now apparent to me that I spent lots of energy putting my 2012 tweet in context and little energy in disavowing the anti-Semitic trope I unknowingly used, which is unfortunate and offensive.”
There was nothing unknowing about it, unless she’s as dim as a 10-watt bulb.
BDS co-founder Omar Barghouti has said Zionism is based on “irredeemable racism” and “the current Zionist state of Israel” was “criminally built.”
There are many, including Jews, who are critical of the Jewish state’s policy, especially on expansion of settlements in the West Bank. Israel isn’t buffered against denunciation, certainly not at the UN. But BDS is a thin cover for demonization of Israel.
Also last month, Omar told Yahoo news that when politicians “still uphold” Israel “as a democracy in the Middle East, I almost chuckle.”
As for her colleague, Tlaib, she tweeted last month that senators who support antiBDS legislation, which will pass shortly in the Senate (and probably die in the House) “forgot what country they represent.” Again, raising that old shibboleth about dual and duelling loyalties among Jewish Americans.
Tlaib is a Palestinian American whose mother still lives in the West Bank.
Days later, as reported by multiple media outlets, Abbas Hamideh, a prominent Palestinian activist who heads a “right of return” group, posted a photo of Tlaib on social media, saying they had just had a “private dinner.” This is the same man who has equated Zionism with Nazism.
Tlaib defended herself by saying she’s not responsible for her supporters’ actions. She complained about being a victim of right-wing media, although the facts were the facts. “Yes, I am Muslim and Palestinian. Get over it.”
Tlaib has vowed to vote against military aid to Israel and, at her swearing-in ceremony in Detroit last month, posed for a photo with Hamideh, staunch defender of Hezbollah, which is deemed a terrorist group in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., the European Union and Australia.
In the midst of the Omar controversy, even fact-averse President Donald Trump got it right, calling her apology “lame.”
It is lame. It convinces nobody except Democrats who want to put this messy squabble behind them. It should be noted, however, than none of the Democrats who’ve thrown their hat into the presidential nominee ring or are believed to do so at some point, have publicly censured either Omar or Tlaib.
Nor has the Democratic Party jettisoned Omar from a plum seat on the powerful House foreign relations committee, though its chair, Eliot Engel, released a statement in response to Omar’s tweets without specifically naming her. “It’s shocking to hear a Member of Congress invoke the anti-Semitic trope of ‘Jewish money,’ ” he said.
One can easily imagine where Omar will try to steer the committee. Her toxic views on Israel are as objectionable as Rep. Steve King making comments embracing white supremacy, for which he was stripped of all his committee assignments. The House passed a resolution condemning his words.
The Democrats appear worrisomely headed for an ideological schism between the old guard and the energizing new. There is an obvious generational divide in the party between staunch allies of Israel and ascendant young liberals with a strong socialist inclination — the Bernie Sanders Children — who discovered Palestinians about 15 seconds ago and are hell-bent on vilifying Israel.
It’s up to Pelosi, a veteran politician of inestimable skill, to tamp down some of that youthful zeal or the Democrats could fall prey to the same strain of anti-Semitism that has infested the Labour Party in Britain.
And that would play right into Trump’s re-election plans.
“Anti-Semitism is real and I am grateful for Jewish allies and colleagues who are educating me on the painful history of anti-Semitic tropes.” ILHAN OMAR MINNESOTA REPRESENTATIVE