Despite having a Jewish son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and a daughter, Ivanka, who married Kushner and converted to the Jewish faith, reporters attempted to twist President Donald Trump’s recent remarks, arguing that his comments claiming that Jews who vote Democrat are “disloyal” are somehow anti-Semitic.
On Wednesday, Trump was even asked by a reporter on the South Lawn outside the White House if his comments were anti-Semitic.
Such distortion of Trump’s actual views by the mainstream media is not new. After the 2017 Charlottesville, Virginia, clash between neo-Nazi extremists and the far left Antifa, Democratic Party politicians and their fellow liberals in the media falsely said that Trump had said the neo-Nazis and the white supremacists were “fine people.” Actually, he specifically said he was excluding the neo-Nazis and the white supremacists from his description of “fine people.”
Jonathan Greenblatt, president of the left-wing Anti-Defamation League was typical of those falsely accusing Trump of espousing anti-Semitic views. “[Trump] made it clear he thinks Jews have a dual loyalty to Israel. This anti-Semitic trope has been used to persecute Jews for centuries and it’s unacceptable to promote it. He should apologize immediately.”
Actually, it is Greenblatt who should apologize to Trump, who has been perhaps the most pro-Israel American president in decades. For example, it was Trump who moved the American embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Israel’s actual capital city, Jerusalem.
In stark contrast, the media has largely circled the wagons to defend actual anti-Semites in Congress, such as Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, who do not even accept the right of Israel to exist as an independent nation. In fact, they favor a campaign to boycott, sanction, and divest of any investment in the mostly Jewish nation. Tlaib is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America.
After the socialist Tlaib wept for the cameras, following Israel’s refusal to let her into the country (Israel had granted her permission to visit her aging grandmother, if she would promise to refrain from making any political statements or engaging in any political activity while there, but she refused those conditions), Trump said, “Sorry, I don’t buy Rep. Tlaib’s tears. I have watched her violence, craziness and, most importantly, WORDS, for far too long. Now tears? She hates Israel and all Jewish people. She is an anti-Semite. She and her three friends are the new face of the Democratic Party.”
Trump’s comments about “disloyal” Jews were clearly not meant to say that Jews who support the Democratic Party were disloyal to America, but rather to their fellow Jews, wherever they live.
And, the Republican Jewish Coalition defended Trump’s position late Wednesday. “President Trump is pointing out the obvious: for those who care about Israel, the position of many elected Democrats has become anti-Israel. When Tlaib and Omar talk loyalty they’re questioning American Jews’ loyalty to the United States. President Trump is talking about caring about the survival of the Jewish state.”
These Republican Jews understandably share Trump’s frustration that many American Jews continue to support the Democratic Party, despite its growing support of anti-Semitic members of Congress, such as Omar and Tlaib, both Muslims. Trump did manage to win the votes of the majority of Orthodox Jews in the 2016 presidential election, but most Jews have continued to constitute a strong voting bloc for the Democrats. Hillary Clinton won 71 percent of the Jewish vote against Trump in the presidential election, and 79 percent of Jewish voters supported Democrats in the 2018 midterm elections.
Others besides Trump and the Republican Jewish Coalition have wondered why Jews would continue to support the candidates of a political party that is so tolerant of anti-Semitism in its ranks.
This then, was the context for Trump’s condemnation of Jews who vote Democrat. “Dems have such disdain for Israel! … And I think any Jewish people that vote for a Democrat, I think it shows either a total lack of knowledge or great disloyalty.” Clearly, Trump was speaking of disloyalty of some Jews, not to the U.S., but to their fellow Jews in Israel who must contend with neighbors who have called for the end of their national existence.
Wayne Allyn Root, a political commentator, even praised Trump as “the greatest president for Jews and for Israel in the history of the world, not just America, he is the best president for Israel in the history of the world … and the Jewish people in Israel love him.”
Had Root stopped there, one could accept the comments as within the bounds of normality. However, Root went on to say, and Trump re-tweeted Root’s remarks, as he did the first remarks: “Like he’s the King of Israel. They love him like he is the second coming of God.” This was clearly beyond what an Orthodox Jew or a Christian could say about Trump or any other human being, but Root’s additional remarks were more reasoned: “But American Jews don’t know him or like him. They don’t even know what they’re doing or saying anymore. It makes no sense!”
Indeed, it does not. Root concluded that Trump was not only good for Israel and “all Jews,” he was also good for “everyone,” and “most importantly, he’s good for everyone in America who wants a job.”
One does not have to agree with Root’s over-the-top “second coming” comment to agree that a reference to Trump as anti-Semitic is totally without foundation. It indicates that his opponents, including those in the media, are descending to a level of vitriol and unfair accusations that should cause any fair American to reject such hatred as irrational.
But there could be a reason for the vitriol — fear that Jews will abandon the Democratic Party, which has increasingly demonstrated their hate for them.
Photo: Luke_Franzen / iStock / Getty Images Plus
Steve Byas is a university history and government instructor and author of the book, History’s Greatest Libels. He may be contacted at [email protected]
