Rashida Tlaib and the Trojan horse of antisemitic tropes
After seeing the weak condemnation following Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s latest revisionist comments about the creation of Israel and the Holocaust, everything I have been warning about has finally come to pass. I have been concerned that the overly strong backlash to Rep. Ilhan Omar’s antisemitic tropes would unintentionally help enable more antisemitism, because it felt as though Jews and their allies were putting the cart before the horse, and losing sight of what truly drives mainstream left-wing antisemitism.Virginia Lawmaker Connected to Anti-Semitic Groups
Antisemitism from the Left is mostly caused by its inaccurate perception of Israel as an oppressive imperialist state. The irony is that this mainstream left-wing sentiment is actually rooted in what might be the most harmful antisemitic trope of them all: simply lying about Jews harming others, similar to the blood libel used against Jews in the middle ages. These modern-day blood libel tropes and other false accusations used against Israel, unlike Omar’s recent tropes, are actually much more systematic and dangerous to Jews because of their mainstream use in the left-wing political world.
While people have been focusing on Omar’s vile antisemitic tropes, they largely ignored that Omar: supports the anti-Israel boycott movement; has claimed Israel is similar to Iran in not being a democracy; surrounded herself with antisemites like Linda Sarsour; covers for Hamas; and constantly lies and misleads about the Jewish state and the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
While we all should be condemning antisemitic stereotypes, we need to not lose focus on what’s the main cause of systematic left-wing antisemitism. The strong condemnation of Omar unintentionally gifted left-wing antisemites with a Trojan horse that gave them the green light to say whatever they want about Israel, as long as they avoid classical antisemitic tropes.
There is no better example of this being true then by the lack of pushback from Democrats on Tlaib’s recent comments. We must never forget that what drives most of hate toward Israel are the constant lies, propaganda, double standards, disproportionate focus, demonization, and as Rashida just showed in her recent comments, a revisionist version of history.
A member of the Virginia legislature and former volunteer for Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D., Mich.) is connected to multiple anti-Semitic organizations and is the son of a Hamas fundraiser.Al Sharpton admits to using ‘cheap’ rhetoric about Jews
Del. Ibraheem Samirah (D.)—who received sympathetic national coverage this week after alleging harassment for his Muslim faith at a town hall—has supported multiple virulently anti-Semitic and anti-Israel organizations, once speaking at a Hamas-affiliated conference.
Samirah is a vocal supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, which seeks to use economic and political pressure against Israel. In a 2014 Facebook post, Samirah urged friends to support the BDS movement while Israel was "most exposed."
As a student at American University and then Boston University, Samirah was an active member of Students for Justice in Palestine. He credits the organization with helping convince students that "Israel REALLY sucks."
SJP relies heavily on American Muslims for Palestine, of which Samirah is also a part, for funds and logistics. According to 2016 testimony from Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, "AMP is arguably the most important sponsor and organizer for Students for Justice in Palestine."
AMP's founder and president is Hatem Bazian. He also founded SJP. Bazian has a history of deeply anti-Semitic comments and conspiracies. In 2004, Bazian spoke at a fundraiser for an organization the U.S. Treasury determined was fundraising for Hamas.
Al Sharpton appealed to Reform Jews for a united front in facing down anti-Semitism, racism and other forms of bias, and acknowledged his role in stoking division, recounting how the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s widow reprimanded him for his “cheap” rhetoric.
The civil rights activist and MSNBC host reportedly has expressed regrets privately to Jewish leaders for the incendiary rhetoric that helped fuel the deadly Crown Heights riots in 1991. But Monday’s remarks at the Religious Action Center’s Consultation on Conscience were the closest he has come in public in acknowledging his role.
The invitation earned criticism for seeming to rehabilitate a figure at the center of a number of anti-Semitic clashes in the 1990s. After the accidental killing of a black child in Brooklyn by a car driven by a member of the Lubavitcher rebbe’s entourage, African-American protesters targeted religious Jews in the Crown Heights neighborhood.
Yankel Rosenbaum, a graduate student affiliated with Chabad-Lubavitch, was stabbed to death in the rioting.
Sharpton also was accused of inciting the violent firebombing of a Jewish-owned clothing store in Harlem in 1995.
Without mentioning the Crown Heights riots specifically, Sharpton said he could have “done more to heal rather than harm.” And he said that all the public criticism he received paled next to the rebuke from Coretta Scott King, who was known for her closeness to the Jewish community. It appears to be the first time Sharpton has publicly shared the tale.