Posted on 08/19/2019 4:46:53 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
Should the Netanyahu government have barred "Squad" members and BDS advocates Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib from entering the country? Chattering classes in both countries quickly took sides.
Surprising is how quickly major American Jewish organizations—those one would most expect to defend Israel—jumped to condemn its decision, arguing that it should have rolled out the red carpet for the two congresswomen. While their argument is that keeping the women out harms the Jewish State, it is their position that damages Israel and strengthens its enemies.
"A good-faith visit to Israel is the best way to be exposed to its democracy, complexities, and range of views. And so while we absolutely disagree with the pro-BDS positions of Reps. Omar and Tlaib, keeping them out is counterproductive," tweeted ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt on Thursday, echoing a nearly identical tweet sent out less than half an hour earlier by AIPAC, which declared "every member of Congress should be able to visit and experience our democratic ally Israel firsthand."
The problem is that Omar and Tlaib weren’t visiting Israel. They were visiting a fictitious country called "Palestine," which Arabs hope will replace Israel. Their itinerary, titled "U.S. Congressional Delegation to Palestine," was loaded with meet-and-greets with Palestinian Authority officials. The only Israel representative was the group B’Tselem—a radical organization that last made headlines condemning Israel at the U.N. Security Council. Israel’s ambassador to the United States Ron Dermer described the itinerary as a "BDS circus."
Omar and Tlaib could have come as part of the large Democratic congressional delegation that visited Israel last week. Instead, they came separately under a trip sponsored by Mifteh, run by leading Palestinian Authority member Hanan Ashrawi.
As David French points out in National Review, Mifteh published a classic medieval blood libel that Jews use the blood of Christians at Passover. To French, the scandal is that members of the American government were partnering with vicious anti-Semites on their own anti-Israel propaganda tour.
Any doubt of Omar and Tlaib’s bad faith dissipated with Tlaib’s reaction after Israel backtracked. Apparently hoping to put Israel in an even worse light, Tlaib sent a letter to Israel’s interior minister asking to be allowed to visit her grandmother, in her 90s, because "this might be my last opportunity to see her." When Minister Aryeh Deri unexpectedly granted her request, asking only that she not engage in BDS activities while in Israel, Tlaib tweeted, "I have decided that visiting my grandmother under these oppressive conditions stands against everything I believe in—fighting against racism, oppression and injustice." In other words she believes Israel represents all these things—racism, oppression, and injustice. How can American Jewish organizations possibly spin this into a "good-faith visit to Israel"?
American Jewish groups who are now criticizing Israel make another argument—that barring the congresswomen’s entry alienates half of Congress, endangering decades of bipartisan support for Israel.
The problem with this thinking is that it puts the cart before the horse. Israel isn’t driving a wedge between itself and Democrats. Democrats are driving a wedge between themselves and Israel. It’s because of the Democrats’ radicalized base, of which the leadership is terrified.
It’s a problem that predates Omar and Tlaib, though they have become its most prominent face. The Democrats have an anti-Israel problem. If the party is not careful, it will turn into an anti-Semitic problem similar to that of England’s Labour Party.
Who can forget the embarrassing vote to reinstate language recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital at the 2012 Democratic National Convention? Convention chairman Antonio Villaraigosa had to call a voice vote three times before declaring it for the "Ayes." Anyone who heard the catcalls knows it was nowhere near the two-thirds votes required to make the change.
Democrats have been afraid to take Omar and Tlaib head-on. Not only are they scared of their base, they’re fearful of antagonizing American Muslims, a voting bloc they have begun to woo. That is why their effort in May to pass a resolution condemning anti-Semitism, again sparked in reaction to Omar, was rewritten and watered down so as to be meaningless.
If American-Jewish organizations wish to help Israel, they’d encourage Democrats to go further in their efforts to push back against Omar-Tlaib. AIPAC, the ADL, the Conference of Presidents of American Jewish Organizations, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and all the others who see their job as defending Jewish interests should be encouraging Democrats to isolate this hateful duo and cut them off from the rest of the party.
Instead, they’ve strengthened Omar and Tlaib by giving moral backing to the position that these two should have been admitted to Israel regardless of their agenda, that it was Israel that was in the wrong. But Israel was right. It acted sensibly, stopping a propaganda-fest from being carried out on its home turf.
The House vote condemning BDS was 398-to-17. Five voted present. Two of the nays were Omar and Tlaib. This is a fight U.S. Jewish groups can win. Once they stop putting the ball in their own net.
It seems like a lot of Jewish groups try to see the good in everybody.
While that’s admirable, i’ts not healthy or realistic.
ANYONE who thinks that Israel rolling out the red carpet and showing its great democracy was gonna matter AT ALL to these women is incurably naive.
It’s safer to be Jewish and naive in the US.
Israel is afforded no such luxury with enemies all around them.
The last thing they needed was these yahoos stirring the pot for Palestinians
And most people who consider themselves Jewish will still vote for the Democrats
Luckily the people in Israel still realize that those that compromise their values for peace will soon have neither.
bmp
While there’s some truth to that, don’t forget that there were Jews in both Lenin’s and Hitler’s governments...
I don’t see why Israeli Jews should let American Nazis and islamonazis into their country.
I wouldn’t.
The Jews paid a high price to learn the cost of compromise. But at least the ones in Israel learned - the ones in America either never knew or forgot. And they seem to forget more each year - no matter how bad the democraps screw them.
Yeah that’s not gonna change under Trump.
But the Jewish vote doesn’t really swing any states in the POTUS race.
The swing states where Jewish population percentage is higher than 2:
Florida: 3.0%
Nevada: 2.5%
Pennsylvania: 2.3%
The dems candidate is only getting 70 percent of that 2 or 3 percent so they are Not the reason we win or lose these states. IMHO
Local politics, that’s a different story.
Though Hasidim here in NYC put Giuliani over the top to defeat Dinkins
Is this the same story/trip last week that one of them was trying desperately to visit her grandmother and told us Israel said no?
These are the Jesws that led the other Jews onto the trains.
The Left are always saying that our side standing up for itself is wrong. If we try it they call us intolorant. It is notable however that they have successfully advance their own brand of ABSOLUTE intolarance by charging intolorance to otheres. THEY are intolorant and so must we be.
I’ve met Jews in the US that were holocaust deniers - democrat party over Judaism- every time.
self ping
Far left US Jews don’t consider Hasidim enlightened and vice versa
it is stunnig how times have changed since 1960, when the movie Exodus was released. You could find recordings of Ernest Gold's "Theme from Exodus" on countless LPs from the soundtack album to Manotvani to Ferranti and Teicher. Andy Williams had a big hit with a song version of the theme called "This Land is Mine". Now the left compares Israel to Nazi Germany...
It's not surprising at all - these organizations may love the concept of Israel but can't stand the realities that brought into existence the Netanyahu government.
My Jewish friends from Brooklyn maybe aren’t the typical bunch. I dunno.
They are white and blue collar but most of the parents are/were blue collar. They are right of center, thought not as strongly as us but GOOD ENOUGH.
Down to earth, great people and some of their parents are SO NICE to me.
It’s like being in an Italian home but I can’t understand the second language this time :)
And I don’t know any Hasidim but their neighborhood on State Island is immaculate, I can’t recall the last time I saw one on the front page for murder or assault and their internal ways of handling things are their business.
Most of our “Jewish” groups are liberal or leftist so don’t count on them to support Trump, Netanyahu, Israel or the Torah.
They are 1930’s - type Jews: The Germans (Palestinians, Omar, Tlaib, AOC) are good people and won’t hurt us because we are “Good Germans”.
How did “Good Germans” work out for German Jews in the 1930’s and 40’s? Not so well as I recall. My relatives were slaughtered in Lemberg/Lvov by the “Good Germans”.
Just a word to my fellow stupid liberal Jews, “Lemming is not kosher so you shouldn’t act like them if you want to survive”.
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