Yup, no one seems to want to address that language. Perfectly fair to attack the state of Isreal, but don’t associate the support by some (aka Jews) for Isreal to divided loyalty (“allegiance to a foreign country”)
Lots of folks saying she was attacking aipac, but she did not say that, nor issue a correction saying that is what she meant.
Lots of ways of making the criticism other than with racist tropes.
I wish I could say this was a learning experience, but I fear that it is not, and the only saving grace is that the republicans have 33 folks who voted in favor of racism…
Israel could not get away with its abuses of human rights if not for U.S. protection of those abuses. If that were not true, there would be no reason to pass these (probably unConstitutional) BDS laws.
Omar did not attack any policy of Isreal, she made no policy challenge. Had she done so no democrat would have been upset. Nor did she attack aipac or Sheldon aldrerson. Mentioned neither. Instead she made a series of comments that those who supported Isreal had ‘allegence to a foreign state” and their allegence bought with $100 bills.
The only good thing I can say is that Pelosi managed to get a resolution through, and 23 bigoted far right republicans made the democrats left flank look reasonable…
Given the content of the resolution:
Anti-Semites
And/or Islamophobes
And/or equal opportunity racists.
And it is more than 28 – 28 is simply the number of GOPers whose racism is sufficiently extreme that they could not even pretend.
I like how the Democratic Party has all kinds of opinions — many of intense passion — and yet, in the end, some accede, some persist — and yet there’s unity. Always working together with compassion for all. All kinds of people, of all kinds of colors, of faiths…
Clarification: the purpose of the resolution is an attempt by the Dems to shut Rep Omar up, or at least to mitigate the damage she caused. Unfortunately it failed, the text was diluted to the point of being meaningless, and to satisfy no one but Republicans. Alas, it looks like Trump and Co will be able to ride stupidity and self-aggrandizing of Omar and others like her all the way to 2020 victory. What a tragedy…
So the only way to criticize Israeli policies to be very clear that it is specific policies that are being criticized. For example, The Nation of Israel’s policies disenfranchising the Palestinian cannot be allowed to continue is better than I believe Israel’s policies are bad
How is the second one anti-semitic? They both can mean the same thing. If Israel is a sovereign nation and much of what they do has been condemned by the UN and Human rights groups, how can legitimate criticism be conflated into anti-semitism? Does this mean that in the US, no criticism of Israel is possible without also being anti-semite? That stops any meaningful discussion.
That’s what I"m wondering as well. It seems as though any and all criticism of Israeli policies in any way constitutes anti-semitism whenever it’s convenient to accuse someone of that. It is possible to support a nation while still criticizing it’s policies, though apparently that isn’t true in this case.
Neither one of the two sample statements you made is anti-Semitic. If one makes it clear that what’s criticized is Israel’s policies (whether it’s criticism of specific policies or criticism of Israel’s policies in general*) no accusations of anti-Semitism is valid.
Accusations of anti-Semitism are valid when/if one conflates Israel with Jews in such criticism or the criticism is intended as a rejection of Israel’s right to exist.
Of course at some point blanket criticism without specifics is not criticism but something else.
Here’s a more complete excerpt of Omar’s comments:
I want to talk about the political influence in this country that says its ok for people to push for allegiance to a foreign country. I want to ask, why is it ok for me to talk about the influence of the NRA, of fossil fuel industries, or Big Pharma, and not talk about a powerful lobbying group that is influencing policy.
She’s clearly talking about AIPAC. And it’s a damned good question that no one wants to answer.
So again…sorry Elliot but…every interest group that is offended is now going to ‘push’ for a resolution not to offend them? There isn’t a GROUP in the Congress that isn’t ‘offended’ by something.
Support? No, clearly, ‘support’ isn’t allegiance. A slavish devotion where blatantly criminal human rights abuses can’t be spoken about? Where snipers wearing body armor fire into crowds armed only with rocks they are too distant to be threatened by? Where illegal settlements continue to be established and expanded every year? And none of this can be condemned, because whatever actions that state takes must be supported?
Yeah, that comes pretty hard toward ‘allegiance’. That’s not a statement about Jewish members of Congress. It’s not a statement about Israel. It’s a statement about cowardly members of Congress, Jewish and Gentile alike (and it is far more common among Gentiles). Like the two-faced Gohmerts out there, howling their support for Israel… because they’re eager for their vengeful sky-fairy to condemn the Jews who will not submit to their beliefs. Because that duplicitous hate masquerading as support is anti-Semitic. And that refusal to acknowledge the misdeeds of our allies is cowardice. Neither cowardice, nor anti-Semitism should be tolerated among our leaders. And calling out the former should not be taken as the latter.
I agree with what you say, but will even go further, it is not anti-Semitic to say that Israel should not exist. One can also say that Palestine should not exist. My guess is that people holding both of these views are highly correlated with raciats, but the beliefs, views themselves are acceptable political/strategic views.
The problem is suggesting that someone who holds a view about Israel (or shoe on the other foot) Palestine does so as a result of dual loyalties (“allegiance to a foreign country) or a pay off of $100 bills.
I think most of the people defending Omar would be up in arms if democrats said her views were the result of Omar being in thrall to the Muslim religion and having allegence to terrorists, not America. This more extreme statement is in fact what republicans have said about Omar.
off of $100 bills.