Bad words

[supergee]

The president of the United States is acting in the interests of a foreign power because they own his ass after bailing him out of his many business failures, but saying that sumbnall* Jews are loyal to Israel as well as to the United States is an unprecedentedly evil slur.
*Some but not all (Robert Anton Wilson coinage). I, for instance, am not one.

Comments

[gingicat]

Israel is problematic in the extreme.

[cmcmck]

OFFS!

[arlie]

I think there is a difference between saying that some particular individual - let's call her "Sarah WellKnownName" is acting in the interests of/loyal to Israel (or Russia), as evidenced by (specific incidents), and saying that a whole category of people - or even an unspecified "some" of them - are acting in the interests of Israel (or Rome) because of their membership in/loyalty to their category, particularly if the category is something like religion.

It's pretty clear that a lot of Americans - one of them in the White House - bend over and do whatever Israel wants. I'm unclear whether there's any statistical tendency for Jewish Americans to do this more than others, but unless all pro-Israel Americans were Jewish, or all Jewish Americans were pro-Israeli, (both demonstrably not true) harping on that seems just part of the usual anti-Semitic thought process.

Frankly, most of the Jews I know tend toward disappointed and/or disgusted with Israel - both because they personally tend liberal, and because they have no more use for an Orthodox Jewish theocracy than I would - being from some other denomination, or even merely culturally Jewish.

[julian]

I'm perfectly happy for people to a) continue helping to educate Rep. Ilhan, while b) frequently questioning our foreign policy with regards to Israel, and c) holding others accountable for their anti-Semitism as well.

[lavendertook]

You can critique Israel without invoking antisemitism; Rep Ilhan is not managing to do that and she really needs to educate herself more on Israel and the history of antisemitism if she is to do useful work in this most daunting conflict. I' m sad to say it, but so does AOC.

I do think Pelosi would have done better to call out Ilhan's comment as antisemitism rather than make a party sanction against it which has turned it into an even bigger divisive mess. But Ilhan keeps stepping in it so I understand the move to escalate from informal condemnation to party sanction but I still think it's a mistake. I'm also becoming more skeptical that Ilhan's mistakes are not deliberate antisemitism. There's only so many times you get to step in it and maintain any credibility.

I really concur with Dana Milibank's editorial in the WaPo today.

[lavendertook]

"Merely" culturally Jewish you say? (-; Actually I consider myself culturally and ethnically Jewish and it impacts on my liminal racial identification as well and I am not a lesser Jew or Jewlite or sugar -free Jew for not being religious. My extra-Jewy center is just as good as theirs.

[arlie]

Oops - I didn't mean to be insulting there.

[marahmarie]

Is one to take the usericon you chose to mean that you're not aligned with Israel, or is it the other way around? (Immaterial to me either way, just curious.)

[supergee]

I used to be proud to be pro-Israel and I think it should continue to exist, but it keeps getting nastier. That's also how I feel about porn.