Representative Ilhan Omar is getting a lot of well-deserved grief for her (latest) dimwitted tweets:
It's all about the Benjamins baby 🎶 https://t.co/KatcXJnZLV
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) February 10, 2019
AIPAC! https://t.co/UdzaFUEfrh
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) February 11, 2019
The usual Twitter mobs were unleashed in her defense. If you search Twitter for AIPAC, you’ll find all sorts of crazy talk about “foreign lobbyists” and the stranglehold the perfidious bagel-snarfers have on our democracy including from some fairly prominent figures:
so are we just not allowed to talk about how israeli lobbyists have a hold on the gop https://t.co/tjhlmjLUqM
— Ashley Feinberg (@ashleyfeinberg) February 11, 2019
So, let us get this straight. It is "Anti-Semitism" to point out that the most powerful political moneybags in American politics are Zionists who put another nation's interest (israel's) over that of America ?????? https://t.co/2e1QbIxOGp
— David Duke (@DrDavidDuke) February 11, 2019
Of course, it’s no surprise that Omar believes this garbage. It’s one of the lazier and most timeless talking points of a rogue’s gallery of cranks, Islamists, and, of course, anti-Semites of the Left and Right, as well as conspiracy theorists generally. Congress is “Israeli Occupied Territory” according to all the worst people.
…….
Israel is popular with a number of important constituencies including many Jews (imagine that). But its real popularity resides among evangelical Christians and voters generally. And, despite its perfectly debatable flaws, real and alleged, it should be popular. It’s an ally. It’s democratic. It’s Western. And its enemies are largely our enemies. It’s no coincidence it’s listed as the “Little Satan” alongside the “Great Satan” that is America, by some of the most evil and backward regimes in the world.
But as with guns, Israel’s detractors cannot imagine that Congress — or Americans generally — could support Israel in good faith. It must be because of the evil string-pulling jooz spreading around their filthy Benjamins that we haven’t thrown her under the bus. This socialism of fools is a very old story and the idea that those who traffic in it are just “realists” telling it like it is an old trope as well.
If they understood how old it is, and what has been done in furtherance of such conspiracy theories, they might even understand why some people think it’s worth fighting against such people, even in the form of lobbying Congress. Indeed, they might even understand that they have the causality backward. The “Israel Lobby” exists precisely because people like Omar and her defenders make it necessary for it to exist.
- Discussion
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