The madness that penetrates Congress and the White House was smoothly transferred to the cavernous Walter E. Washington Convention Center that sheltered AIPAC’s yearly gathering in Washington D.C.
Vice President Mike Pence led the Republican crusade last week to exploit Jewish concerns, a spectacle which was shockingly shameless. He invoked Donald J. Trump’s so-called “total vindication” from Robert Mueller and lied about the scale of anti-Israel influence among Democrats in the House of Representatives.
My jaw dropped when in a televised address Pence declared, “After two years of investigation and reckless accusations by many Democrats and members of the media, the special counsel confirmed what President Trump said all along: There was no collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 election and the attorney general confirmed there was no obstruction of justice.
“This was a total vindication of the president…and it should be welcomed by every American,” Pence continued. “Even if some Democrats want to spend more time on discredited allegations…the president and I are going to continue to focus where we always have, on the issues that are most important to our country.”
Then when he took on anti-Israel House Democrats, he falsely proclaimed: “It’s astonishing to think that (the) party of Harry Truman, which did so much to create the state of Israel, has been co-opted by people who promote rank anti-Semitic rhetoric and work to undermine the broad American consensus of support for Israel.”
Mazel tov, Mr. Vice President. You matched Ilhan Omar and company for abrasiveness, insensitivity and distortions in reference to American Jews. You stood before a crowd of 18,000 supporters of Israel and brazenly politicized a life-and-death issue. The host organization, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, ostensibly represents the concerns of Israel’s supporters in America.
During a heavy news week, the media obscured coverage of Pence and other Republicans at AIPAC’s conference in Washington, D.C. I happened to switch on the television when Pence appeared, and newspapers like The New York Times and The Philadelphia Inquirer either omitted or buried the comments of the vice president and other Republican speakers.
Pence accuses the Democrats of being “co-opted?” Democrats in the House are engaged in a delicate balancing act, but they have not been “co-opted.” Omar and three other House Democrats have voiced hostility toward Israel – out of 235 Democrats in the House. What’s worrisome is whether their numbers multiply to the point that they could control the party in 2021 or afterwards, as happened with Britain’s Labour Party.
Perhaps House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should remove Omar from the Foreign Affairs Committee, but does it matter? Omar’s status as a congresswoman will last until January 2021, and the best resolution is to oust her from her seat (from Minneapolis) as well as Rashida Tlaib (from Detroit) and Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (from Queens/Bronx) in their Democratic primaries more than one year away. Their districts are heavily Democratic. The fourth Democrat is Mark Pocan of Madison, Wisconsin.
Pence’s announcement of Trump’s “total vindication” was even more crass. What does the Mueller report have to do with existential threats to Israel? The question of collusion or obstruction is widely debated, and the AIPAC confab was not the place to address it. American Jews have much reason to be offended by that alone.
The politicking persisted. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly praised Trump in a televised address. David Friedman, our ambassador to Israel, listed Trump’s so-called accomplishments for Israel and with every single one asked if we should “leave it to another administration?” Sen. James Risch of Idaho hewed closely to facts, except when he implicated Democrats, saying, “…We need to mention…the elephant – well, in this case, the donkey in the room, and that is the part that dealt with BDS legislation.”
“Donkey” is a common symbol for Democrats, and S1 is a Senate bill to curb the Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions movement targeted to damage Israel’s economy.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell mentioned a few misrepresentations, saying, “I’ve heard it suggested that our support for Israel is explained away by money, or by secret dual loyalty of our Jewish friends in Congress…I’ve heard even worse anti-Semitic slurs…For many years, such slurs and tropes were limited to the fringes. Sadly, they have recently received new prominence, having been repeated and retweeted by a sitting member of Congress.”
While the malice toward Jews and Israel has worsened, one member of Congress still constitutes “the fringes.” Well, four for that matter.
Then there was this McConnell doozy: “Hate in all its forms deserves swift and thorough action.”
McConnell saw no need for “swift action” when the supremacist invasion of Charlottesville, Va., prompted Trump to comment, “I think there’s blame on both sides.”
Republican advocacy for Israel merits our gratitude. They sound as convincing about Israel as Democrats do about domestic issues, and yet the GOP still makes serious mistakes. By leading the invasion of Iraq, Republicans blundered into strengthening Iran, which now threatens the entire region.
The GOP has sufficient ammunition to criticize Democrats for pro-Arab extremism, and they do not need to embellish. That helps nobody.
Democrats fired back, with Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer probably putting it best: “The foundation of our relationship must remain bipartisan as it has been for decades…Those who seek to use Israel as a means to scoring political points do a disservice to both Israel and the United States.”
Republished from San Diego Jewish World