Alan Dershowitz has wielded the anti-Semitism charge against any critic of Israel, including Jimmy Carter, Desmond Tutu, and Judge Richard Goldstone, for many years. But he defends Trump advisor Steve Bannon against the charge, saying the evidence must be “overwhelming,” out of a need to suck up to Donald Trump over his Israel policy.
Trump’s combination of rightwing extremism and love for Israel will cause American Jews to come out against the Israeli government and its policies, observers say, thereby accelerating the divide between liberal American Jews and the Jewish state, which is practicing apartheid.
The rightwing Israel supporters have redefined anti-Semitism to be criticism of Israel. Now an accused anti-Semite, Steve Bannon, is set to enter the White House as a Trump adviser and many Israel supporters have nothing to say, and the New York Times downplays the appointment, because Trump has said that he is pro-Israel. The Israel lobby is swallowing its own medicine.
According to a recent survey, Muslims are the least politically engaged religious group in the U.S. (among Jews and Christians and themselves), though the level of political engagement is likely to change after this election. As Imam Zaid Shakir in Austin, TX says, “We are in the battle of ideas – not a physical battle – but one of fighting racism and discrimination. This is our battle.”
Over the weekend Interim Democratic boss Donna Brazile, attended a conference organized by the David Horowitz’s Islamophobic think tank Freedom Center. It featured rightwing intolerants, Mike Huckabee, Steve Bannon, Robert Spencer and Caroline Glick, the Israeli who denies the Nakba and the existence of Palestinian refugees. Brazile may think that she can hold the party together with Islamophobic elements, but the party is moving on. Sen. Chuck Schumer has endorsed Rep. Keith Ellison, a Muslim, to fill the position Brazile holds in a nod to the party’s left wing.
Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, which President Obama pursued, will likely not recur under President Trump, according to a leaked document produced by Israel’s ministry of foreign affairs.
If Newt Gingrich is being bandied as Secretary of State under Trump, it’s surely because billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who funded the Trump campaign, share’s Gingrich’s outlook. “I happen to believe what our friend Newt Gingrich said is true,” Adelson says. Palestinians are “a made up people.”
Donald Trump will be ‘most pro-Israel’ president, says David Friedman, bankruptcy expert. The other chair of Trump’s Israel Advisory Committee is Jason Greenblatt, a real estate attorney who once lived in a settlement.
Israeli rightwingers are enthused by Donald Trump’s victory, predicting that he will move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and abandon the peace process too.
Abir Kopty writes about how Donald Trump’s election victory is being viewed from the Middle East: “They see Trump as representing the true face of America: white supremacy. He does not try to beautify racism, elitism, xenophobia behind rhetorics, he says it as it is. They think for what America has done in the world, this is what suits it best. Others are wary his deeds as a president, internally and towards the outside. However, both camps agree on one thing: He is a very bad choice. And he is no different than the leaders we are fighting to overthrow here.”