Berl Falbaum
Veteran Political Journalist/Author
Huh?
That was my reaction to all the sudden consternation about Donald Trump’s engage-ment with anti-Semitism.
Where has everyone been? Have the media and the political world all been wearing blinders and earplugs? There is nothing new in the implications of Trump having dinner with white supremacist, Nick Fuentes, and the anti-Semitic rapper, Ye.
Let’s review the record:
• In the 2016 campaign, Trump distributed an ad in which Hillary Clinton in surrounded by hundred-dollar bills inserted within a Star of David.
• A separate TV ad, with images of Jewish leaders, warned of a “global power structure” and “global special interests…that don’t have your good in mind.”
The language was reminiscent of the “Elders of the Protocols of Zion,” the notorious anti-Semitic fabricated text published in 1903 which holds that Jews are planning to control the world.
• During the 2016 Republican convention, the chat room overflowed with anti-Semitic messages while the former governor of Hawaii, Linda Lingle, who is Jewish, was speaking. The chat room was shut down while Trump and his campaign maintained they did not know anything about the hate messages.
• Trump’s slogan, “America First,” was first used by the pilot, Charles Lindbergh, a virulent anti-Semite.
• Once elected, Trump appointed as top advisors, Steve Bannon and Sebastian Gorka, both of whom had associations with anti-Semitism. At Trump’s inaugural celebration, Gorka wore an honorary pin he received from an Hungarian organization that had ties to Nazism.
• As president, he equated protestors for justice with white supremacists who were shouting, “Jews Will Not Replace Us” and claimed there were “very fine people on both sides.”
• At the ceremony marking the move of the U.S. embassy from Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem, he invited Pastor Robert J. Jeffress, Jr. to deliver the invocation. Jeffress believes Jews will go to Hell for their beliefs. (Previously, Jeffress was a guest at one of Trump’s White House Chanukah parties).
• At the same embassy ceremony, the benediction was delivered by Pastor John Charles Hagee. He believes that the Holocaust was God’s plan for Jews, stating that Hitler, “the hunter,” was doing God’s bidding.
(Former Republican presidential candidates, Mitt Romney and John McCain, both repudiated the support of Jeffress and Hagee given their repugnant reviews).
• Jonathan Weisman, in his book, “(((Semitism))) Being Jewish in the Age of Trump,” wrote that Trump ran the most anti-Semitic campaign in modern American history.
• Deborah E. Lipstadt, the respected historian and Holocaust scholar, discussing her book “Antisemitism: Here and Now,” observed: “I hate to say it, but an enabler [of anti-Semitism] on the right is our own president.”
• At a conference of the Israeli-American Council, Trump told the attendees, “You are brutal killers. Not nice people…” [Emphasis is mine]. But he was confident they would vote for him because, he said, they did not want to lose their “wealth tax.”
• A 1991 book reported that Trump told the writer: “Black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are little short guys that wear yarmulkes every day.” Asked about the statement, Trump said the quote is “probably true.”
• He frequently used the anti-Semitic trope that American Jews were guilty of dual loyalty, i.e., to Israel and the U.S. In one statement, he said that Jews who vote for Democrats show “either a total lack of knowledge or great disloyalty.”
While the political world overall ignored Trump’s trafficking in anti-Semitism, David Duke, the former Grand Wizard of the KKK, took notice. He said the night of Trump’s victory was the happiest of his life. Trump continually refused to disavow Duke or the KKK. He finally did so, succumbing to political pressure.
Duke’s colleague, Richard Spencer, the white-supremacist leader, greeted Trump’s victory with a “Hail Trump.”
So why the hoopla all of a sudden? What makes this incident more obnoxious than all the previous displays of anti-Semitism?
Yes, he is running again for president, but he was a candidate in 2016 when his anti-Semitism (and racism) should have stirred a firestorm as it has now.
Sadly, this Trump crisis, like so many others, will probably fade again given the short attention span of the media, and the selective memory of some in our body politic.
The problem: The seeds of anti-Semitism which Trump planted into the political mainstream and fertilized over the last six years will only continue to grow, especially given the haunting silence from so much of our political leadership. Kudos to Jonathan Greenblatt, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) CEO who, throughout the years, chastised Trump’s ugly politics.
The country, particularly the Jewish community, will pay a dear price for not recognizing the dangers of Trump’s wallowing in bigotry and not taking the appropriate actions to steer the country on a different course.
(Berl Falbaum is a veteran political columnist and author of 12 books.)
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