Pres. Trump, increasing anti-Semitism and Israel’s demand for war with Iran
Before I am accused of being anti-Semitic please note that most of the info has been sourced from an article by Steven Cruzo in the November 2019 issue of the South African Jewish Report.
United States Pres. Donald Trump faces impeachment over a July 2019 phone call by Trump to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky (also a Jew). Trump asked Zelensky to investigate former Vice-Pres. Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, over links to a shady Ukrainian energy company. Biden is the Democratic front runner against Trump in the Nov 2020 presidential elections.
The leading role of prominent Jewish Democrats in the impeachment is stoking anti-Semitic rhetoric by Trump and his supporters as they fight back. The main congressional committees involved are all chaired by Jewish legislators: Adam Schiff (intelligence), Jerry Nadler (judiciary) and Eliot Engel (foreign affairs). Some Jewish first-timers in congress, including Elaine Luria and Elissa Slotkin, wrote to the Washington Post requesting impeachment. The enquiry is led by Schiff (a Jew) who also led the Russian/Trump link to the 2016 election which proved nothing.
Trump and his fans are on the offensive, and have Jews in their cross-hairs. Schiff is referred to as “Shifty Schiff”. This plays on stereotypes of Jews as dishonest, untrustworthy, and manipulative. Journalist Peter Beinart “often plays notes that Trump on well-worn caricatures about deviousness, and physical weakness” when mentioning Jews, evoking anti-Semitic tropes.
In 2017, hate crimes against Jews or Jewish institutions in the US increased 37%. The attack at the Synagogue in Pittsburgh and the attack in New York at the home of a Rabbi are examples.
Trump has repeatedly disparaged Schiff and called him a traitor and a puppet of left-leaning Jewish billionaire George Soros. On 2 October, Trump tweeted, “We don’t call him ‘Shifty Schiff’ for nothing,” and told reporters, “He’s a shifty, dishonest guy.” The following day, he tweeted, “Schiff is a lowlife who should resign [at least!].” On 5 October, he retweeted a video clip from the Disney cartoon Pinocchio intercut with interviews with Schiff denying that he knew the whistle-blower’s identity. Trump headed the video “Lying’ Shifty Schiff!” Trump’s railing against Jews has a history. In August, he accused Jews who didn’t vote for him of being “dumb and disloyal”. He also said that neo-Nazi demonstrators were “very fine people”. It is likely that as the impeachment enquiry gathers momentum, so will the anti-Semitic outbursts and hints of Trump and his supporters. It is easy for Trump’s base and the right-leaning media like Fox News and Breitbart to believe that a nefarious Jewish plot to oust the president is at play. Jews are frequently seen as being at the heart of conspiracy theories, further fuelling anti- Semitism.
The question is, what does the Jewish “conspirators” want. One theory suggests that should Pres. Trump attack/invade Iran the impeachment will disappear. Israel desires the destruction of Iran and many American politicians serves Israel and not the interest of the American people.
Cllr Yagyah Adams