The MRC's Partisan Interpretation Of 'Anti-Semitic'

The Media Research Center had trouble criticizing Kanye West's anti-Semitism, but it rushed to proclaim without explanation that Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar's criticism of Israel is "anti-Semitic." PLUS: The MRC defended Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones against charges of racism after an old photo resurfaced.

By Terry Krepel
Posted 5/26/2023

Ilhan Omar

Indeed, Omar has been a longtime MRC target for building a narrative of anti-Semitism around her. In February 2022, Curtis Houck complained that Stephen Colbert called out Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for not quickly denouncing neo-Nazis but "ignored DeSantis emphasizing how anti-Semitism is a scourge inside the left as they’ve chosen to include open anti-Semites in the halls of Congress like Ilhan Omar (MN). In an April 2022 post, Matt Philbin sneered when Omar called out right-wing Christian travelers who inflicted their religion on their fellow plane passengers by holding a loud prayer session: "It’s not just Jews. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn, doesn’t seem to like Christians much, either.

As the MRC was desperate to downplay the Kanye/Trump drama, it was quite eager to attack Omar's alleged anti-Semitism -- particularly as Republicans taking control of the House meant that they would purge designated Democratic enemies like Omar off committees. Nicholas Fondacaro raged in a Nov. 22 post when a co-host on "The View" defended her:

Up in arms that possible House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) promised to strip extremist Democrats of their committee assignments when/if he becomes speaker of the House, including Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, The View took to downplaying her rabid anti-Semitism on Tuesday and giving a full-throated defense of her anti-American comments comparing the United States to terrorist groups like Hamas and the Taliban.

Despite admitting that Omar had used disparaging tropes about the Jews and money, racist co-host Sunny Hostin whined that McCarthy’s repeated references to them were somehow harmful “tropes” against her. “She committed to learning more. We’ve never heard her say anything like that again,” she falsely declared, pointing to their midterm win percentages as a bizarre argument against McCarthy.

Hostin then tried to use her big brain to hint that McCarthy attacking Omar, a popular politician on the left, was somehow racist code for the Republican base:

So, I think it's very interesting that the people he chooses to attack are the very same people that he thinks his base wants attacked. That says something about where the Republican Party is today.

In recent months, co-host Sara Haines has become the only cast member willing to stand up to Hostin when she’s spewing nonsense. And she did it again in this instance as she called out how Omar had compared the U.S. and Israel to the terrorist organizations of Hamas and the Taliban.

Hostin and co-hosts Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar immediately jumped to Omar’s defense arguing that what she said was true “depending on who you talk to”:

The Omar remark to which he's referring is so entrenched on the right that Fondacaro didn't feel the need to explain or elaborate. It comes from a 2021 remark in which she noted that "we have seen unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban"; she later clarified to note that “I was in no way equating terrorist organizations with democratic countries with well-established judicial systems."

Note that Fondacaro also did not dispute the accuracy of Omar's statement but instead rushed to smear her as anti-Semitic for saying it; he also did not explain how it was "false" for Hostin to say Omar is "committed to learning more."

Kevin Tober called Omar a "noted anti-Semite" in a Nov. 26 post, unironically linking to a 2019 NPR story on Omar's "criticism of Israel," thus again conflating any criticism of Israel to anti-Semitism (and blowing up the MRC's narrative about NPR being hopelessly biased). Jeffrey Lord gushed over McCarthy's plans in his column the same day:

The liberal media loved Pelosi for forcing the Republican Rep. [Marjorie Taylor] Greene off her committee assignments for, among other things, anti-Semitism. McCarthy warned of the precedent this would set, but he went unheeded.

Now McCarthy has turned the tables. Democrat Rep. Omar has been seriously accused -- as was Greene -- of anti-Semitism. Infamously Omar had written of AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, “It’s all about the Benjamins baby.” An uproar ensued. On another occasion Omar had cited what she called “unthinkable atrocities committed by the US, Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan and the Taliban.”

The MRC portrayed Greene as a victim because her anti-Semitism (Jewish space lasers, anyone?) and extremism was called out and even whined that she was being compared to Omar.

In his Dec. 3 column, Lord touted right-wing radio host Chris Salcedo playing whataboutism over Trump dining with Ye and Fuentes, highlighting that he declared "Fuentes is every bit as anti-Semitic as 'AOC, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, and Louis Farrakhan are.' For Trump to dine with Ye and Fuentes, he said, was just as bad as if he 'broke bread with Ilhan Omar, the leaders of BLM, or Linda Sarsour, or any leftwing Jew hater.'"

As new Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy moved toward kicking Omar off House committees as revenge for Democrats denying committee seats to extremists like Marjorie Taylor Greene, the MRC hauled the label out again. A Jan. 29 post by Mark Finkelstein complained that MSNBC's Mark Finkelstein referenced "the danger that Trump poses to this country" during a visit to Auschwitz and brought up how Trump leans into white supremacism with Doug Emhoff, husband of Vice President Kamala Harris, which Finkelstein countered with Omar whataboutism:

In decrying anti-semitism in the US, the only example Emhoff gave was of the tiki-torch-carrying white nationalists at Charlottesville. And—in a clear shot at Trump—he decried "so-called leaders who see this stuff, hear this stuff, and they know better. And they don't say a word. They don't say a word because some lack courage."

Not a peep from Emhoff about black anti-semitism —something that is by no means limited to the likes of Kanye West or Kyrie Irving. This 2022 analysis of black anti-semitism in America cites a study indicating that 36% of black Americans hold "strong anti-semitic beliefs" a percentage that rises ro 42% among black liberals.

And then there is Arab-American anti-semitism, as exemplified by Squad members Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib. Again, not a word on that from the Second Gentleman.

Finkelstein didn't mention how his employer had trouble criticizing the anti-Semitism of West and Irving, nor did he acknowledge that Trump does, in fact, use anti-Semitic tropes.

The same day, Kevin Tober cheered that in "random act of journalism," Omar was asked about her "anti-Semitic comments" in an appearance on CNN:

Finally, [host Dana] Bash turned to Congresswoman Ilhan Omar and went through the comprehensive list of anti-Semetic comments she’s made over the years which are responsible for her pending removal from the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

“I'm told that Republicans presented a list in their meeting, in their private meeting this past week, included in that list, is that you said that Israel hypnotized the world. You said that Israel is an apartheid regime,” Bash noted.

Continuing to list her disgusting comments, Bash recalled how Omar said “politicians with pro-Israel stances were all about the benjamins, which you very notably apologized for, that you support the BDS movement, which a lot of people think is rooted in anti-semitism, compared the U.S. and Israel to Hamas and the Taliban. I want to give you a chance to respond to all of that, which they say is a clear pattern.”

Tober didn't explain how Omar's criticism of Israel equates to anti-Semitism. Alex Christy played the same evidence-free equivocation in a Feb. 2 post:

The Thursday edition of Andrea Mitchell Reports on MSNBC was in full spin mode as Republicans prepared to kick Rep. Ilhan Omar off the Foreign Affairs Committee for her history of anti-Semitic statements, but according to Mitchell it was simply “criticism of Israel.” Meanwhile, Washington correspondent Yamiche Alcindor alleged that Republican hypocrisy is the real story.

Mitchell kicked off her show by explaining, “This breaking news, now you've just watched it on the House floor. A heated debate is under way leading up to Republicans planning to hold that vote this hour to remove Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar from the Foreign Affairs Committee over her frequent criticism of Israel. She later apologized for some of those-- her comments but stood by others. Omar is a Somali refugee and one of the first Muslim Americans to serve in Congress.”

What is the criticism behind allegations of hypnotism, dual loyalty, and financial puppeteering? And what does being a Muslim and Somali refugee have to do with anything?

Still, a few minutes into the segment, Mitchell returned to the latter idea and, ignoring that Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell are neither Muslims nor immigrants from Somalia, asked Alcindor, “So, Yamiche, Congresswoman Omar is saying that she's being targeted because she's an immigrant, because she was Somali-born. She showed that picture of herself as a 9-year-old refugee.”

Instead of explaining why he believes any criticism of Israel is anti-Semitic, Christy complained that Alcindor accurately observed that Trump "has said all sorts of things that people see as anti-Semitic," then tried to play whataboutism with that by linking to a old Fox News article noting that Barack Obama appeared in a picture 20 years ago with Louis Farrakhan and huffing, "Alcindor should stay on topic because she probably does not want to take that argument to its logical conclusion." Yes, whataboutism would be a logical conclusion for Christy.

The next day, the MRC made Omar its designated enemy of the day. Tober attacked an MSNBC segment in who "went into an anti-Semitic and anti-Israel tirade accusing the state of Israel of being a terrorist state and turning the West Bank into an apartheid state," which he claimed "sounded like it was written by anti-Semites like Ilhan Omar." Later that day, Christy returned to whine that NBC's Seth Meyers called out McCarthy's pettiness in kicking Omar off committees and calling it right-wing cancel culture:

After playing clips of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene talking about Critical Race Theory, Meyers transitioned to a new topic, “So that's who the GOP thinks should be able to serve on committees. Meanwhile, today they voted to kick Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, a refugee and one of the only two Muslim women in the House, off the Foreign Affairs Committee for the simple reason that they don't like her or her point of view.”

[...]

As for Omar, simply applying the same standard to Omar that Democrats applied to Greene is not “cancel culture.”

Christy did manage to refrain from calling Omar "anti-Semitic."

A Feb. 3 post by Finkelstein raged at Scarborough for daring to suggest that Omar's criticism of Israel may not be anti-Semitic:

Today, Morning Joe's virtue-signaling spotlight turned to the ouster, by a vote of Republicans, of far-left Representative Ilhan Omar from her seat on the House Foreign Affairs committee.

Scarborough spoke of some of Omar's past comments having been "considered" to be antisemitic.

"Considered?" As a sitting Member of Congress, Omar said that support of Israel by US politicians was "all about the Benjamins."

When Omar was subsequently asked who she thought was paying American politicians to be pro-Israel, she replied: “AIPAC"—the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.

Although Omar subsequently mouthed an apology, as recently as this past weekend she claimed that when she made the statement, she was unaware of the "Jews and money" trope. Riiiiight.

Nicholas Fondacaro cheered that "The View" co-host Sunny Hostin (whom he brands as "racist" because he doesn't understand how metaphors work) got a verbal beatdown from the other co-hosts for defending Omar:

With co-host Whoopi Goldberg taking here usual Friday off, most of The View cast seemed to feel empowered to confront racist Sunny Hostin after she tried to defend Ilhan Omar, the antisemitism Minnesota Democratic Congresswoman who, after spewing hate for years, was punished on Thursday for when she was stripped of her position on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Hostin was caught off guard, scrambling to take swipes as co-host Joy Behar led Sara Haines and Alyssa Farah Griffin in the pile-on.

In the last of five posts on Feb. 3, Tim Graham had a right-wing anti-Omar author on his podcast to help him bash her:

As the House voted to remove far-left Rep. Ilhan Omar from the House Foreign Affairs Committee, the bluest media (like Morning Joe) said they would stand proudly with Omar and against GOP "hypocrisy." Scarborough would only say Omar's antisemitic rantings were "considered antisemitic," and hey, she apologized. CNN put on Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to suggest the GOP were committing "stochastic terrorism" and Omar was being punished for being a Woman of Color.

Benjamin Weingarten joins the show to explain the whole scene. He's Deputy Editor at RealClearInvestigations, a Senior Contributor to The Federalist, and author of American Ingrate: Ilhan Omar and the Progressive-Islamist Takeover of the Democratic Party. We discussed Omar's dishonest claim on CNN on Sunday that she had no idea that her mockery of Americans being bought off by Jewish money was an antisemitic trope, and how Omar had to unruffle feathers in Minneapolis about her rants before she ever moved to Washington.

Weingarten credits Republicans for laying out in a resolution all of the reasons Omar deserves to be removed from a committee on American foreign policy -- starting with her tweet suggesting America has committed "unthinkable atrocities" just like terrorist groups Hamas and the Taliban. In a speech last year, he said our media "smears those who disagree with it as not only deplorable, and irredeemable, but terroristic."

Jeffrey Lord used his Feb. 4 column to cheer Omar being removed "because of her blatant and repeated anti-Semitism," going to use her to smear Democrats as a whole:

But the bottom line is that as created and as it has evolved the Democrat Party [sic] of today exists in a culture of race and racism. Everything is about race.

Which can easily explain why this latest episode with The Squad has happened in the first place. Congresswoman Omar is not viewed by The Squad as what, in fact, she is: an American. And a Member of Congress. Neither of which terms have any relationship to skin color. No. The Squad demands that she be judged on her skin color.

[...]

Where is the liberal media when it comes to educating Americans that the Democratic Party of staunch support for Jews and the Jewish state has now dissolved into a sewer of anti-Semitism?

Says the guy who gave a pass to Trump leaning into anti-Semitism because he pushed right-wing pro-Israel talking points.

In contrast to its lashing out at Hostin, the MRC was completely silent when podcaster Joe Rogan defended Omar by insisting her "all about the Benjamins" remark was "not an anti-Semitic statement" and that "she’s just talking about money." Then he arguably went further than Omar did, claiming that "The idea that Jewish people are not into money is ridiculous. That’s like saying Italians aren’t into pizza. It’s f—ing stupid. It’s f—ing stupid." But then, the MRC spent a good chunk of last year defending Rogan after he got called out for spreading COVID misinformation, so his anti-Semitic leanings get the same pass from the MRC it gave to Trump.

Defending Jerry Jones

Meanwhile, the MRC found another dubious character to defend: Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, after the Washington Post found a 1950s picture of a teenage Jones among a crowd of segregationists harassing a group of black students integrating a high school in North Little Rock, Ark., where he grew up. An outraged Dec. 1 post by Maxson was in full lash-out mode -- not at Jones, of course, but at the Post for exposing what Jones did and at LeBron James for commenting on it:

We know that LeBron James is more than an athlete and the Washington Post sports section is more than a sports section. They’ve told us so. On Wednesday night, James took on members of the media in condescending fashion after a Lakers’ game about why they did not question his reaction to an ages-old photo of Cowboys’ owner Jerry Jones watching desegregation efforts in Arkansas.

The Washington Post’s race-baiting SJW’s (who take a backseat to nobody -- not even James -- in their self-regard) are doing a series castigating the NFL for not hiring more black coaches. Last week the installment centered in on the photo of Jones watching racial intimidation in Arkansas as a 14-year-old boy. Jones was quoted saying he was present to watch the event out of curiosity and he did not participate in it.

The Post headline belittled Jones as a man who transformed the NFL, except when it comes to race. He was photographed in Arkansas during a time of racial conflict, and he’s never hired a black man to coach the Cowboys. He’s risen to power in the confederacy of the pro football plutocracy, the Post story goes, in part based on the cultural effect of Jim Crow of his youth. It’s character assassination at its finest.

Maxson didn't explain why it was "race-baiting" for the Post to accurately report on the Cowboys' dismal record on coaches, or why it was "character assassination" to report accurate information about that and the photo -- or why he censored that the Post also reported that under Jones' Cowboys ownership, "just two of the team’s offensive or defensive coordinators, the steppingstones to head coaching positions, have been Black, including none since 2008."

Maxson then complained that James "was miffed that the media had recently jumped all over the Brooklyn Nets’ Kyrie Irving for anti-semitism and why Jones wasn’t canceled over a photo of Jones resurrected from 1957," going on to huff:

Getting back to James, while constantly running interference for his evil Communist Chinese benefactors, he assumed that Jones was guilty of something for just having watched race relations boil over in Arkansas so long ago. Jones also opposed anthem kneeling in 2017, putting a target on his back for social justice warriors. James is no longer the Dallas Cowboys fan he used to be.

Irving was suspended in November because he posted a link on social media to a documentary that included antisemitic tropes, and he has since apologized. The media typically feeds James’ massive ego and sought out his opinion on that issue. He craved for the same attention over Jones.

Maxson didn't mention that his MRC colleagues had trouble criticizing Irving's fit of anti-Semitism, with Maxson himself (or herself) playing the whataboutism card. And he played whataboutism here too, insisting that James was somehow a bigger racist than Jones.

In that vein, the closest thing to a forceful criticism of Irving's anti-Semitism by the MRC came in a Dec. 1 post by Mark Finkelstein -- and it happened only because Finkelstein was defending Jones and criticizing James:

What's next, Don Lemon: "whether or not you agree with the people hanging 'Kanye Is Right' banners?"

Lemon hosted a segment on Thursday's CNN This Morning to discuss LeBron James complaining that his old Cavaliers teammate Kyrie Irving has been subjected to intense criticism over his promotion of an antisemitic book and movie, whereas there has been relatively little attention paid to a photo that recently published by The Washington Post showing a 14-year-old Jerry Jones, now owner of the Dallas Cowboys, in a crowd blocking black children from entering a North Little Rock school in 1957.

Jones claims he was curious, but not a participant in the event. He was 14. Kyrie Irving is 30.

At one point, Lemon said of LeBron's statement:

"I've been making a very similar point, that there are a lot of people, whether you agree with Kyrie Irving or not, but there are a lot of people who feel the same way that LeBron James does."

So, there are two legitimate sides to this, Don? Those that agree with Irving that it is worthwhile to promote vile antisemitic tropes, including Holocaust denial, and those that don't?

To paraphrase a former president, are there "very fine people" on both sides of Kyrie Irving's promotion of antisemitism, Don?

Meanwhile, Nicholas Fondacaro suddenly found harsh words to condemn West's anti-Semitism in a Dec. 2 post that, again, came in the context of trying to defend Jones and attack James:

Racist Sunny Hostin was at it again on Friday’s edition of The View. During a discussion about Kanye West’s heinous comments spouting anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial, the ABC co-host demanded a “limitation” on the First Amendment. Something she surely doesn’t intend to apply to her, as she followed up with a disgusting assertion that Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones could have been in the KKK when he was 14.

[...]

The condemnation of West and his ilk was broken by co-host Ana Navarro, who hijacked the conversation to draw attention to Jones. She began the detour agreeing with basketball player LeBron James’s hypocritical gripe that people go to him for his opinion on matters dealing with race and bigotry.

“LeBron made the point that he gets all these questions about Kyrie Irving, about everybody else, and all these things. He says, you guys haven't asked me about Jerry Jones and why the disparate attention?” she said.

They missed the obvious point that James gets people asking him about those things because he’s put himself out there as an activist on the issue of so-called “social justice.” He gets asked about Irving because he’s a fellow player in his league, while Jones is an owner in a different one. Meanwhile, The View doesn’t have an issue with James’s silence on China’s genocide of the Uyghurs.

“I hope Jerry Jones really does take the opportunity to own this, to talk about it, to explain it and to talk about the change that has happened in 65 years, and his role in it,” Navarro proclaimed, saying he’s someone “who has so many black players, who has such a platform, who has all this money, who's got all this access”

In the 1957 photo in question, a 14-year-old Jones can be seen craning his neck from what The Washington Post reluctantly admits is “yards” away from other teens blocking passage of black students from entering a high school. And Hostin admitted Jones “claims he was just a casual observer at that event.”

Joy Behar pointed out that Jones, who’s now 80, was only 14 in 1957. But Hostin countered, pointing to how other kids Jones’s age at the time were in the KKK, seemingly hinting at the possibility that Jones could have been one of them:

On the subject of China, Fondacaro seems to have forgotten that his employer hypocritically stopped criticizing Elon Musk for being too cozy with those commies when he got interested in buying Twitter in order to own the libs. Instead, Fondacaro is demonstrating yet again that the MRC cares about criticizing racism or anti-Semitism only when doing so advances its partisan right-wing narratives, and they have little interest in unequivocal criticism of their fellow right-wingers.