{"id":180878,"date":"2016-12-04T19:54:00","date_gmt":"2016-12-05T00:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2016\/12\/04\/when-youve-lost-the-forward\/"},"modified":"2016-12-04T19:54:00","modified_gmt":"2016-12-05T00:54:00","slug":"when-youve-lost-the-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2016\/12\/04\/when-youve-lost-the-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"When You’ve Lost the Forward\u2026\u2026\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

The battle for the next head of the DCCC is heating up, and it appears that someone is concerned that Keith Ellison is jeopardizing their phony baloney jobs,*<\/sup> because they are casting broad aspersions of antisemitism. <\/p>\n

A number of outlets have called bullsh%$ on this most recently The Foreward<\/i>, formerly known as the Yiddish Daily Forward, which declares that his so-called antisemitic speech is a result of deliberately deceptive editing<\/a>:<\/p>\n

If you\u2019ve been following the uproar over Congressman Keith Ellison and his run for chairman of the Democratic National Committee, you might recall hearing about a 36-second audio clip<\/a> containing a snippet of an Ellison speech that, according to his critics, proves he\u2019s anti-Israel and shouldn\u2019t get the job. You may even have listened to the clip and been left wondering exactly what it means. <\/span>

<\/span>If so, you\u2019re in luck. The other 22 minutes of Ellison\u2019s speech are now available for your listening pleasure. You can listen and make up your own mind. <\/span>

<\/span>Some background: The audio file captures Ellison, the first Muslim ever elected to Congress, addressing a 2010 campaign fundraising event for a fellow Muslim who was running (unsuccessfully) for the Virginia state legislature. Ellison is heard claiming that U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East is \u201cgoverned\u201d by \u201cwhat\u2019s good or bad\u201d for a certain nation of 7 million. Translation: Israel\u2019s welfare is a primary goal of American policy. <\/span>

<\/span>He goes on to say that American Muslims could wield their own influence on American policy if they got more involved in the political process. In other words, donate tonight and help the Muslim cause. More on that later.<\/span>

<\/span>\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span>

<\/span>I posted a piece<\/a> on Friday morning dissecting various bits of evidence that Ellison\u2019s critics cite to prove he\u2019s anti-Israel, including the 36-second audio. I expressed skepticism about the case against him. Regarding the audio, I wrote that it could just as easily be understood as a description of plain fact: that Israel\u2019s welfare ranks high among U.S. policy priorities and Muslims might have more influence if they were better organized. That Israel\u2019s advantage is held up not for condemnation so much as emulation.<\/span>

<\/span>It\u2019s worth noting that the first interpretation \u2014 the ADL\u2019s reading \u2014 accords with the image of Ellison as an Israel-hater that\u2019s popular in conservative Jewish circles. The second, more benign reading, on the other hand, jibes with the picture of Ellison portrayed by the Democratic leadership in Congress and virtually the entire leadership of the Jewish community in Ellison\u2019s hometown of Minneapolis-St. Paul, where he\u2019s consistently described as a friend and ally of the community and a supporter of Israel.<\/span>

<\/span>\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span>

<\/span>Well, on Friday afternoon I got an email from Steven Emerson. He wrote that there was no intention to leave the audience dangling, and that the full speech, audio and transcript, was about to be released. And sure enough, an hour later the full speech appeared on the project\u2019s website. Click here<\/a> to read and listen to the full 22-minute speech.<\/span>

<\/span>\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span>

<\/span>Fifth, in case anyone thought he was advocating extreme action, he\u2019s calling for \u201cpublic diplomacy.\u201d He says it twice. And, he adds, crucially: \u201cThis is not to say that I don\u2019t want the U.S. to be friends with Israel.\u201d (Having trouble sorting out all the double and triple negatives? Hint: He just said he wants the U.S. to be friends with Israel. To what he thought was a closed audience of Muslim activists.)<\/span>

<\/span>He continues: \u201cI just want the United States to have a lot of friends. And to be in a position with the friend to say \u2014 you are wrong and you must stop.\u201d (That is, Israel is and will continue to be a friend, but friends don\u2019t let friends drive drunk.)<\/span>

<\/span>Finally, here\u2019s his most conspiratorial-sounding statement: \u201cThat country\u201d \u2014 Israel \u2014 \u201chas mobilized its Diaspora in America to do its bidding in America.\u201d Sounds ominous, right? He\u2019s accusing AIPAC of doing a good job. But now he draws the lesson he wants to drive home to Muslims: \u201cThe question is, with all of us here, we ought to be able to do at least as much. You understand what I am trying to say? That we got a lot of work to do.\u201d That is, the Jewish community does effective work on its causes. Muslims should learn from them.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

While this is not an official OP\/ED of The Forward<\/i> editors, it is from its former editor-in-chief, Jonathan Jeremy \u201cJ.J.\u201d Goldberg.<\/p>\n

Rather unsurprisingly, this is all about a battle power, control, and money among the party apparatchiks.<\/p>\n

*<\/sup>One of the most vociferous condemnations of Ellison have come from Clintonistas and other members of the Democratic Party Nomenklatura such as Clinton megadonor Haim Saban<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The battle for the next head of the DCCC is heating up, and it appears that someone is concerned that Keith Ellison is jeopardizing their phony baloney jobs,* because they are casting broad aspersions of antisemitism. A number of outlets have called bullsh%$ on this most recently The Foreward, formerly known as the Yiddish Daily …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[889,804,799,816,824],"class_list":["post-180878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-antisemitism","tag-hypocrisy","tag-politics","tag-stupid","tag-wanker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180878"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180878\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}