Once again, elements of the American left are rushing to defend an anti-Semite, in this case Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib. Victor Davis Hanson, surveying several such recent outbursts, comments:

The far left is intertwined with Islamist activists. Both share a hatred of the U.S. and see the Middle East as a postcolonial victim of Western imperialism. . . . Radical Muslims and the left disguise their hatred of Jews by claiming that they are only championing downtrodden Palestinians. Few bother to ask them why a tiny democracy in a sea of autocracy is always singled out any time global attention turns to the question of refugees, disputed territories, or treatment of supposed religious minorities. In other words, the hater of Jews always says, “I have no problem with the Jewish people, but I do not like the imperialist and colonial policies of the Jewish state of Israel.” . . .

Anti-Semitism . . . is also deeply embedded among the elite black progressive community. Numerous contemporary African-American national leaders —Jesse Jackson (“Hymietown”), Al Sharpton (“If the Jews want to get it on, tell them to pin their yarmulkes back and come over to my house”), the Reverend Jeremiah Wright (“Them Jews aren’t going to let him [Obama] talk to me.”)—have at some point trafficked in anti-Semitism.

The Jew-hating Louis Farrakhan is no outlier. He has been prominent in the progressive Women’s March, has had his picture taken with a then-smiling Senator Barack Obama (the photo was repressed until after Obama left the presidency), and he was once close to the former Democratic National Party vice-chairman Keith Ellison. Representative Hank Johnson, like Farrakhan, has compared West Bank Jews to “termites.” . . .

In such old-new binaries, Jews and Israelis are now recast as “privileged whites.” So their frequent attackers expect immunity from condemnation; they seek refuge as marginalized people for whom charges of bias or privilege do not so readily apply. . . .

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.