Asked by a journalist to comment on the president’s executive order extending certain protections of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to Jews, the chief executive of the Central Conference of American Rabbis said that “it feels dangerous,” adding that she had “heard people say this feels like the first step toward us wearing yellow stars.” John Podhoretz comments:
In my view, part of the responsibility of leadership in a community is standing strong against those within who peddle vile, ignorant, weirdly self-justifying and self-infatuated argle-bargle. But of course, Rabbi Hara Person of the Central Conference of American Rabbis didn’t just “hear” people say these things. She clearly shares a belief in this awful, unspeakable, vile calumny—the slander that a president who agreed to a change in policy to aid American Jews on college campuses in their efforts to advocate for the Jewish state is an anti-Semite.
Now, I write this as someone who came under constant daily, even hourly, assault on social media in 2015 and 2016 from noxious Jew-haters who emerged from the dank American cultural sewers as the Trump campaign gathered steam. These repugnant creatures felt empowered by Trump’s cultural divisiveness and the hostile rhetoric he used toward illegal immigrants and simply applied them to Jews who were not falling in line. So I am more than mindful that the rise of Trump has been accompanied by a rise in anti-Semitic rhetoric—and, of course and tragically, the targeting of two synagogues.
But if he hates Jews, Donald Trump has a funny way of showing it—through acts that strengthen us and strengthen the nation-state of the Jewish people.
Read more on Commentary: https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the-reverse-blood-libel/