After Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, in a hearing, slandered both her own country and the Jewish state by not only accusing them of “atrocities” but by placing them in the same category as Hamas and the Taliban, a handful of her Democratic colleagues issued a very gentle rebuke. Omar responded with much indignation, and her fellow members of the “Squad”—as she and other young hard-left House members have been dubbed—along with left-leaning pundits, rushed to her defense and joined in her outrage. Christine Rosen comments on what happened next:

No doubt as a result of a phone call from Democratic leaders, Omar, still insisting that she was being “taken out of context,” conceded that she was “in no way equating terrorist organizations with democratic countries.” The House Democratic leadership then issued a statement saying they “welcome the clarification” by Omar. This is the model Democrats followed in 2019 when Omar made anti-Semitic remarks and Democrats refused to condemn them outright. Instead, they passed a resolution condemning all bigotry, effectively condemning nothing at all. Democratic House leaders have failed to call out Omar’s remarks for what they are: clear evidence of her unfitness to serve on the House Foreign Relations Committee at the very least, and evidence of her continued poor judgment.

Of course, even this mild non-rebuke was too much for Omar’s fellow wing-women in the Squad. Representative Rashida Tlaib raged on Twitter that “Freedom of speech doesn’t exist for Muslim women in Congress. . . . House Democratic leadership should be ashamed of its relentless, exclusive tone policing of Congresswomen of color.” The Progressive Caucus in the House issued its own statement blaming a “right-wing media echo chamber” for the response to Omar’s remark.

Which is probably why Pelosi found herself backpedaling on CNN on Sunday.

Criticism of a public official for questionable or misleading statements she made in the course of doing her job, [however] isn’t “tone policing” or Islamophobia or racism. It’s part of the job of being a public servant; you have to answer for your public statements.

Last year, the Dubai-based television channel Al-Arabiya, the Times of Israel, and several other media organizations worked together to conduct numerous interviews with residents of the Gaza Strip, taking great pains to protect their identities. The result is a video series titled Whispers in Gaza, which presents a picture of life under Hamas’s tyranny unlike anything that can be found in the press. Jeff Jacoby writes:

Through official intimidation or social pressure, Gazans may face intense pressure to show support for Hamas and its murderous policies. So when Hamas organizes gaudy street revels to celebrate a terrorist attack—like the fireworks and sweets it arranged after a gunman murdered seven Israelis outside a Jerusalem synagogue Friday night—it can be a challenge to remember that there are many Palestinians who don’t rejoice at the murder of innocent Jews.

In one [interview], “Fatima” describes the persecution endured by her brother, a humble vegetable seller, after he refused to pay protection money to Hamas. The police arrested him on a trumped-up drug charge and locked him in prison. “They beat him repeatedly to make him confess to things he had nothing to do with,” she says. Then they threatened to kill him. Eventually he fled the country, leaving behind a family devastated by his absence.

For those of us who detest Hamas no less than for those who defend it, it is powerful to hear the voices of Palestinians like “Layla,” who is sickened by the constant exaltation of war and “resistance” in the Palestinian media. “If you’re a Gazan citizen who opposes war and says, ‘I don’t want war,’ you’re branded a traitor,” she tells her interviewer. “It’s forbidden to say you don’t want war.” So people keep quiet, she explains, for fear of being tarred as disloyal.