{"id":72741,"date":"2015-08-16T11:30:42","date_gmt":"2015-08-16T19:30:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=72741"},"modified":"2015-08-16T11:30:42","modified_gmt":"2015-08-16T19:30:42","slug":"the-bizarre-charge-that-obama-is-an-anti-semite","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=72741","title":{"rendered":"The Bizarre Charge That Obama Is An Anti-Semite"},"content":{"rendered":"

J.J. Goldberg writes<\/a>: The campaign against President Obama\u2019s Iran nuclear deal tends toward the apocalyptic even when it\u2019s in repose. Right now it\u2019s virtually jumping the rails, plunging into a swamp of anti-Obama conspiracy theory, with a gaggle of conservative pundits openly accusing the president of anti-Semitism.
\nThe charge has been a staple of the extreme far right since Obama first began his White House bid in 2007. Until recent weeks, though, it wasn\u2019t common in the mainstream. Now it\u2019s spreading like a chemical spill in a coal miner\u2019s backyard creek.
\nAs the theory goes, Obama\u2019s recent comment about money and lobbyists mobilizing to stop the deal is actually a veiled reference to Jewish donors and pro-Israel lobbyists. In mentioning them, he\u2019s supposedly trying to silence his opponents by threatening to unleash the anti-Semites.
\nNot that certain Jewish donors and a brigade of pro-Israel lobbyists aren\u2019t mobilizing to stop the deal. They are, energetically. It\u2019s just that it\u2019s rude to say so. The president is supposed to pretend he doesn\u2019t notice.
\nTechnically, the Jewish community is tangential to the main act. The actual showdown takes place in September on Capitol Hill. The fault line will be partisan, not religious. Until then, though, the theatrics are heavily populated by Jewish activists. Israel\u2019s welfare is Item No. 1 in the debate, at least for much of the opposition.
\nAnd lest we forget, the field marshal leading the anti-deal troops is Israel\u2019s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. His deliberate centrality to the drama radically enhances his American Jewish allies\u2019 visibility. In effect, Netanyahu has turned the Iran debate into a global battle of the Jewish people against the great world powers.
\nIt\u2019s fantastically foolhardy. Former Israeli justice minister Tzipi Livni is calling for an urgent Knesset inquiry into Netanyahu\u2019s anti-deal campaign, its legality and possible damage to Israel-U.S. relations.
\nStateside, the Obama-as-anti-Semite theme seems familiar, but it actually surfaced suddenly. It happened July 22, right after the president appeared on \u201cThe Daily Show With Jon Stewart.\u201d The president said that if people favoring the deal contacted their representatives, they\u2019d be heard. Indeed, he said, \u201cthe same is true on every single issue. If people are engaged, eventually the political system responds. Despite the money, despite the lobbyists, it still responds.\u201d
\nA neutral observer might read this as a comment on America\u2019s current debate over money in politics and citizens\u2019 feeling of powerlessness in shaping policy. But some Jewish conservatives read it differently.
\nLee Smith, right-wing political columnist for the online magazine Tablet, called it a \u201cdog-whistle.\u201d He claimed Obama was \u201chinting broadly at anti-Semitic conceits \u2014 like dual loyalties, moneyed interests, Jewish lobbies \u2014 to scare off Democrats tempted to vote against\u201d the deal. He predicted that if any Democrats did oppose it, Obama was \u201cgoing to tar them as dual loyalists who are willing to send Americans out to make war on behalf of Jewish causes.\u201d That\u2019s a dramatic prediction, based on rather slim evidence. But it\u2019s classic Smith.
\nJonathan Tobin, online editor of Commentary, called the \u201cDaily Show\u201d comment a \u201csmear.\u201d When the president predicts that war will result from the deal\u2019s defeat, Tobin wrote, he\u2019s labeling opponents \u201cwarmongers.\u201d And since \u201cmoney and lobbyists\u201d is obviously code for \u201cJews,\u201d Obama is calling Jews warmongers, ready to send other people\u2019s sons to die.
\nTobin further dismissed Obama\u2019s claim that the \u201conly alternative to his appeasement of Iran would be war.\u201d Now, you might think calling Obama\u2019s negotiation \u201cappeasement\u201d is itself a smear, implicitly identifying Obama with Neville Chamberlain, who handed Czechoslovakia to Hitler in 1938. But one man\u2019s smear is another man\u2019s Speaking Truth To Power.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

J.J. Goldberg writes: The campaign against President Obama\u2019s Iran nuclear deal tends toward the apocalyptic even when it\u2019s in repose. Right now it\u2019s virtually jumping the rails, plunging into a swamp of anti-Obama conspiracy theory, with a gaggle of conservative … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[605,1569,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anti-semitism","category-barack-obama","category-israel"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=72741"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72742,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72741\/revisions\/72742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=72741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=72741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=72741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}