If you aren’t Jewish, then imagine for a moment that you are. And the fact that your people had just suffered the worst mass murder since the Holocaust.
All committed by people shouting the most Nazi-like slogans.
Imagine all that had only just happened.
And then imagine what it must have been like to have gone through these past few weeks.
To have seen crowds in American cities not even draw breath before turning out on the streets to celebrate the killings.
Imagine, what´s more, that instead of a great wave of sympathy and support, in city after city and campus after campus, it seemed like the country was turning on the Jews.
Instead of even giving them time to breathe and bury the dead, sick people everywhere suddenly crept out and openly celebrated the killing.
But there is a worse turn.
Which is that instead of people in a position of leadership being on your side, they decided instead to play identity politics.
And particularly — for political reasons — to offer sympathy to the co-religionists of the Jews’ killers.
That is what is happening right now.
On Wednesday, Vice President Kamala Harris had a big announcement:
A new strategy to counter “hate” in America.
Kamala may not be able to fix the southern border crisis.
Or much of anything.
But she does plan to eradicate “hate.”
After her success in this effort, I’m sure we can look forward to her getting rid of other human evils next.
Perhaps she could move on to “envy” or “gluttony”?
Who knows?
In any case, the veep had a very specific form of hatred she said she wants to fight.
And that is the thing called “Islamphobia.”
Personally, I do not care for this word. It has always seemed to me to be — as my late friend Christopher Hitchens put it — “a word created by fascists, and used by cowards, to manipulate morons.”
He must have seen Kamala coming.
Because on Wednesday Harris announced that the Biden-Harris administration was planning to leap into action and present a new “National Strategy to Counter Islamophobia.”
You might have thought that it is Jews who most need a strategy right now to counter Jew-hatred.
But no, despite the fact that the figures are in.
As FBI Director Christopher Wray said at a Senate hearing this week on hate crimes against Jews, “The reality is that the Jewish community is uniquely targeted by pretty much every terrorist organization across the spectrum. And when you look at a group that makes up 2.4%, roughly, of the American population, it should be jarring to everyone that that same population accounts for something like 60% of all religious-based hate crimes, and so they need our help.”
That’s quite a stat: 2.4% of the population, but 60% of the victims of hate crimes.
But Kamala doesn’t seem to know this figure, or doesn’t know what to do about it, and so on a video posted to X this week, she said, “For years, Muslims in America and those perceived to be Muslim have endured a disproportionate number of hate-fueled attacks. As a result of the Hamas terrorist attack in Israel and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, we have seen an uptick in anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents across America.”
Of course, if there is any such thing as “Islamophobia,” it has a very straightforward explanation.
“Islamophobia” is the expression of distaste many people feel about the murderous behavior of radical Muslims.
And while most Muslims in the West don’t engage in such acts, too many are willing to condone them, or fail to condemn them. A lot of people notice that and don’t like it.
But this stupid moral inversion is all that this administration seems to be capable of.
VP Harris’ statement echoed White House press spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre’s declaration that “For too long, Muslims in America, and those perceived to be Muslim, such as Arabs and Sikhs, have endured a disproportionate number of hate-fueled attacks and other discriminatory incidents.”
What people like KJP may not realize is that the false narrative they pump out gives cover to people who should have none.
For instance, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) is very keen to denounce her critics as “deeply Islamophobic.”
Whereas most people who dislike her dislike her because she is a Palestinian extremist.
One who finds it morally complex to condemn the deliberate murder and abduction of Jewish children.
But even the president is at it.
In a speech on October 20, he said, “I know many of you in the Muslim American community or the Arab American community, the Palestinian American community, and so many others are outraged and hurting, saying to yourselves, ‘Here we go again,’ with Islamophobia and distrust we saw after 9/11.”
In fact, considering the scale of the 9/11 attacks, it is a testament to the decency of the American people that there were so few attacks on or criticisms of Muslims in the US.
Had the followers of any other religion committed those acts, I would expect any backlash to have been far worse.
But contrary to the false narrative, there has been no spike in anti-Muslim hate.
And especially not since October 7.
Yet liars are going to lie.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is an organization that has been linked to numerous terrorist groups.
But it still claims to be the main Muslim spokesgroup in the US.
Which is a problem right there.
Its research and advocacy director, Corey Saylor, recently said, “Many companies have previously pledged their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace. Yet, the disregard for the Palestinian and Muslim employees affected by this current conflict has indicated otherwise.”
And that, of course, is simply not true.
There has been no “disregard for Palestinian and Muslim employees” in the US. It is a fiction created by CAIR to turn themselves into the victims.
But here’s the thing.
Muslims aren’t the victims here.
The Jews of Israel were.
And the Jews of the US now are, as part of that blowback.
So return to where I started.
Imagine you are a Jew.
And then imagine how it must feel to see your persecutors and tormentors — from Gaza to Brooklyn — being turned into the victims.
Sick, sick, sick.