President Obama has frequently cautioned that Americans should take great care to avoid fomenting anti-Muslim passions in our reaction to the murderous activities regularly being perpetrated by terrorists in the name of Islam.
One wonders why, though, he seems to have no concern with the potential for anti-Semitic fallout from his full-court press against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over Netanyahu’s acceptance of House Speaker Boehner’s invitation to address Congress on the administration’s looming deal with Iran over its nuclear program.
One also marvels at his unwillingness to describe with precision the targets of jihadi attacks, whether Jews in Paris or Coptic Christians in Libya. Even though the terrorist who perpetrated the attack on the Hyper Cacher market in Paris told journalists during the siege that “I have 16 hostages and I have killed four; I targeted them because they were Jewish, ” the president and others in his administration attempted to whitewash the identities of both the terrorist and his victims.
Thus, in an interview with Vox, Mr. Obama responded to a question about whether “the media sometimes overstates the level of alarm people should have about terrorism” with this statement:
Look, the point is this: my first job is to protect the American people. It is entirely legitimate for the American people to be deeply concerned when you’ve got a bunch of violent, vicious zealots who behead people or randomly shoot a bunch of folks in a deli in Paris.
The president plainly wished to avoid noting that the site of the murders was a kosher market or that the targets were Jews, who could be expected to be there, especially on a Friday when the attack took place. He also chose not to let the word “Muslim” escape his lips, labeling the terrorists “who behead people” and “randomly shoot…folks in a deli” as “vicious zealots,” as if their Islamist beliefs have nothing to do with their actions.
Lest one think the president’s comments were unintentional, White House spokesman Josh Earnest removed any doubt that Mr. Obama knew what he was saying. Asked by a reporter whether the president had any doubt that the Paris deli was targeted because the terrorist knew Jews would be there, Earnest responded:
It is clear from the terrorists and the writings they put out afterward what their motivation was. The adverb that the president chose was used to indicate the individuals who were killed in that terrible, tragic incident were killed not because of who they were but because of where they randomly happened to be.
When the reporter pressed him, Earnest insisted that “There were people other than just Jews who were in that deli.”
When State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki was questioned by a reporter along the same lines – “Does the administration really believe that the victims of this attack were not singled out because they were of a particular faith?” – she replied, “Well, as you know, I believe if I remember the victims specifically, they were not all victims of one background or one nationality.”
One can only shake one’s head at these verbal somersaults that point to the absurd lengths the president and his spokespeople are prepared to go in order to shield Islam from any identification with the terrorists.
To be sure, both Mr. Earnest and Ms. Psaki quickly backtracked when their remarks drew widespread scorn on social media and in newspaper editorials, but it was clearly a matter of damage control. Their initial comments obviously reflected the administration’s thinking.
Contrast the president’s extreme reticence about offending Muslim sensibilities with his unabashed rebuff of Prime Minister Netanyahu. The president will not meet with him and he has pushed Democratic lawmakers to boycott Mr. Netanyahu’s speech to Congress.
We do not casually dismiss the president’s substantive concerns in the invitation controversy, even as we disagree with it. What rankles is his insistence on downplaying the victimization of Jews – and Christians – at the hands of fanatical killers who shoot, stab, bomb, and behead for one reason only: their fealty to radical Islam.