According to POLITICO, “a slew” of Democratic Party leaders officially endorsed the reelection bid of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.). They include Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), and the previous top trio of House Democratic leadership: Reps. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.).
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a statement: “Rep. Omar has been elected by her constituents three times and has consistently stood up for them, including through her service on the House Budget Committee. As House Democratic Leader, I vigorously endorse her re-election and stand with her as we battle Extreme MAGA Republicans for the future of our nation.”
A spokesperson for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee confirmed the plan to back Omar and other House incumbent progressives.
Omar issued a statement saying she was “proud to have earned the respect and support of every single member of the Democratic House leadership for my re-election campaign.”
Last March, the Gallup Poll reported that “after a decade in which Democrats have shown increasing affinity toward the Palestinians, their sympathies in the Middle East now lie more with the Palestinians than the Israelis, 49% versus 38%.” This represented “an 11-percentage-point increase over the past year in Democrats’ sympathy with the Palestinians. At the same time, the percentages sympathizing more with the Israelis (38%) and those not favoring a side (13%) have dipped to new lows.”
In July, when Israeli President Yitzhak Herzog spoke before a joint session of Congress, Rep. Omar tweeted: “There is no way in hell I am attending the joint session address from a President whose country has banned me and denied Rashida Tlaib the ability to see her grandma.”
In February, the House voted to remove Omar from her seat on the Foreign Affairs Committee, citing past comments she had made about Israel and concerns over her objectivity. They meant to say that she is a rabid antisemite.
Two Republican candidates running for Congress have called for Omar’s execution.
In November 2019, Danielle Stella, Omar’s Republican opponent for Congress, was banned from Twitter for suggesting that Omar should be hanged for treason if found guilty of passing information to Iran. In December 2019, George Buck also suggested that Omar be hanged for treason. Buck was removed from the National Republican Congressional Committee’s Young Guns program.
Too harsh? Possibly, but emotionally very gratifying, one must admit.
In August 2019, Israel banned Omar from entering the country over her support for BDS, based on Section 2 of the Law on Entry into Israel. She was scheduled to visit together with Congresswoman Talib, and the visit was canceled. After reviewing the case, Israel allowed Talib to visit her grandmother in the village of Beit Ur al-Fauqa on humanitarian grounds, on the condition that she respect Israeli law and refrain from supporting BDS during her visit. Tlaib refused those terms and the visit never happened.
On that point, it’s likely that the next time Omar and Tlaib show up at Ben Gurion International, Israel would have to open its gates and let them through, because the US visa waiver deal compels the Jewish State to accept its worst enemies. Everything must be done to ensure that Israelis won’t have to wait for their Visas to America. We hear very good things about the Statue of Liberty.
According to Jewish Insider, in recent months, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee has been busily recruiting Democrats ready to challenge members of The Squad who are hostile to Israel. Last round, AIPAC shelled out $350,000 in support of Omar’s opponents, but to no avail. This time around the pro-Israel lobby is financing an opponent to Rep. Jamaal Bowman, who represents New York’s 16th Congressional District, which had been for years the home district of Jewish Democrat and Israel lover Eliot Engel. Bowman joined Cori Bush and Ilhan Omar in boycotting President Herzog’s speech.
On July 18, 2023, Bowman and eight other Squad members: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Cori Bush, Andre Carson, Summer Lee, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, Delia Ramirez, and Rashida Tlaib, voted against a congressional non-binding resolution that “the State of Israel is not a racist or apartheid state,” and Congress rejects “all forms of antisemitism and xenophobia,” and “the United States will always be a staunch partner and supporter of Israel.”
In August, Omar posted a belligerent tweet saying, “THIS IS URGENT. A right-wing Super PAC funded by millions of dollars in Dark Money spending is working around the clock to unseat Ilhan from Congress in 2024.”
We looked it up. In US politics, “dark money” refers to spending to influence elections, public policy, and political discourse with money whose source is not disclosed to the public. AIPAC states that it is a registered American lobbying group, funded by private donations, and receives no financial assistance from Israel or any other foreign group.
In 2022, AIPAC spent $24 million on efforts to defeat anti-Israel Democratic candidates in primaries. It spent $7 million on defeating Congresswoman Donna Edwards in Maryland after the incumbent Democrat had been considered the shoo-in candidate.
J Street is a major foe of the pro-Israel AIPAC, and asked Democratic candidates to refuse its support, saying: “With their overwhelming spending, AIPAC hopes to send an intimidating message to others: cross our red lines, and you could be next. While political space for open and healthy debate over US foreign policy has opened up considerably in recent years, they appear determined to close it down.”
Political debate? Really? In 2012, Omar tweeted: “Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.” After NY Times columnist Bari Weiss wrote that Omar’s statement tied into a millennia-old “conspiracy theory of the Jew as the hypnotic conspirator,” Omar apologized for not “disavowing the antisemitic trope I unknowingly used.”
Ignorance is bliss.
