12/15/2019
President received a tumultuous reception and applause throughout his speechThe atmosphere in the room was In an age when history is edited to suit political agendas and propagated by campus faculties, foreign subsidized movements, public relations entities and cyber communications among like-minded people, it should be incumbent on the media to report events accurately and without distortion.
Unfortunately, this is far from the case.
I attended the American Israeli Council event in Hollywood, Florida this weekend. I was in the room and heard every word of the President’s speech. I am incensed to read reports suggesting that the President made comments that were critical or demeaning of Jews.
replete with love of Israel, America and Trump. Flags of Israel and the US were everywhere The .
In his speech the President described how he accomplished the relocation and building of the US Embassy in Jerusalem for under $400,000.00 after original requests for $2 Billion dollars. His aside about some in the audience being involved with money and real estate being able to appreciate his accomplishment was a kidding remark entirely consistent with self-kidding Jewish humor. The speech was adamantly pro-Israel and stressed the importance of our historic, political and cultural ties. His comment that some Jews don’t love Israel enough has insightful implications: amalgamation into a comfortable life in the US, generational distance, lack of knowledge about the holocaust and Israel’s incredible history of survival, have rendered many American Jews insensible to, if not ignorant of, the true horrors of life in an anti-Semitic environment and the lifeline Israel represents to many of us.
For the media to distort the meaning of these few comments is nothing other than an effort to further sway those Jewish voters who support the President toward insecurity and into the anti-Trump camp, or further entrench those who don’t support him in their opposition.
We finally have a President who does not stand for the historic, toxic United Nations bias against Israel, refuses to financially support the Palestinian Authority and Gaza who funnel the funds to support terror, and who just this week assured that Jewish students will be protected against harassment on our campuses while pro- Palestinian groups are often supported and rewarded. In his speech he called out the Democratic “squad” for their outspoken anti-Semitism. At the Hanukah event at the White House this week the President expressed his pride in having Jewish members of his own family.
But the press marches on in its ceaseless endeavors to portray Trump as an anti-Semite and to report only what serves a collective political agenda. Amid endless reports of the “plight” of the Palestinians and their cause, how much reporting do we see about the 950,000 Jews who were expelled from, murdered and had their possessions confiscated after the 1947 War of Independence from the Arab counties? Are these people and their descendants screaming for a right of return? Are they murdering people in our streets, cafes and airports? Are they inundating European welfare rolls and demanding changes in the legal system to accommodate Jewish law? No - they blended into other countries including Israel and became productive members of society - so there is just no story there to continuously sell. The manipulated history of a lost Palestinian “country” and of an anti-Semitic president is a much better story.
It is much more profitable press to write about the 750,000 Arabs who were kept in squalid refugee camps by the Arab countries who refused to absorb them because they saw their political value and the opportunity to
ferment hatred. It’s easier to sell stories about the lack of Arab rights in Israel - where Arabs are 20% of the population, vote, serve in the Knesset, in the court systems as physicians and nurses in hospitals and even serve in the army. On the other hand, the number of Jews in Tunisia, Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordon, Syria, Lebanon is close to zero – a number which the Palestinians brag they will maintain even if a two state solution is reached. I suppose there just isn’t much of a story there.
But why give credit to a president whose stances go counter to what sells? It is much more profitable to distort history.
Unfortunately, you would have to have been there last weekend to see and hear the truth – it certainly won’t come from the media.
