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Why the Media Ignore Anti-Semitism

Posted on Thursday, April 18, 2024
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by Outside Contributor
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israel flag; media and anti-semitism

In April in Teaneck, New Jersey, outside one of the town’s largest synagogues, approximately 100 “pro-Palestinian” protesters, many of whom had been bused in for the occasion, attempted to disrupt an event honoring ZAKA volunteers. ZAKA is an Israeli humanitarian search-and-rescue organization that ensures proper burial for Jews, including the victims of terrorist attacks. Several volunteers had traveled to Teaneck to share their firsthand accounts of what they saw in Israel after the barbaric attacks by Hamas on October 7.

Outside, an angry mob waved posters falsely accusing Israel of genocide and, as FreedomNews.tv footage showed, chanted, “Allahu Akbar!” and “Intifada Revolution!” By contrast, a large pro-Israel crowd that had gathered to prevent the protesters from disrupting the event played Israeli music and sang “The Star-Spangled Banner.” One month earlier, nearly 800 protesters attempted to disrupt another synagogue event in Teaneck, again calling for intifada, hurling anti-Semitic insults, and spitting on and physically threatening Jews trying to get to the synagogue. Multiple law-enforcement agencies had to respond to quell the “pro-Palestinian” mob.

If only read or listened only to mainstream media, you might not have known about either of these events. What little coverage the first Teaneck demonstration received from the New York Times did not bother to mention the anti-Semitic rhetoric or threats made by the “pro-Palestinians.” Instead, it described the angry mob as having “traded profanities and taunts with a much smaller group of pro-Israel counter-demonstrators.” In the Times’ rendering, calling for the elimination of the Jewish people and their nation and physically attacking Jews for being Jews are little more than an exchange of playground insults.

Nor have you seen much if any mention in mainstream-media reports of the abuse hurled at 89-year-old Holocaust survivor Susanne DeWitt, who was surrounded by a group of protesters and heckled as she made the case for a Holocaust Remembrance Day before the Berkeley, California, city council in March. During the meeting, as the Jerusalem Post reported, a man in a keffiyeh hurled abuse at several Jewish speakers, yelling, “How much money did these assholes give you?. . . You money suckers.” Another was recorded saying, “Get the f—k out of here, you Zionist pig.”

Nor did the mainstream media spend much time parsing the meaning of the words of those who spoke at a “pro-Palestinian” rally in Dearborn, Michigan, celebrating “International Al-Quds Day.” On that April day, speakers chanted “Death to America!” and called Israel a “cancer” on the world while praising the Iranian Ayatollah Khomeini (who orchestrated the taking of 53 American hostages in Tehran in 1979).

When the New York Times did get around to reporting on some of these incidents, the article’s focus was not on the thuggish rhetoric and behavior of Palestinian activists toward Jews, but rather on how such behavior was affecting Democratic politicians’ holiday parties and fundraisers. “Protests over the Biden administration’s handling of the war are disrupting the activities of Democratic officials from city halls to Congress to the White House, complicating their ability to campaign—and, at times, govern—during a pivotal election year,” the story noted.

What the paper of record failed to mention, but is easily visible across social media on a regular basis, is that these protests are promoting and normalizing anti-Semitism, not taking a principled stand on behalf of the Palestinians (a majority of whom approved of Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, according to polling data). In New York in late March, for example, outside a fundraiser for President Biden, a male protester was captured on video following a young woman who was trying to get into the building. He screamed at her, “F—ing murderous kike. F—ing die. Keep it moving, bitch.”

Why aren’t these anti-Semitic attacks front-page stories? Why aren’t they given the kind of relentless scrutiny that anti-Semitism on the right has properly received in these same outlets? The Times has published countless stories about the rhetoric of participants in the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Where are the big-think pieces and deeply reported stories about the organizations and funders behind the anti-Jewish groups staging protests outside synagogues and other Jewish institutions?

It’s not as if their readers and viewers are unaware of the problem. According to Pew Research, the percentage of Americans who say Jews face discrimination has doubled from 20 percent in 2021 to 40 percent in 2024. And yet, for some reason, mainstream-media outlets seem to be the only ones who haven’t drilled down on the issue.

In fact, the decision to downplay the anti-Semitic threat from the left is deliberate. Left-leaning media do not like to cover the behavior of their own, as the inconsistent coverage of the Jew-baiting members of the Democratic Party’s “Squad” during the past several years attests. Mainstream reporters at outlets like the New York Times take great pains to provide context and explanations for Representative Ilhan Omar’s blatant anti-Semitism, for example. A 2019 piece gave Omar and her defenders ample space to claim she was being unfairly targeted for criticism because she was a progressive Muslim woman while glossing over the fact that she had repeatedly accused Jews of having dual loyalties.

Amid the current conflict, it’s evident there is tacit agreement among most in the mainstream media that because Israel is defending itself by trying to root out Hamas in Gaza, the behavior of protesters is somehow justifiable and acceptable—but only because it involves Israel and the Jews.

This goes well beyond the deliberately misleading stories and factual errors about the war that have appeared in outlets such as the Washington Post. As Zach Kessel and Ari Blaff outlined in National Review, in a deep dive of the Post’s coverage of the Israel–Hamas war, the newspaper “has been a case study in moral confusion and anti-Israel bias” and has “violated traditional journalistic principles that have shaped coverage of foreign conflicts by American newsrooms for decades.”

Similarly, a recent story in the Free Press by Uri Berliner, a long-time editor and reporter at National Public Radio, described how NPR “approached the Israel-Hamas war and its spillover onto streets and campuses through the ‘intersectional’ lens that has jumped from the faculty lounge to newsrooms,” which meant “highlighting the suffering of Palestinians at almost every turn while downplaying the atrocities of October 7, overlooking how Hamas intentionally puts Palestinian civilians in peril, and giving little weight to the explosion of antisemitic hate around the world.”

By contrast, imagine if an elderly African-American civil-rights activist were being heckled and bullied with racist taunts while trying to speak before a red-state city-council meeting about the need to properly recognize Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Every major newspaper, magazine, and television and cable network would air nonstop coverage of the event.

The double standard at work in mainstream media has become impossible to ignore and is a sign of a deep moral failing in the profession of journalism: When it comes to threats and attacks against Jews, integrity is sacrificed on the altar of ideological conformity. Thus the self-proclaimed seekers of truth became handmaidens to barbarity and the world’s oldest and most destructive hatred.

Reprinted with permission from AEI by Christine Rosen. 

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.

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Max
Max
5 months ago

If one has not figured it out yet, most of MSM is owned by those who wish to see the fall of our nation and Israel. It only seems that the BAD situations and events are announced and reported on while the GOOD that is done throughout the world is ignored. This is all the part of the evil agenda of the Left and company. It is not going to improve.

Sharon
Sharon
5 months ago

George Soros are paying these protesters. Why? He hates Trump and he hates the USA.

anna hubert
anna hubert
5 months ago

Today open anti Semitism tomorrow open anti Christianity until all is according to a prophetic psychopathic sociopath I am not sure how that will jive with the communism

At a place where truth rules
At a place where truth rules
5 months ago

Hearing loud and clearly from multiple Americans and American groups:
“They are either ignorant of facts and truth, need to hate, follow some hollow person, or do not know better. Suggestion – Leave America for your choice of Muslim countries, Why Not?”

Marlene
Marlene
5 months ago

Sadly, we personally know Black family members who are genuine people of the Bible, BUT watch CNN, MSDNC, Joy-less racist Reid and they believe every lie, every half truth, and never reported truths from these fake news outlets. They want to keep them in the dark! These are deceived low information voters.

CLIFFORD F GERACI
CLIFFORD F GERACI
5 months ago

The GREATEST threat to our Constitutional Republic is the Corporate Media. They misuse the “power of the press” by shelter and protecting those they favor and slander and lie about those they do not.

Robert Zuccaro
Robert Zuccaro
5 months ago

One just set himself on fire in the “protest area” outside Trumps trial; lets hope all of them follow suit!

Bruce
Bruce
5 months ago

The media chooses to promote or ignore stories based on the administration. The same story that would be front and center national news if a Republican were president gets ignored when a democrat is president. The slobbering love affair the media has with the democratic party became more visible with President Obama but was there for decades.

Bob Chase
Bob Chase
5 months ago

Most clear thinking folk I know ignore the main stream media. That media group does not practice journalism nor do they report news. They are propaganda machines for their owners. Period!

Jeri
Jeri
5 months ago

Media is not going to condemn that which they advocate. MSM is anti- Semitic. Please convince me they are not.

PapaYEC
PapaYEC
5 months ago

Islam is Satanic and causes misery, destruction, and death wherever it is allowed to fester.

Robert Zuccaro
Robert Zuccaro
5 months ago

AMAC is not the “mainstream media” any more than AARP is. Here’s one for you to think on next time you watch one: why is every Republican considered “not moderate” referred to as “far right” but those on the left, particularly “the squad” are not called “far left”? Gee. I wonder.

MizDi
MizDi
5 months ago

So the protests and harassment outside synagogues is perfectly peachy while six pro-lifers get up to ten years in prison for “defying the FACE Act” by merely peacefully praying outside an abortion clinic. People burn and deface churches and synagogues and there is no meaningful “investigation”, but the alphabet soup agencies plant undercover agents in Catholic Churches that use the traditional Latin mass because “those people are more likely to be domestic terrorists”
Lord Jesus, come quickly!

FJB
FJB
5 months ago

The media absolutely does not ignore “Anti-Semitism”! They propagate it as strongly as they can!

betty
betty
4 months ago

because they are anti Israel and anti America.

ParentFailure
ParentFailure
5 months ago

I am Fed up with these pro Satan protesters we need to send them back to their own country, defund Universities it is a waste of money! The woke students that are doing this are completely clueless just following peers have not been educated on history at all no critical thinking skill’s not able to have independent thought!parenting

johnh
johnh
5 months ago

How many of these protesters are American citizens? If not a citizen, they should be deported back to their own country & quit attacking us.. And anyone that chanted DEATH TO AMERICA should be deported right away before they get worse.

johnh
johnh
5 months ago

Yes, it is mind boggling to me that Trump invited Kanye to White House when in office & then to dinner at Marlago. What is the point of this, and meanwhile ignoring some Americans that could use encouragement from Trump.

Deb
Deb
5 months ago

Interesting enough, when I tried to share this article to Facebook, I could not post it. There was no tab to share it…

Will
Will
5 months ago

Too many people don’t understand that half of Congress, and half of the media, have dual citizenship in the United States and Israel. They are likely also unaware that Israel does not have an extradition treaty, meaning that these people cannot be forced to come back to the United States if they run TO Israel.
All of the above is by design.

Tom
Tom
5 months ago

Some truth is called anti semitism by Zionist when they are called out to cause fear and resentment to person speaking truth.

Michael
Michael
5 months ago

I just attempted to send this article via a TXT to a dear friend. What they received was not this article, but a blatant pitch to buy this product AMAC. I expect this kind of CRAP from any / every LIB-TURD / KOMMUNIST / DEMON-CROOK Organization, not a supposed American Conservative one. GET YOUR ACT TOGETHER, OR KNOW YOU “ARE” REPLACEABLE.

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