Omar slammed for implying opponent is ‘in the pocket’ of Jewish contributors

Radical congresswoman’s election flyer says her primary opponent is “in the pocket of Wall Street” and lists only his Jewish contributors.

By Paul Shindman, World Israel News

The American Jewish Congress slammed radical Congresswoman Ilhan Omar Friday, saying she had “crossed the line” with by sending out an election flyer accusing her opponent of being “in the pocket of Wall Street” and listing only Jewish donors to his campaign.

On Thursday, the news website Vice published a copy of Omar’s campaign flyer targeting her Democratic primary opponent, attorney Antone Melton-Meaux, for the large donations he received from wealthy and moderate donors. However, the only donors identified on the flyer by name were Jewish, and no other donors are mentioned except for a man named “Michael, a donor from Scarsdale, New York,” which is known as having predominantly Jewish residents.

“It’s a common campaign tactic for progressives to attack their moderate foes for taking big corporate money. But by solely mentioning Jewish donors by name while painting Melton-Meaux as being in their “pocket” to do their bidding on financial issues, her campaign’s mailer makes an argument that critics see as an anti-Semitic trope — especially in light of her string of previous controversial remarks about Israel,” Vice reported.

“@IlhanMN you promised to learn about “the painful history of antisemitic tropes.” When you say that your political opponent is in the pocket of ‘Wall Street’ and then only list Jewish donors, you have once again crossed the line. Why is this so difficult?” the AJC tweeted.

A Jewish community leader in Minneapolis expressed his frustration with Omar’s latest anti-Semitic blunder.

“My immediate thought when I saw the mailer was ‘Here we go again.’ This had both implicit and explicit anti-Semitic tropes,” Rabbi Avi Olitzky of the Beth El Synagogue in St. Louis Park, the center of Greater Minneapolis’ Jewish community, told Vice.

Olitzky said he has personally talked with Omar about her previous anti-Semitic remarks.

“Most disappointing were the presence of tropes that we’d personally discussed as hurtful, as offensive, and that I received a commitment not only would it not happen again but education would take place to learn more as to why it’s a problem,” Olitzky said. “I am beyond dismayed that especially in the heat of the primary season, such nuanced hate still rises to campaign literature.”

AJCanti-SemitismAntone Melton-MeauxIlhan OmarUS politics