A rift between liberal Democrats and their more centrist colleagues was exposed again this week over comments by Rep. Ilhan Omar that many perceived as antisemitic.
Omar touched off the latest round of infighting Tuesday, when she tweeted an exchange she had with Secretary of State Antony Blinken during a congressional hearing and appeared to conflate the actions of the United States and Israel with those of the Taliban and Hamas.
A dozen of her fellow House Democrats, all of whom are Jewish, came together on Wednesday to demand Omar “clarify her words” in a statement that suggested the Minnesota liberal had revealed “deep-seated prejudice” with her remarks.
JEWISH DEMOCRATS CONFRONT ILHAN OMAR FOR GIVING ‘COVER TO TERRORIST GROUPS’
While Omar initially reacted to their statement with scorn, calling it a “shameful” and “offensive” attempt to silence her with Islamophobia, she clarified her original remarks just hours later in a new statement aimed at quelling the uproar.
“I was in no way equating terrorist organizations with democratic countries with well-established judicial systems,” she said Thursday afternoon.
But House Democrats were already in open warfare, with fellow progressives rushing to Omar’s defense amid the backlash to her initial comments.
A rare statement from the entire House Democratic leadership team on Thursday scolding Omar for “drawing false equivalencies” in a way that “foments prejudice” raised the temperature even higher.
“Pretty sick & tired of the constant vilification, intentional mischaracterization, and public targeting of [Omar] coming from our caucus,” New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted.
“I’m not surprised when Republicans attack Black women for standing up for human rights,” tweeted Rep. Cori Bush, a Missouri liberal. “But when it’s Democrats, it’s especially hurtful. We’re your colleagues. Talk to us directly. Enough with the anti-Blackness and Islamophobia.”
And Rep. Ayanna Pressley, a member of the so-called “Squad,” blasted “bad faith attempts to take [Omar]’s words out of context.”
The latest row comes just weeks after Democrats grappled over how the U.S. should respond to the latest conflict between Israel and Hamas.
President Joe Biden faced pressure from liberals to confront Israel about its airstrikes in Gaza, even as Hamas fired thousands of rockets at the Israelis. While lawmakers and activists on the Left insisted they were simply taking up the cause of Palestinians, others accused those critics of pushing, or at least quietly tolerating, antisemitism.
“I’ll say the quiet part out loud; it’s time for ‘progressives’ to start condemning anti-semitism and violent attacks on Jewish people with the same intention and vigor demonstrated in other areas of activism,” Rep. Dean Phillips, one of the 12 Democrats who signed the statement this week chastising Omar, said on May 24. “The silence has been deafening.”
The latest spat pitted liberal members directly against Democratic leadership on the question of whether some forms of advocacy for Palestinians rise to the level of bigotry.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib, the only other Muslim woman on Capitol Hill, argued that “freedom of speech doesn’t exist for Muslim women in Congress” in a broadside at Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other members of leadership after they spoke out about Omar.
“House Democratic leadership should be ashamed of its relentless, exclusive tone policing of Congresswomen of color,” Tlaib tweeted on Thursday.
Other Democrats took a victory lap over Omar’s seeming concession, however, after she at first resisted the effort to clean up her tweet.
“I am pleased [Omar] heard our concerns about her tweet, issued a clarification, and agrees with our point,” said Rep. Brad Schneider, the Democratic lawmaker who organized the 12-person statement against Omar. “I hope all can avoid such offhanded statements in the future as we work together to support American jobs & families.”
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The party faced criticism during the Israel-Hamas conflict last month for the perception that it was shying away from taking on antisemitism directly amid growing attacks on Jews across the country.
Multiple liberal lawmakers all tweeted versions of the same statement in late May that condemned antisemitism, along with a laundry list of other forms of prejudice, such as Islamophobia and “anti-Blackness.”
Some Jewish advocates bristled at the refusal to name antisemitism alone as a problem, arguing that including it as a point on a list diluted the urgency of the issue.
