Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) slammed the “dozens of members” of his occasion who’ve engaged in antisemitism and mentioned Democrats “don’t get a pass” relating to bigotry in opposition to Jews.
“I’ve been angry, and I think the Jewish community should be angry,” the Florida rep mentioned in a forceful speech whereas accepting the “Ray of Light in Darkness” award from the Israel advocacy org EMET at DC’s Grand Hyatt Lodge on Tuesday night.
Moskowitz has personally handled antisemitism. Earlier this month, he revealed that an armed maniac with a manifesto containing “antisemitic rhetoric” and the 43-year-old’s identify on a “target list” was arrested close to his residence.
Furthermore, his grandmother is a Holocaust survivor whose dad and mom had been killed in Auschwitz.
“She’s one of those children you read about. She told me about things that seemed unbelievable … never did I think that we would see some of those same currents and themes,” Moskowitz lamented throughout his speech.
Since Hamas’ barbaric Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israel that noticed 1,200 folks murdered, 254 taken captive and hundreds injured, the US has seen a surge in antisemitic hate crimes and Jewish college students have been harassed and intimidated on faculty campuses by their anti-Israel classmates.
The Florida congressman bashed his left-wing colleagues for turning a blind eye to the plight of the Jewish group.
He ripped specifically his “progressive colleagues who’ve fought for every endangered species but when it came to Jews they were silent.”
Moskowitz urged Jews from throughout the ideological spectrum to unite in demanding that each Republicans and Democrats root out antisemitism inside their very own ranks.
“I want to see Republicans call out Tucker Carlson when he has a Holocaust denier on his program, and Democrats call out the dozens of people in our party, and the people in the streets and the people on Twitter treating us like second-class and third-class citizens,” Moskowitz pressured.
In September, “historian” Dale Cooper appeared on Carlson’s podcast and claimed Winston Churchill was the “chief villain” of World Conflict II and that the Holocaust was an unintended consequence of poor German warfare planning.
Moskowitz has stood as much as his personal occasion up to now. In April, he blasted “Squad” Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) after she accused Jewish faculty college students of being both “pro-genocide or anti-genocide.”
“I got 10-year-old and 7-year-old Jewish children,” he mentioned on the time. “I don’t know if they’re pro-genocide or anti-genocide. I guess I’ll talk to them about that.”
Omar’s historical past of antisemitic remarks, which embody a 2012 tweet during which she accused Israel of getting “hypnotized the world” and prayed for “Allah [to] awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel,” led to her being booted from the Home Overseas Affairs Committee in April 2023.
Moskowitz informed The Publish that it’s but to be seen if the Democrats might want to take additional steps to fight antisemitism from Omar or different progressive reps.
The Florida pol accused Democrats of getting a double commonplace relating to discrimination in opposition to Jews versus different minority teams.
“Students who are walking to class, nobody knows if they support the war or support Netanyahu, but they have a Jewish star around their neck and are assaulted. Does anyone actually believe if that wasn’t a Jewish student but it was a minority student that any of this stuff would have gone past lunch on the first day?” he requested.
“If that was a minority student or an LGBTQ student, my party would have led the effort — and we didn’t.”
Moskowitz went on to say that regardless of the antisemitism inside his occasion, he would stay a Democrat, warning that American Jews wouldn’t profit if antisemitism or Israel assist turned a “partisan issue.”
“We do not want people fighting antisemitism in my party to leave,” he added. “You don’t want that. Jews in this country need to come together. Because we’re the target.”
The Florida pol, who as soon as labored as an aide to the late Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, a Democrat-turned-independent, lamented that whereas Jews had fought for different persecuted minority teams, that they had been “abandoned” of their hour of want.
“We’ve been at the forefront of every movement in this country when other minority groups needed help, we were the ones who stood up. And when we needed them, they abandoned us, period.”
