Keith Ellison isnt an anti-Semite. Hes the victim of a vicious smear.

[portlander23]

Keith Ellison isn’t an anti-Semite. He’s the victim of a vicious smear.
Jesse Myerson
Washington Post

Ellison, the first Muslim member of Congress and a prominent Bernie Sanders supporter, is now a leading candidate for chairman of the Democratic National Committee. However, since he is also a measured critic of U.S. support for Israel’s occupation of Palestine, he has fallen victim to the same accusations of anti-Semitism that the ADL has promiscuously dispensed in recent years.

It all happened so suddenly. Two weeks ago, the ADL’s national director Jonathan Greenblatt regarded Ellison as “a man of good character” in emailed remarks to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Now, per an official ADL release, Ellison’s views on the Israel-Palestine conflict are “both deeply disturbing and disqualifying.” What changed? Greenblatt claims the U-turn happened when he became aware of a 36-second clip of taped remarks Ellison made to supporters in 2010. “The United States foreign policy in the Middle East is governed by what is good or bad through a country of 7 million people,” said Ellison on that occasion. “A region of 350 million all turns on a country of 7 million. Does that make sense?”

The mode of condemning legitimate political opinions as affronts to Judaism, which had grown familiar to the point of dreariness before the election, is freshly outrageous in the age of Trump. Even the penchant the president-elect himself has for flagrant anti-Semitism is somehow eclipsed by the record of his chief strategist, Steve Bannon. Under Bannon’s management, Breitbart News became the primary propaganda outlet for ultra-right xenophobic populism, a political niche whose discourse is riddled with anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, and so his elevation was met with glee from the KKK, American Nazi Party, and other white supremacist groups. Though the ADL rightly condemned Bannon for featuring racist and sexist material at Breitbart, it was careful explicitly to acquit him personally of the offense that makes Ellison a “deeply disturbing” candidate: anti-Semitism.

[baldguy]

1. A vicious RW smear at that.

[dhill926]

2. K & R...

[BainsBane]

3. I like Keith

He's my congressman, and he does a lot for Democratic voter turnout in our area. His comments about Castro, however, lead me to believe he's not prepared to take on the position of DNC chair for a party that has to represent a country without the same political sensibilities as Minneapolis.

[uponit7771]

4. A good portion of the fake news comes from the established news organizations that allow and print

... bold faced false statments

[KittyWampus]

5. He said what he said. Let him be a grown up, professional politician and answer for his own words.

Making him answer for his own words and actions is not a smear.

His supporters for him getting the DNC chair just want it given to him with no fight. Just like the same people, Bernie Bros, just wanted Bernie to be given the nomination.

[George II]

6. Ellison is not a "leading candidate for chairman" of the DNC.