Congresswoman Ilhan Omar

Right now there is a war over the truth, thanks to the courage of one freshman congresswoman from Minnesota. Ilhan Omar has single handedly ignited a firestorm of a debate by sticking to her guns and continuing to tell the truth about Israel and the power of their lobbying efforts in Washington. Rep. Omar has faced a vile smear campaign from all comers, and much of it is not even due to her statements on Israel. Recently, Rep. Omar found her name on a list of targets for assassination by a Coast Guard lieutenant named Christopher Paul Hasson, who has since been charged in a federal court. In a gas station in Rogers, Minnesota the message “Assassinate Ilhan Omar” was written in Graffiti on the wall. And perhaps the most egregious incident occurred at a West Virginia GOP event at the Capitol, with one of the exhibitors having a sign that connected Omar with the 9/11 attacks.

For what its worth, Congresswoman Omar has shown a level of bravery and fearlessness in the face of impending danger. She herself would say that is due to her faith. In an interview with Mehdi Hasan of the Intercept, Rep. Omar had this to say in response to concerns about her safety:

I’m a person of faith. So, I know that I will leave this Earth when the time comes and I know that there is important work for me to do and so I’m focused on that.

We know that there are two ways to assassinate someone, one being the actual taking of their physical life, and another being the killing of their legacy. We see it all the time with the constant whitewashing of radical historical figures, and the smear campaign against Ilhan Omar is nothing more than an attempt at a character assassination that leaves someone in the public eye experiencing what I would call a living death. Charges of antisemitism are a deathblow to any public figure, but in the realm of American politics, it is almost worst to be anti-Zionist. Ilhan Omar is definitely not anti-Zionist, considering she supports the two state solution, thereby supporting an Israeli state, but her public statements critical of Israeli power over the US government have brought a litany of attacks upon her. The most dangerous attacks have come from within her own party.

I have faced this fact a long time ago, but liberals need to come to terms with the fact that the Democratic party is not a safe space for people like Congresswoman Omar. It simply is the lesser of two great evils. This is supposedly the party of tolerance, the party of progressivism, the party of “Resistance”. Right now this is the party of anti-Muslim bigotry and an enabler of violence against Ilhan Omar. As much of a trailblazer as she is, her identity is only useful to the Democratic party when they can march her gender, skin color, and hijab in front of cameras as a testament to the appeared diversity of the party, as well as on the cover of rolling stone magazine with the wicked witch of the left herself…

God forbid Congresswoman Omar comes into the party speaking her mind, they will destroy her quicker than one could say “It’s all about the benjamins baby”. It was that phrase that set everything off, and resulted in an official condemnation from the Democratic leadership, which can be read below…

Yes, they mentioned her by name, and the worst thing about this is that by doing so they invited the attacks against her from the right. Prior to this incident, the only accusations coming at Ilhan Omar were from looneybin GOP Rep. Kevin McCarthy, himself accused of tweeting anti-semitic tropes. By jumping into the lion’s den, the Democrats just made it a bipartisan feast, lending legitimacy to the charge of antisemitism, and not a single member of Congress on either side came out to support her cause. It wasn’t until the debate was back into the comfortable threshold of partisan bickering that her colleagues came to her defense.

Congresswoman Omar once again caused a stir during a recent appearance at Busboys and Poets when she said “I want to talk about the political influence in this country that says it is okay to push for allegiance to a foreign country.” This immediately elicited further cries of antisemitism as this time she was accused of invoking the “dual loyalty myth”. Of course dual loyalty is a subject that has been discussed very much, even among Jewish writers and defenders of Israel. Philip Weiss documents many of these instances of Jewish acknowledgment of dual loyalty in an article I will include below. I encourage everyone to read it.

Rep. Eliot Engel, a staunch Zionist, and chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, which Omar sits on, called it a “vile antisemitic slur” and has demanded an apology from her. Omar also got into a spat with Congresswoman Nita Lowey, who accused her of mischaracterizing support for Israel and also urged her to retract her statement. The Democrats might also be preparing a nuclear option in the form of official language to be passed on the house floor condemning antisemitism. Whether or not Rep. Omar will be named in that legislation is not yet known.

One of the most unfortunate, but least surprising aspects of this entire fiasco, is that the first high profile Democrat to lend her hand to the bipartisan smear campaign of Ilhan Omar was Chelsea Clinton. We all remember Chelsea Clinton’s tweet in response to Omar’s Bad Boy lyrical reference. Clinton was co-signing a condemnation tweet from Liberal Zionist bootlicker Batya Ungar-Sargon.

That’s right, it is Murican to join in the symbolic lynching of a Black Hijabi woman. You go gurl

One thing that has often escaped debate about Omar is her Somali identity, especially considering the history Chelsea Clinton’s family, and the Democratic party has with Somalia. As we might remember, Bill Clinton was president during the infamous “Black Hawk Down” incident, which caused a US troop “pullout” (we were right back in not too long after) from Somalia and changed public perception in this country about Somalia for the worst. The American public has never had a positive view of Somalia, and the American government has always loved bombing it. Whether we had a Democrat or Republican in the White House, our government has treated Rep. Omar’s home country like a field for target practice, whether that be with drone strikes, backing AU troops that have committed gross human rights violations, or interfering in the internal politics of the Somali government.

It’s hard for me to believe that a party that is complicit in such a campaign of violence and disgusting paternalism can respect any of their people. It is hard for me to believe that Congresswoman Omar is safe with these people. It is a unique situation that we have someone in Congress that comes from a nation that has been the target of such an extensive military campaign. The dehumanization of entire peoples that comes with the reality of Empire surely must mean something. One thing is for certain, whether it be in her home country, or sitting in the halls of Congress, America has been a violatile safe space for Ilhan Omar, and the Democratic party is right there to usher her into the living dead that comes after having your character assassinated.

Happy with your “Blue Wave” yet?