If it weren’t so sad, it would be funny. Speaking to the leftist Jewish newspaper The Forward, President Obama said he is personally hurt by the anti-Semitism accusations he has faced since signing the nuclear deal with Iran:
“And there’s not a smidgen of evidence for it, other than the fact that there have been times where I’ve disagreed with a particular Israeli government’s position on a particular issue."
For a guy who's feelings are hurt by charges of anti-Semitism, this president has sure surrounded himself with, and honored, many anti-Semites, and made policy declarations that can be read as anti-Jewish.
Beginning with his first campaign for president, Obama surrounded himself with anti-Semites like General Merrel McPeak, 2008 Obama for President Co-Chair who has an impressive resume of blaming our foreign policy on the "Jewish Lobby." Perhaps, the best example came when he was asked during an interview why there isn't peace in the Middle East and said, "New York City. Miami. We have a large vote -- vote, here in favor of Israel. And no politician wants to run against it." (in other words, those pesky Jews who control America's policy on the Middle East.). Another of his campaign advisers was the anti-Semite Zbigniew Brzezinski who has warned about the power of the pro-Israel lobby buying Congress.
One of his first presidential appointments was the anti-Semitic Chas Freeman who blamed his resignation on the evil Israel lobby (a nicer way of saying Jewish lobby), and his first presidential Medal of Freedom honorees were Bishop Desmond Tutu and Mary Robinson. The nicest thing Bishop Desmond Tutu ever said about Jews was: "People are scared in this country [the US], to say wrong is wrong because the Jewish lobby is powerful." He also said that “the Jews thought they had a monopoly on God." Tutu's co-honoree Mary Robinson presided over the "World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance" that turned into a non-stop hate-fest against Jews and Israel.
The conference was so anti-Semitic that then-Secretary of State Colin Powell the Secretary of State walked out.
During his presidency Obama has allied himself with Al Sharpton who led the anti-Semitic pogrom in Crown Heights and incited the anti-Semitic fire bombing of Freddy's Fashion Mart in Harlem. Obama sent his closest advisor, Valerie Jarrett, to keynote an anti-Semitic ISNA conference where discussions argued that key Obama aides are "Israeli," proving Jews "have control of the world" - and that the Holocaust was punishment of Jews for being "serially disobedient to Allah."
For Secretary of Defense, Obama appointed Chuck Hagel, who believed in the nefarious “world wide Jewish conspiracy,” Hagel was once quoted as saying "The political reality is that... the Jewish lobby intimidates a lot of people up here."
Of the anti-Semitic Occupy Wall Street movement, the President said, "We are on their side."
Some will cite the president's policy of demanding concessions from Israel and not the Palestinians, or his passive-aggressive support/condemnation of Israel during last year's Israeli/Hamas war, as examples of his anti-Semitism, but that might have more to do with his concessions to radical fundamentalists such as Iran than his dislike of Jews.
In recent months, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) invited two world leaders to speak to a joint session of Congress. Both times, the Speaker made the move on his own without first checking with the White House.
The invitation of the Jewish leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, was widely criticized by the administration; in fact they encouraged their fellow Democrats to boycott the speech.
The speech by the second world leader, Pope Francis, will happen in November. But, despite not being informed of the invite before it was made, the White House did not criticize the invitation - only the Jewish man's visit was criticized. I am not saying his visit was criticized only because he is Jewish---I'm just pointing out a fact.
When radical Islamists attacked a kosher supermarket Hyper-Cacher (French for Super Kosher) in Paris on a Friday afternoon just before the Jewish Sabbath when they knew it would be crowded with Jews, Obama first insisted it was a random act and not an anti-Semitic act (see video below). And when the world leaders came together to march in Paris as a protest against the Charlie Hebdo shooting and the anti-Semitic Hyper-Catcher attack, Obama was conspicuous in his absence.
Previous presidents have criticized Israel for building homes in disputed territories. Under Bush, there was a deal where Israel could add homes to existing communities and Jerusalem. Not only did Obama unilaterally break that deal, but he also went further. Obama criticized Israel for allowing Jews to purchase homes (with real money) in East Jerusalem. President Obama has not mentioned any other places around the world where he believes certain people should not be allowed to purchase homes---except for the Jews.
President Obama’s July 31 phone call organized by the Anti-Israel group J Street and other progressive Jewish groups seemed to be a recent example of Obama's anti-Semitism.
In the 20 minute phone call Obama said over and over that opponents of the Iran deal come from the same “array of forces that got us into the Iraq war,” he said a “bunch of billionaires who happily finance super PACs” are “putting the squeeze on members of Congress.”
The message was clear to the Jewish participants, William Daroff Senior Vice President for Public Policy & Director of the Washington office of The Jewish Federations of North America tweeted during the meeting “Jews are leading effort to kill #Irandeal. ‘Same people opposing the deal led us into Iraq war,’" and followed with “Canard: Jews got us into Iraq War.”
During the call, Lee Rosenberg of AIPAC questioned the president's statement comparing people who object to the Iran deal to those who supported the invasion of Iraq he pointed out that many anti-Semites falsely claim the Jews pushed Bush into invading Iraq. Obama explained that Netanyahu supported the Iraq invasion (true). But Bibi wasn't the premier at the time - he was a private citizen. The prime minister Ariel Sharon strongly urged Bush not to invade Iraq, arguing correctly that if Saddam were removed, “Iran, a far more dangerous player, will be rid of its principal enemy and free to pursue its ambitions of regional hegemony.”
So, Obama used private-citizen Netanyahu who was strongly for the war as a scapegoat - even though his V.P. Joe Biden, both of his secretaries of state (Kerry and Clinton), and his biggest ally in the Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) all supported the invasion of Iraq in Congress.
Whether one believes Obama is an anti-Semite or not, it seems there's certainly more than a "smidgen" of evidence one could use to make a fact-based argument that this president has an issue with Jews.