What Does the New York Times Have in Common with the Pittsburgh & San Diego Murderers?

The offensive cartoon by Antonio Moreira Antunes that the New York Times published last week in its international edition [not in the US edition. I wonder why.] showed a blind President Trump wearing a Jewish skull cap being led around by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, depicted as a guide dog for the blind. The dog wears a collar with a magen David [shield of David] on it. The meaning here is that Netanyahu and/or the State of Israel control American policy.

The Pittsburgh and San Diego murderers, Robert Bowers and John Earnest respectively, both believe or claim that Israel/Jews control the US through Trump. The same message as the cartoon in the NYTimes.

The claim of Jewish control of the US government has long been a theme of neo-Nazis in the United States. They commonly used the abbreviation ZOG, standing for "Zionist occupied government." A similar theme was also found in the notorious forgery and plagiarism produced by the Russian tsarist secret police, the Okhrana, called The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. The Protocols argue that a secret Jewish conspiracy dominates the world, incites wars and all sorts of grave social ills and mass suffering. Considering that most presidents have been hostile to Israel or worked to thwart Israeli policy, such as Obama, this argument is ridiculous. By the way, in the usual practice of politicians to make promises that they cannot or have no intention of keeping, some of the presidents have spoken warmly about Israel. Were they sincere or not, we cannot say since nobody has a sincerometer to measure sincerity. But the ZOG argument is ridiculous. Also consider that President Franklin D Roosevelt --a hero to American Liberals and progressives to this day-- tried hard not to rescue Jews from Hitler's genocide or save Jews or destroy the gas chambers with air power, which was possible by 1943 when American forces were already in Sicily and were bombing areas in Poland near Auschwitz (Oswiecim) -- but not bombing the Auschwitz death camp or the railroad tracks leading up to it.

The theme of Jewish control --or Israeli control in the up to date version-- of the world also popped out of the typing hands of US Congresswoman, Ilhan Omar, in her effort on  Twitter several years ago: Israel has hypnotized the world. In Omar's case she was injecting alleged Jewish magic into the discussion. After all, hypnotizing the world could only be done through magic, and hypnotism is perceived as a form of magic. Her claim that American support for Israel is purchased by Benjamins [$100 dollar bills with a picture of Benjamin Franklin] is an insult to both Jews and US congressmen and women. It is saying that Jews control the US Congress and presidents through payments of money, as if there are no good arguments for Americans and their congressmen to support Israel. It says too that the congressmen and presidents can simply be bought by money. Lastly, it endorses the ZOG claim that Jews and/or Israel control US policy. If money could buy everybody in Congress or the White House, then the US would have been supporting the Arab cause since long ago. After all, the money stored up by Qatar [a slave state] and other oil-rich Arab sheikdoms and kingdoms --money probably exceeding Jewish wealth-- would have been able to buy Congress and presidents with ease. Of course, Arab states have been able to hire various US politicians and former State Department and CIA officials. Saudi Arabia, for instance, hired several who had retired from State or the CIA. And the two Bush administrations were noted for their concern with the needs of the Saudis and the palestinian Arabs and Kuwait and so on. But that did not mean Arab control of Washington. So the ZOG claim is ridiculous whether it comes from neo-Nazis, Alt-Right bigots or  Rep. Ilhan Omar.

Now this belief or insinuation or claim that Jews control the world or only the USA also turned up in the rants of the Pittsburgh and San Diego murderers who attacked synagogues, shooting congregants at prayer services. Seth Frantzman has conveniently brought together the rants of Robert Bowers and John Earnest in an article for the Jerusalem Post [JPost 28 April 2019].

Frantzman wrote:
The antisemitic links between the two attacks are clear. Both expressed hatred of Jews, who they accused of destroying or invading the United States. Bowers accused Jews and Jewish groups, such as the non-partisan refugee protection organization HIAS, of being behind “migrant caravans” whom he calls “invaders.” The Poway attacker asked: “Is it worth it for me to live a comfortable life at the cost of international Jewry sealing the doom of my race?”

Frantzman's deduction is based on:

The alleged manifesto of the shooter behind the attack on the Chabad of Poway synagogue includes condemnation of US President Donald Trump. The letter, or manifesto, was posted on the popular US-based image board website 8chan. “That Zionist, Jew-loving, anti-White, traitorous [expletive],” John Earnest wrote in a version quoted online.
Similarly, Pittsburgh synagogue shooter Robert Bowers wrote on the mainly far-right website Gab that he opposed Trump, who he claimed was surrounded by Jews. “Trump is a globalist, not a nationalist.” He claimed that Jews, who he used an expletive to describe, were an “infestation” in the White House.

And he quotes more:

Bowers talked about a “Jewish international oligarchy” while Earnest wrote about “international Jewry.”

Here is Frantzman's conclusion:

there is a link between antisemitism on the far Right and anti-Trump views, a link that is also clear on the far Left. It tends to unite around hatred not only of Jews, but also of Israel and of beliefs that the US is controlled by Jews, who in turn are accused of controlling banks or the media

 Note that the two murderers also hate President Trump and believe or claim that he is controlled by Jews. Well, just what was the meaning of the offensive cartoon published by the NYTimes in its international edition? Was it not, among other things, that Trump is controlled by Jews? So here we have a convergence of the San Diego and Pittsburgh murderers with a cartoon published [later removed after widespread condemnation] by the NYT and with Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Muslim whose early education was in Somalia, a fanatic Muslim country which cannot live at peace with itself.

We can conclude that conventional notions of "Right" and "Left" and of a Left-Right spectrum fail to consider or understand or explain the significant convergence of Left and Right and Islamic Judeophobia. The New York Times is running with the rabid dogs infected with Judeophobic notions already standing out in the notorious Protocols, produced around 1900, and can certainly have helped to inspire the San Diego and Pittsburgh murders.
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See other Seth Frantzman articles on the NYT cartoon and the San Diego & Pittsburgh murders listed at this link: here.

Aryeh Stav  has studied Arab anti-Jewish and anti-Israel cartoons in a book and a pamphlet. The book was published in Hebrew with a subsequent English translation, plus a pamphlet in English.
(אריה סתיו, השלום - קריקטורה ערבית (תל אביב: זמורה ביטן  1996
Arieh Stav, Peace, The Arabian Caricature of Antisemitic Imagery (Jerusalem: Gefen Pubs. 1999)

Aryeh Stav, "Arab Antisemiism - After Peace" (Tel Aviv: The Center for Policy Research), Policy Paper 1. This pamphlet is an extensive summary of the book on caricatures listed above. Note that Stav's first name is spelled differently in different places.