(JTA) — In his brief time in the House, freshman Jewish Congressman Randy Fine has built a reputation for combative outbursts — particularly about Muslims.

But the Florida Republican ignited a new round of controversy earlier this month with a series of disparaging remarks about Palestinians and what he called “mainstream Muslims” that his critics —on the left and right — say are not just provocative but amount to “genocidal.”

“I don’t know how you make peace with those who seek your destruction. I think you destroy them first,” Fine said during a Dec. 10 hearing with the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, after remarking, “There has to be a reformation, really, of Islam.” 

He doubled down on similar rhetoric aimed at “mainstream Muslims” and “mainstream Islam” in the week that followed, and has intensified his stance following the Hanukkah terror attack in Australia by avowed ISIS supporters. 

“It’s time for a Muslim travel ban, radical deportations of all mainstream Muslim legal and illegal immigrants, and citizenship revocations wherever possible,” he declared in a statement posted to social media. “Mainstream Muslims have declared war on us. The least we can do is kick them the hell out of America.”

Fine’s remarks — which have also included putting blame on Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar “and her fellow Somalis” for a public assistance fraud scheme carried out largely by Somali defendants — go far beyond what other Jewish pro-Israel elected officials have said publicly. They have been widely condemned, including by other Jews.

“As a part of the Jewish community, I know that I must speak out,” Noam Shelef, of the progressive group New Jewish Narrative, said in a statement. “Rep Fine, who wears a kippah, will be seen as a face of the American Jewish community. His hate is not who we are.”

Yet at a moment when the global Jewish community is reeling from the aftermath of the Australia attack, Fine’s support among the conservative pro-Israel Jews he seeks to cultivate has not been dented in any obvious way. 

The Republican Jewish Coalition remains in Fine’s corner, and pro-Israel lobbying giant AIPAC has endorsed him heading into a contested primary for his reelection. Since his initial comments about Muslims, he has spoken at a conference hosted by the Jerusalem Post, attended Attorney General Pam Bondi’s Hanukkah party and spoke at a Hanukkah gathering for Young Jewish Conservatives. Some of his fans tell JTA they think his comments about Muslims are on the mark.

“It certainly isn’t the words that I myself would use to describe the situation,” Matt Brodsky, a Jewish GOP strategist who worked with Trump’s first-term Middle East diplomatic team and has worked on political campaigns for Muslim Republicans, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. 

But, Brodsky said, “He could very well be making a point that the Muslims who would stand with Jews or stand with Israel tend to be the exception, not the rule. And I don’t know that I would argue differently.” Brodsky added that, in the grief of the Australia attacks, he doesn’t want “to be splitting hairs over what a Jew says.”

The Trump administration also seems to agree with Fine’s assessment on restricting Muslims from entering the country. On Dec. 16, the federal government added the Palestinian Authority, as well as new Muslim-majority countries including Syria, to its travel ban.

Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville, of Alabama, also recently called for a Muslim ban, leading to condemnation from Chuck Schumer, the Jewish Democratic Senate minority leader. (On Dec. 14, Vickie Paladino, a Republican member of the New York City Council, made similar remarks claiming that expelling Muslims would aid the fight against antisemitism, and expounded on her views in the Queens Jewish Link.)

Reached for comment, Fine pointed to his social media statements but also seemed to soften his stance. 

“Not all Muslims are or support terrorism,” Fine wrote to JTA. He added that he was “grateful” for “Muslims like” Ahmed el-Ahmed — the bystander in Australia who was shot while disarming one of the gunmen, and has been praised by Jewish groups for his heroism.

Such people, Fine added, “just want to live in peace [and] prosperity with the rest of us.”

Fine, who was elected in an April special election in a deep-red district with few Jews that he himself still had not moved into months after his victory, has made his Jewish identity an unmissable component of his politics. He wears a kippah on the House floor, is an unwavering Israel supporter and has called out members of his own party who he believes have crossed the line into antisemitism. On social media, where he’s adopted the “Hebrew Hammer” moniker, he shows off new MAGA-themed yarmulkes he added to his collection.  

Part and parcel with that persona are Fine’s views on Muslims and Palestinians, which some even in his party consider extreme. As the right in general is wrestling with a larger problem of antisemitic influence and the erosion of a once-assured consensus in support for Israel, Fine’s bellicose rhetoric has made enemies on his side of the aisle — even as he, like many other conservatives, has claimed to be following in the footsteps of Charlie Kirk, the slain founder of Turning Point USA.

In July, amid reports that Israel was withholding humanitarian aid to Gaza, Fine simultaneously called such reports “a lie” and also declared, “Release the hostages. Until then, starve away.” The American Jewish Committee and other groups decried his remarks. An undaunted Fine repeated the phrase “starve away,” along with variations like “#KeepOnStarving,” several times in the waning months of the Israel-Gaza war — even as backlash to his remarks grew on the right. 

“A Jewish U.S. representative calling for the continued starvation of innocent people and children is disgraceful,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the far-right Georgia Republican and recent Trump critic who will be leaving the House in January, tweeted after Fine’s July remarks about Gaza. 

Lauren Witzke, a QAnon activist and former Republican Senate candidate in Delaware who attended Turning Point USA’s recent AmericaFest gathering, has repeatedly slung personal insults at Fine. She has promised to “personally fundraise for the candidate who primaries this genocidal freak who gets off watching little toddlers and infants being blown to pieces.” (Aaron Baker, a challenger who also ran against Fine in April, took Witzke up on the offer even as he has made his own support for Israel part of his campaign platform.) 

Tucker Carlson, himself a lead driver of antisemitic conspiracy theories on the right and an emergent critic of Israel, has also lambasted Fine over the congressman’s calls, in May, for Gaza to be nuked. During his address at AmericaFest, the recent gathering hosted by right-wing group Turning Point USA at which antisemitism was a hot topic, Carlson more generally criticized Republicans who he said were “attacking millions of Americans because they’re Muslims. It’s disgusting. And I’m a Christian.”

At the time of his “starve away” remarks, Fine had not yet been endorsed by AIPAC for reelection. One of his non-Jewish primary opponents, Palm Coast City Council member Charles Gambaro, harshly criticized Fine’s Gaza remarks and declared that Gambaro, too, would seek AIPAC’s endorsement. 

Since then, AIPAC has endorsed Fine. 

“The pro-Israel community supports Rep. Fine because of his work to strengthen America’s partnership with Israel,” an AIPAC spokesperson told JTA earlier this month.

Another Jewish institution continuing to back Fine: the Republican Jewish Coalition. 

Following his “destroy them first” remarks, the Jewish Democratic Council of America said Fine “is blatantly engaging in hate speech.” The RJC’s X account, in turn, blasted its Democratic counterpart for condemning Fine.

“You are total clowns,” the RJC declared in a tweet directed at the JDCA.

The RJC continued: “Maybe start with holding Hakeem Jeffries accountable for campaigning with and endorsing antisemite Mayor-elect of NYC, Zohran Mamdani.”

The larger digital ecosystem of hard-line supporters of Israel has also regularly championed Fine. “Congressman Randy Fine is speaking truth to power — and it matters,” Betar USA, a pro-Israel group that has also demanded “blood in Gaza” and whose members have protested outside mosques, tweeted Dec. 17, a day after Fine tweeted, “We either wake up or Mainstream Muslims will conquer the West for good.”

“At a time when too many politicians stay silent or hide behind cowardly talking points, Randy Fine stands unapologetically for America, for Israel, and for moral clarity,” the Betar post continued. “He says what others are afraid to say — and he doesn’t back down.”

Gabe Groisman, a Jewish podcaster and former mayor of Bal Harbour, Florida, has also approvingly featured Fine on his podcast.

Not all Jewish conservatives agree with Fine’s bluster. 

“On the one hand, I’m glad there is somebody who’s giving voice to a more robust pro-Jewish, pro-Israel point of view,” one Jewish nonprofit professional who ran for office as a Republican told JTA after Fine’s “starve away” remarks this summer. “On the other hand, I wish it was someone other than Randy Fine.”

Without questioning Fine’s pro-Israel bonafides, the former candidate — who asked to remain anonymous, citing ongoing involvement in Jewish organizations — believed the politician was failing to meet the moment. 

“Those of us who are publicly, overtly Zionist, and especially those who seek public office based on their Zionism, I think have an obligation to be thoughtful about how they present themselves,” the Republican said, comparing Fine’s outbursts unfavorably to those of far-right Israeli ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich. “They say things which are then used against Israel in the international press.”

For Brodsky, though, Fine is a necessary truth-teller at a time when vocal Israel critics such as Omar get what he believes is a free pass for their own extreme remarks.

“I personally don’t like getting into games where we deal with shoving a microphone in exclusively Republican faces in order to justify anything a Republican said, but we don’t do that for Ilhan Omar,” he said. Brodsky had worked on the 2024 campaign of a Muslim Republican challenger to Omar until he was fired over tweets in which he stated that Israel should “carpet bomb” an area of Lebanon where Irish peacekeepers were stationed.

Fine is still embracing his role as a heel of sorts. When Omar called for his expulsion earlier this month over his “destroy them first” comments, he had a simple retort: “Go for it.”

The post Rep. Randy Fine’s incendiary comments on Muslims alarm many Jews — without denting his standing on the pro-Israel right appeared first on The Forward.