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Jamaal Bowman Accuses AIPAC of Being Funded By ‘Racist’ Republicans During Podcast Interview
US Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) speaks during the National Action Network National Convention in New York City, US, April 7, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
US Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) complained about the amount of attention given to antisemitism and accused the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) of racism during a Tuesday interview with the Higher Learning podcast.
Higher Learning hosts Rachel Lindsay and Van Lathan asked Bowman if he believed the attention given to his views on the Israel-Hamas war have served as a distraction during his Democratic primary. Bowman agreed and argued that the US Congress has focused outsized attention on Israel at the expense of its constituents.
“Every other week, with all due respect, it seems like we’re voting on a bill related to Israel in support of Israel or reasserting that we are not antisemitic,” Bowman said.
Bowman said “racism” is the reason why Congress supposedly addresses the needs of Jews more urgently than its black and brown constituents
“The organization AIPAC, they’re funded mostly by racist, MAGA Republicans. And most of their resources go towards challenging black and brown members of Congress who happen to be critical of Israel, whether it is the occupation or apartheid or what’s happening right now,” Bowman said.
He added that AIPAC, the foremost pro-Israel lobbying group in the US, has had more time and opportunity to build “political power” and “economic power” than “marginalized folk” such as black Americans and immigrants.
Bowman then accused George Latimer, his opponent in the Democratic primary, of being financed by “MAGA Trump donors.” Bowman also pointed to AIPAC’s endorsement of Latimer as proof of his opponent’s lack of progressive bona fides.
“So this is an individual who is endorsed by AIPAC, which is mostly funded by MAGA Republicans, the same MAGA Republicans who didn’t certify the election results in 2020, the same MAGA Republicans who are trying to take your reproductive freedom, the same MAGA Republicans trying to take our voting rights,” Bowman said.
Bowman, who has long been a fierce critic of Israel, has found himself embroiled in a heated primary battle in New York’s heavily-Jewish 16th Congressional District. During a debate on May 13, Bowman claimed Latimer sees him as “an angry black man.” Bowman attempted to use Latimer’s relationship with AIPAC to tie him to Republicans.
“George Latimer has taken money from AIPAC, who also supports Republican candidates,” Bowman said.
The Algemeiner has reached out to AIPAC for comment for this story.
The post Jamaal Bowman Accuses AIPAC of Being Funded By ‘Racist’ Republicans During Podcast Interview first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran Says Eight Arrested for Suspected Links to Israel’s Mossad Spy Agency
The Mossad recruitment ad. Photo: Screenshot.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday they had arrested eight people suspected of trying to transmit the coordinates of sensitive sites and details about senior military figures to Israel’s Mossad, Iranian state media reported.
They are accused of having provided the information to the Mossad spy agency during Israel’s air war on Iran in June, when it attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and killed top military commanders as well as civilians in the worst blow to the Islamic Republic since the 1980s war with Iraq.
Iran retaliated with barrages of missiles on Israeli military sites, infrastructure and cities. The United States entered the war on June 22 with strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.
A Guards statement alleged that the suspects had received specialized training from Mossad via online platforms. It said they were apprehended in northeastern Iran before carrying out their plans, and that materials for making launchers, bombs, explosives and booby traps had been seized.
State media reported earlier this month that Iranian police had arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the 12-day war with Israel, though they did not say what these people had been suspected of doing.
Security forces conducted a campaign of widespread arrests and also stepped up their street presence during the brief war that ended in a US-brokered ceasefire.
Iran has executed at least eight people in recent months, including nuclear scientist Rouzbeh Vadi, hanged on August 9 for passing information to Israel about another scientist killed in Israeli airstrikes.
Human rights groups say Iran uses espionage charges and fast-tracked executions as tools for broader political repression.
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Body of Idan Shtivi, Murdered on Oct. 7, Retrieved from Gaza in Special IDF Operation
Idan Shtivi. Photo: Courtesy of the family
i24 News – The body of Idan Shtivi, a 28-year-old murdered by Palestinian jihadists at the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023, was recovered in a joint operation by the IDF and Shin Bet in central Gaza, it was cleared for publication on Saturday.
Shtivi’s remains were returned to Israel alongside the body of Ilan Weiss, another hostage killed during the October 7 massacre.
“Idan Shtivi was abducted from the Tel Gama area and brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists after acting to rescue and evacuate others from the Nova music festival on October 7th, 2023. He was 28 years old at the time of his death,” read an IDF press release.
“Following an identification process conducted at the National Center for Forensic Medicine, along with the Israel Police and the Military Rabbinate, the Hostages and Missing Persons Headquarters notified his family.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Shviti “was a gifted student of sustainability and governance, and a courageous individual” who acted heroically on October 7, helping others flee.
“He was killed in the process and his body was abducted to Gaza by Hamas. My wife and I send our heartfelt condolences to the Shtivi family. So far, 207 hostages have been returned, 148 of them alive. We will continue to act tirelessly and decisively to bring back all our hostages—living and deceased.”
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Woman Stabbed at Ottawa Grocery Store in Latest Antisemitic Attack
A social media post by the alleged attacker, Joseph Rooke of Cornwall, Ontario. Photo: Screenshot via i24
i24 News – The stabbing of a Jewish woman at an Ottawa grocery by a man with a long history of antisemitic posts on social media, the latest antisemitic hate crime in Canada, sparked outrage and prompted condemnation from officials including the prime minister.
Both the victim and the attacker are in their 70s. The woman is reportedly in serious condition.
The suspect was identified as Joseph Rooke, who has authored a series of lengthy rambling screeds on social media, ranting against Israel and Jews.
“Judaism is the world’s oldest cult,” he writes in one post, going on to say “over time jews have become insidious in governments, businesses, media conglomerates, and educational institutions in order to do what they do better than anyone else. Jews are the world’s masters of propaganda, gaslighting, demonization, demagoguery, and outright lying. Using their collective wealth they have become masters of reprisal.”
“I am under no obligation whatsoever, legal, moral, or otherwise, to like jews and I do not. If that means I meet the jewish definition of an anti-semite, so be it.”
Canada has seen a steep spike in antisemitic attacks over the past two years, including a recent incident in Montreal where a Hasidic Jew was beaten in front on his children.
After Prime Minister Mark Carney condemned the incident, many, including former Israel’s ambassador the US Michael Oren, pointed out that Carney’s rhetoric and policies contribute to the increasing insecurity of Canada’s Jewish community through uncritical embrace of outrageous and easily disprovable allegations that Israel and its supporters were guilty of the worst crimes against humanity.