Explaining the craziness of American Jews supporting people who hate them

Ruthie Bloom:

n fairness to US President Donald Trump, he is not alone in his bafflement at the behavior and political beliefs of the bulk of American Jewry. But as has been the case with previous of his often indelicate gut reactions to current events, his statement this week about Jews and the Democratic Party was distorted by his enemies and blown way out of proportion.

The scandal erupted when Trump responded to the vile press conference held on August 19 by antisemitic freshman congressional Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan), whose plan to visit Israel and “Palestine” earlier this month – on a mission to bash the Jewish state – was thwarted. Their sojourn, organized by the radical Palestinian NGO Miftah, not only supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel, but has praised suicide bombers as “sacrificing their lives for the cause.” You know, the cause of killing Jews. Oh, and some of its members have written pieces claiming that Israelis drink the blood and steal the organs of innocent Palestinian children, the usual blood-libel stuff that the Democratic Party of old never would have tolerated, let alone ignore to placate members of its ranks.
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Under the circumstances, Trump’s response made perfect sense.

“Five years ago, the concept of even talking about this, even three years ago, of cutting off aid to Israel because of two people that hate Israel and hate Jewish people – I can’t even believe we’re having this conversation,” he said. “Where has the Democratic Party gone? Where have they gone that they’re defending these two people over the State of Israel? And I think any Jewish people that vote for a Democrat, I think it shows either a great lack of knowledge or a great disloyalty.”

Jumping disingenuously on the word “disloyalty” – which is antisemitic when employed as a slur to accuse US Jews of caring more about Israel than they do about their own country – anti-Trump Jews around the world went into a calculated frenzy.

Nothing new there. Such Jews have been trying to pin the antisemitism label on Trump since his election, blaming him for everything from the Charlottesville riots to the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting to “white supremacist” Twitter trolls.

These are the same Jews who have the gall to liken illegal immigrants storming the Mexico border to Jewish refugees during the Holocaust. These are the very Jews who similarly slam Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Contrary to the outcry on the part of his critics, Trump was not accusing Jews of being disloyal to America, but rather to themselves.
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In other words, Trump was expressing shock and disappointment that Jews would willingly betray their own interests. In his eyes, this means that they must be ignorant of the direction in which the party they overwhelmingly support has been going. If not, they appear to be purposely sabotaging US relations with the single state established in their ancestral homeland to protect their people and serve as America’s buffer against hostile, anti-democratic forces in the volatile, strategically important region.
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There is more and it is worth reading in full to try to understand why so many of them cling to a group that hates them.  She does a good job of explaining this mystifying behavior by otherwise intelligent people.  But even with an explanation it is still weird behaior.