May 16, 2019

TOGETHER:

We must confront threat of white nationalism -- together (Ilhan Omar and Jan Schakowsky, May. 14th, 2019, CNN)

As a Muslim American and a Jewish American elected to the United States Congress, we can no longer sit silently as terror strikes our communities. We cannot allow those who seek to divide and intimidate us to succeed. Whatever our differences, our two communities, Muslim and Jewish, must come together to confront the twin evils of anti-Semitic and Islamophobic violence. [...]

It is no secret that the President normalized white nationalism when he referred to some of the white supremacists marching in Charlottesville as 'very fine people' -- and again doubled down on this statement last month in a speech before the National Rifle Association, by characterizing those who attended the Unite the Right rally as people who "felt very strongly about the statue of Robert E. Lee."

Less well-known are the policies put in place by this administration, which undermine the fight against domestic terrorism. Last year, President Trump ended grants from the Department of Homeland Security designed to help fight white supremacist violence. And just weeks before the Poway attack, Trump's Department of Homeland Security disbanded a group of intelligence analysts focused on domestic terrorism.

White nationalists win when our two communities are divided. They seek to exploit our divisions and grievances to further an agenda of hate. But we know that when are united, we are stronger. We know this because in our own communities, Jewish and Muslim constituents have joined hands in solidarity and denounced these hate-filled massacres.

We saw it when Muslim-American organizations raised more than $200,000 to support the victims and their families after the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting. And we saw it again in March, when Jewish groups from the city of Pittsburgh raised money to support the New Zealand Muslim community in the wake of the Christchurch mosque shooting.


Posted by at May 16, 2019 4:00 AM

  

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