Exclusive: ZOA Slams ‘Deeply Troubling’ Tweets of House Committee, Ilhan Omar on Holocaust Remembrance Day

Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) President Morton Klein blasted the House Foreign Affairs Committee (HFA) as well as Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) on Friday, after tweeting out messages on Holocaust Remembrance Day viewed as “reprehensible,” “hateful” and “antisemitic.”

In an exclusive statement to Breitbart News, ZOA head Morton Klein expressed his “deep concern” over an official HFA tweet that neglected to “mention Jews and antisemitism,” and instead merely recalled “six million (unidentified) lives” and “general forces” of prejudice and injustice, in addition to a “hateful, antisemitic” tweet by Omar which used Holocaust Remembrance Day to attack the Jewish state.

The official HFA tweet reads:

On #YomHaShoah we commit ourselves to remembering the 6 million lives extinguished during the holocaust & millions more who survived its cruelty. To honor their memories, we must remain vigilant against the forces of prejudice & injustice or risk reliving the horrors of the past.

On #YomHaShoah we commit ourselves to remembering the 6 million lives extinguished during the holocaust & millions more who survived its cruelty. To honor their memories, we must remain vigilant against the forces of prejudice & injustice or risk reliving the horrors of the past.

— House Foreign Affairs Committee (@HouseForeign) April 8, 2021

Klein, who was born in a displaced persons camp in Germany and is a child of Holocaust survivors, described the omission as both “incomprehensible and reprehensible.”  

“The Nazis and their collaborators murdered six million Jews,” he stressed, “including almost two million Jewish children.”  

“Universalizing the Holocaust forgets its victims and ignores the uniquely hateful scourge of antisemitism, which is rearing its ugly head more and more today,” he added, before noting that several Congresspersons also “issued similar tweets, omitting all mention of Jews and antisemitism.” 

Klein also slammed Omar for a personal tweet of hers which he also deemed antisemitic.

In the tweet, Omar describes Israel as “a wealthy country that’s getting $3.8 billion a year from America. Yet their Ambassador has the audacity to complain about $150 million going to Palestinian refugees,” before adding, “Shameful.”

Also, Israel is a wealthy country that’s getting $3.8 billion a year from America.

Yet their Ambassador has the audacity to complain about $150 million going to Palestinian refugees.

Shameful. https://t.co/K4r37r3R1y

— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) April 7, 2021

”It is deeply troubling that Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-MN) chose Holocaust Remembrance Day to issue another of her hateful, antisemitic and insensitive tweets,” Klein wrote, as he elaborated:

In her Yom HaShoa Day tweet, antisemitic BDS-promoter Omar wrongly referred to the Jewish State as “wealthy,” condemned the military assistance that enables Israel to defend herself from Arab/Muslim terrorists, and even condemned Israel for expressing concern that the Biden administration is renewing sending hundreds of millions of dollars to UNRWA (whom Omar misleadingly referred to as “Palestinian refugees”). Israel-hater Omar ignored the fact that UNRWA, which will receive hundreds of millions of dollars of U.S. taxpayer funds, teaches Arab children to hate and commit violence against Jews and Israel, in their textbooks and schools. UNRWA also has operations with the murderous terrorist group Hamas.  

 Klein then referred to a “shocking” video posted by a Twitter user in reply to Omar’s tweet, showing Arab school children describing the lessons they learned from their UNRWA school education: 

“They teach us that Jews are bad people”; “I am ready to stab a Jew and drive a car over them”: “I will run a car into the Jews”; “We have to constantly stab [the Jews], drive over them and shoot them”; “Stabbing and running over Jews brings dignity to the Palestinian people”; “I’m going to run [the Jews] over and stab them with knives”; “I am prepared to be a suicide bomber”; and “With Allah’s help, I will fight for ISIS.”

Klein also noted the Nazi collaboration with a Palestinian Muslim leader in Mandatory Palestine.

“Hitler and his collaborator [Palestinian leader] Haj Amin Al Husseini also plotted to murder every Jew in the Middle East,” he wrote. “We must never forget those monstrous facts, painfully unique in human history.”  

As a result, the ZOA — the nation’s oldest pro-Israel organization — called for corrections to be published.

“ZOA urges the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and anyone else who omitted the Holocaust’s Jewish victims, or the need to stamp out antisemitism today, to issue a corrected statement,” Klein wrote, adding that Omar should also “publicly rescind her ugly statement insensitively issued on Holocaust Remembrance Day.” 

In contrast, Klein personally thanked Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Chair of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s GOP members, and its Ranking member, Congressman Michael McCaul (R-TX) and others, both Democrats and Republicans, for their “heartfelt statements.”  

“Senator Menendez commemorated the unspeakable horrors that the Jews of Europe endured from 1939-1945, and condemned the dangerous current worldwide rise in antisemitism,” he wrote. “The House Foreign Affairs GOP members’ statement, retweeted by Ranking Member McCaul, made it very clear that the Nazis murdered 6 million Jews and millions of others, and honored the survivors and heroes.”

Follow Joshua Klein on Twitter @JoshuaKlein.

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