The Issue: Former President Barack Obama’s record of aligning politically against Israel (Golda Meir Update)

Letters to the editor — Oct. 23, 2026

"Former President Barack Obama endorsed radical-left and antisemitic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, and the two will continue trashing Israel on the campaign trail (“Embracing an Israel-Hater,” Editorial, Oct. 21).

It looks like Obama isn’t the soft-spoken and empathetic Christian many thought he was.

Will Graves Winter Park, Fla.

Michael Goodwin’s column failed to include one critical element that sheds light on the origins of Obama’s longstanding animus toward Israel and Jews (“Obama spurred Dem Israel hate,” Oct. 21).

For 20 years, Obama attended the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, whose pastor, the notorious Israel-hater Rev. Jeremiah Wright, frequently lashed out against Jews and Israel, and was an associate of the infamous Louis Farrakhan.

When sermon clips went viral, Obama issued a weak apology and canceled his membership. But he was a member of the church for two decades. Why didn’t he ever speak out against Wright or Farrakhan before political pressure mounted?

Mitchell Schwefel  Barnegat, NJ

What Obama said is not just anti-Israel; it’s purely antisemitic. The land-grab accusation is just another way to express the old antisemitic trope that Jews love money and power.

Svetlana Shapiro Brooklyn

Obama uses being a former president to lie about Israel, accusing it of stealing Arab land.

Jews have lived in the area for a millennium, and Israel has offered land for peace multiple times. His animus toward the Jewish state does not justify lying to bolster his claims. Mel Young" . . .

"I'm Not Jewish. I'm a Zionist": The Viral Trend Defying Anti-Israel Hate | HonestReporting  "Non-Jews are proudly declaring themselves Zionists in a viral X trend, pushing back against anti-Israel hatred and showing solidarity with Israel."

"The anti-Israel mob wants ‘Zionist’ – the belief that the Jewish people have the right to self-determination in their historic homeland – to be a word people whisper. Over the past week or so, more and more people have been typing it out loud."  

 Hundreds join viral 'I'm not Jewish, I'm a Zionist' trend on social media | The Jerusalem Post 

 "Among posts found on October 4 were broader declarations such as, “I’m not Jewish, but I am a Zionist.”

"By October 5, however, users had begun inserting their national identity into the declaration. One early example read, “I’m not Jewish. I am Irish, and I am a Zionist.”

"An October 6 post similarly stated, “I’m English, I’m not Jewish, but I am a Zionist.'”

A Zionist Scripture I'm sure Obama's Rev Wright would not have taught!  Restoration of Israel: The Centerpiece of Prophecy

Obama’s Dangerous Mideast Words - WSJ 

. . . "The timing of his remarks matters. This week he will rally in Detroit for Abdul El-Sayed, Michigan’s Democratic U.S. Senate nominee, who has accused Israel of “genocide” and “apartheid,” called it “bloodthirsty” and a “rogue state,” and, when asked three times on CNN whether Israel has a right to exist, refused to say yes. Mr. Obama is free to campaign for whomever he chooses. But when he, the most trusted voice in the Democratic Party, misrepresents Jewish history and then shares a stage with Mr. El-Sayed, Jewish Americans can be forgiven for hearing one message. Perhaps it is not the one he intends. That is precisely the point about words." . . .

Obama is wrong to call Jews 'excessive.' Elisha Wiesel sets him straight 

UPDATED

. . . "Going deeper into Obama’s misrepresentation of the Israeli-Arab conflict, Wiesel challenges Obama’s narrative that the Jews were “oppressed in Europe and then arrive somewhere else and took too much.” But the Holy Land belonged to the Jews for centuries before the Arabs arrived. Read the Bible. God gave it to them in perpetuity.

"The “West Bank” is a modern geographic invention for what the Bible calls Judea and Samaria — the Holy Land. Wiesel quotes his father’s 2001 words on the territorial question: “To compromise on territory might seem, under certain conditions, imperative. [...] But to compromise on history is impossible.”

"Wiesel also notes that the auditorium at the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, which opened this past June, is named for his father.

"Wiesel closes with a passionate and moving challenge, calling on Obama to change his mind. He writes: “Mr. Obama’s place isn’t with those who call Jewish survival excessive. His place is with the murdered of Hebron and of Oct. 7, and with a people that has been waiting, since 1947, for someone across the table to stop choosing hate.”

"I would extend Wiesel’s call to all Americans and to people of common decency everywhere.

"Too often today, anti-Zionism is morphing into antisemitism or serving as camouflage for it." . . .

Fans Revolt Against WNBA After Despicable Behavior During National Anthem

Kyle Becker

"This is narcissism on full display. Americans who work actual jobs, who turn on sports to feel inspired, do not relate to petulant millionaires who cannot be respectful to our country for two minutes of their day."

Meet Sunny Hostin and Joy Reid's audience

"A disclaimer is in order before we delve into the ongoing chronicles of "Why the WNBA Sucks and Nobody Watches It."

"When I say there is a "revolt" against watching the WNBA, that means among the trifling sliver of the population that gives a damn about the sport, there are lots of fans miffed about it.

"It is thus a bit of a head-scratcher why a sport that piqued general sports' fans interest with colorful characters like Caitlin Clark and Sophie Cunningham, and budding rivalries with the likes of Angel Reese, would squander any possibility of good will and viewership with petulant, crybaby, leftist politics. 

"There was a kind of WWE-NBA heroes and villains theme brewing, but the league is blowing it with braindead woke activism.

"The latest installment came on Wednesday when the league management showed once again that it will defend leftist policies at the expense of their potential viewership.

"As RedState's Bob Hoge regaled us in a trenchant post::

The two teams playing in the WNBA Finals game Wednesday, the Who Cares and the I Don't Knows, once again walked off the court while the national anthem was being played. 

Naturally, the clown show of an association has said nothing, even though this is the third time in a row. That would be enough to keep me from ever watching their side hustle — basketball, allegedly — forever, but it wasn’t the only thing that went down at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta, Georgia.

Enes Kanter Freedom’s hilarious bid to join the league was shot down by Commissioner Cathy Engelbert in a letter to House Republicans that was released Tuesday because he and his fellow would-be draftee Royce White are “both men.” Evidently, the League knows what men are, but still couldn’t come up with a definition for what a woman is in their statement. " . . .   

More.

 Kyle N.A. Becker is a podcaster, independent journalist, and RedState columnist. He previously worked as a writer for Fox News’ top-rated show and as Director of Viral Media at a leading news-and-politics website. He is the author of the highly rated fantasy book "Hypernea: The Cursed Kingdom."

Trump-LeBron Feud Heats Up After Latest Anthem Diss   . . . "Despite being a certain Hall of Famer who’s won four championships, James has never enjoyed the almost-universal love that the LA Lakers' Kobe Bryant and the Chicago Bulls’ Michael Jordan — who won five and six championships, respectively — did, partly because he wasn’t primarily associated with one team during his career, like they were, and partly because he regularly spouts out leftist political talking points and behaves like a buffoon during America’s national song."

Good thing this Englishman didn't attend a WNBA game

Why Captured German Nurses Were Shocked by American POW Camps in WW2

Frontline Echoes - Harold Warfield

"I liked the comment about if medical personnel were not needed that would be returned. An American nurse in WW 2 that was on an air evac flight that ran into flak was taken prisoner. She worked in a POW hospital camp where wounded Americans were treated while the commandant made the arrangements to send her back. Once the plans were in place she was given a traveling suit, donated by the camp commandant's wife, currency, a rail ticket and travel documents so she could go to Switzerland."

"My mother was a U.S. Navy nurse and officer, initially commissioned an ensign, and later promoted to lieutenant (junior grade). She had attended nursing school at the Medical College of Virginia, hoping to become an airline stewardess (an RN certification was required at the time). Instead, she was invited to join the Navy's nursing corps after graduation in May 1941, and upon completion of her officer training, she was assigned to the naval hospital at Norfolk Naval Station. She would spend virtually the entire American portion of the war working in the burn ward of the Norfolk naval hospital, treating severely burned U.S. Marines, sailors, Allied sailors, merchant mariners, and the occasional German prisoner. Most had horrific burns received in the war. My mother was a chatty woman, but she never really talked about her wartime work; it hurt too much to remember the young men she served. Like so many of the men of her generation, she could never really open up about her experiences -- too much loss, too much sorrow, too much trauma; it was easier to bury it and do their best to move on with their lives after a 10-year depression and a 4-year war in which almost every family suffered some form of loss or trauma. "These German women may have served the enemy regime in Europe, but I have nothing but admiration for the POW nurses who continued to nurse German and Allied wounded while they were prisoners. At the end of their lives, I hope they all found peace and some semblance of happiness."

Captured German Nurses Didn't Know Where the Americans Were Taking Them. It Was the Front Line.  "On Sunday, July 2, 1944, American ambulances drove eight captured German nurses out of Cherbourg. Nobody had told them what the Americans meant to do with them. By evening they were riding in two ambulances with sealed windows, past the last American outposts near Caumont, toward the German lines. For thirty minutes the guns on that stretch of the front went silent.

"The fall of Cherbourg and the German naval hospital; the 1929 Geneva Convention rule on medical personnel; nurse Herta Wist of Karlsruhe; the radio messages to the German side; Captain Quentin Roosevelt and Captain Fred Ghercke on the road between the lines; the second handover of July 9 and Lieutenant Kenneth Calligan; and the night Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr. died."

"I Walked Through A ‘Peaceful’ French Protest. Hours Later The Same Street Was On Fire. . . Everything in stores but ham was stolen."

What’s happening in France is a preview of what’s coming to America if the Democratic Socialists of America have their way.

Martha Careful - American Thinker

Emmanuel Macron’s [Bidenish,Carterish] milquetoast response to the worst riots in years does not bode well for the future. What the French need is a leader who loves France, its history, and its values, and most importantly, understands what’s at stake. 

Uncle Paul's Parodies

"Early last week, I participated in my first protest march in France. Well, technically, I didn’t really protest. I was on one side of the street and had to cross to the grocery store on the other side, pushing through tens of thousands of protesters between me and there. So I had to wade into the crowd and walk with them for about a block to make it to the other side without being trampled.

"The group was mostly kids in their late teens to mid-twenties, but there were more than a few Boomers. There were cardboard signs, Che Guevara shirts, and Palestinian flags. Nonetheless, everyone was chatting and smiling and seemed to be having a great time. A few people wore black and balaclavas, but not many.

"Later that evening, I heard a couple of faint explosions. I didn’t really think much of it because there’s construction around. Only later, when I was on X, did my feed start to fill with the chaos. There were videos of a line of cops running toward a bunch of rioters. On closer inspection, I noticed it was literally on the very street I'd been on a few hours earlier, a block away. I was a bit surprised because the crowd that I had made my way through had been so...well...happy and polite.

"But that’s the way things seem to work here. You have protesters who may or may not have legitimate grievances—honestly, usually not, but everyone loves a good protest march that gets them out of school or work—followed by the violent thugs.

"And that’s exactly what they are. These thugs were throwing rocks at the police, breaking windows of stores of every kind—never bookstores—and stealing everything inside—except the ham from supermarkets. They attacked police, started fires in trash bins, broke the glass of bus stops, and set bikes and cars on fire." . . .

"The (relative) hellscape I saw in Paris on Sunday is an omen of things to come. From shattered windows to shattered lives, the red/green alliance can and will destroy everything in its path, and as history has shown, agitators only get more brazen the more they’re coddled."

Victor Davis Hanson: Macron is Gavin Newsom with a French accent.

America's press will make manifest the crimes in the streets!  MSNOW should pretty much do as MSNBC did once.

Nothing to see here! MSNBC reporter mocked mercilessly for downplaying riots as building burns   . . . “There is a deep sense of grievance and complaint here, and that is the thing. That when you discount people who are doing things to public property that they shouldn’t be doing, it does have to be understood that this city has got, for the last several years, an issue with police, and it’s got a real sense of the deep sense of grievance of inequality,” Velshi added.

"The ridiculous take caused swift reaction on social media." . . .

Only Some Kinds of Protest Are Always 'Mostly Peaceful' | National Review

. . . "And on occasions when right-wing extremists commit acts of violence, nobody in the mainstream media plays the “well, you criticized them when the Tea Party protested peacefully, what did you expect?” card. You could say the same about pro-life protests (ask Nick Sandmann how eager the media was to defend him and his classmates for being “mostly peaceful”).

"The thing these outlets always forget is that everybody can see what you’re doing. You’re not fooling anyone."

'Horrible, horrible human being': Alan Dershowitz says he hopes Rep. Ilhan Omar goes to jail amid citizenship fraud investigation

'Horrible, horrible human being': Alan Dershowitz says he hopes Rep. Ilhan Omar goes to jail amid citizenship fraud investigation

Townhall

. . . "While discussing the case, Dershowitz declared, "I hope she has to go to jail."

"He also accused the congresswoman of being a “horrible” human being who is anti-American and anti-Israel.

"The former Harvard Law School professor said that while many of the allegations against her may be barred by the statute of limitations, she could still face questions about potential citizenship fraud if she conspired to alter her birth date to make the naturalization process easier.

"He said she is unlikely to face criminal charges but could be denaturalized and deported if found guilty.

"However, President Donald Trump disagreed, stating that she could go to jail if the allegations are true. Dershowitz said that the government has to prove she lied in her application. He also said she would be in “deep trouble” even if it was her father who committed the alleged fraud." . . .   More...

Obama 'besmirching his brand' by defending Ilhan Omar amid fraud probe: Tiana Lowe Doescher   “It is a basic principle of American democracy that the government can’t selectively target individuals simply because of their political beliefs or what they say,” Obama said. “But that’s exactly what the Trump Administration is doing to Congresswoman Ilhan Omar of Minnesota.”

"Doescher said the statement was hypocritical given Obama's investigations into people like Carter Page for alleged Russian ties in 2016, as well as the 2010 investigation into Fox News reporter James Rosen for a government leak.

"Omar’s fraud allegations began in January, when Trump said that the representative was under investigation over financial records discrepancies." . . .

What Happened to John Cleese Isn’t Funny | Britain’s free-speech crackdown makes the Ministry of Silly Walks look positively sensible.

  The American Spectator | USA News and Politics

One of John Cleese’s most trenchant comedic performances was a Monty Python skit on the Ministry of Silly Walks. It hilariously lampoons government’s petty pretentiousness. It is tempting to laugh off what has now befallen Cleese, something he himself did: “All good comedy material. For those with a sense of humor.” [Below]

"For the first time, what has happened to John Cleese isn’t funny. Instead, he is living the adage “when you laugh, the world laughs with you; when you cry, you cry alone.” He is because, sadly, he is a voice crying out alone. Alone because Britain of today has done everything it can to intimidate its citizens from crying out at all.

"As anyone who knows anything about British comedy, John Cleese has been at its forefront for six decades. His work is iconic, from Monty Python to Fawlty Towers to numerous movies and television appearances. So important has Cleese been to modern British culture that it is impossible not to recount the importance of the shows in which he has starred, and so integral has he been in these that it’s equally impossible to list them without seeing his performances in your mind’s eye.

"Yet Cleese is today starring in something that is no laughing matter in Britain. Because of a series of posts about Islam, Cleese is threatened with cancellation for the first time in his career. (RELATED: The People Who Once Laughed With John Cleese Are Now His Punchlines)

"As a comedian, Cleese made his living and societal mark by observing and lampooning British conduct. Then, the world laughed with him. Now, he is crying out against certain Islamic practices; in today’s Britain, that can make you very lonely indeed.

"On Sept. 22, Cleese was referred to Prevent, a British program designed to assess speech for radical content and possible links to terrorism. The referral claims his social media posts trip “several indicators used in PREVENT risk assessments for anti-Muslim hate and counter-extremism concerns.” (RELATED: The Unfathomable Horror of Britain’s Rape-Gang Holocaust)

"There is nothing in Cleese’s posts that were included in the pro-Islam 5Pillars (a website concentrating on British Muslim news) article that indicates any reason for counter-extremism concerns. There is not, because Cleese was merely stating his opinion. The complaint against Cleese’s opinions is intimidation, pure and simple. (RELATED: The Fall of Britain — and the Warning for America)

"While Cleese may be the lonely voice on Islam in today’s Britain, he is not alone in running afoul of government censorship in Britain. Two years ago, J.K. Rowling challenged Scotland’s hate crime law by audaciously describing transgender women as men. As she posted on the day the law took effect: . . ."  More.

Even a stopped clock is raped twice a day

Ann Coulter 

"When it comes to any feminist cause, no one can believe anything the Times says. It’s sad, but that’s where we are." 

ChatGPT

"As the Cornell circus drags on, we are past the point where The New York Times has to be told, I’m sorry, this is a feminist thing, you have to recuse yourself. The paper can only respond, You’re right, but I have a problem with alcohol.

"Having repeatedly made itself a journalistic laughingstock by believing any gang-rape accusation against white men, the Times thinks it gets an unlimited number of free shots, with no penalty.

"To take a few of the paper’s standout efforts: in the Duke lacrosse debacle, the Times held out to the bitter end, believing the soon-to-be-disbarred prosecutor and hiding the burgeoning evidence of the players’ innocence long after every other media outlet had admitted the truth.

"A few years later, the Times gave front-page billing to Jamie Leigh Jones’s tale about being violently gang-raped by military contractors in Baghdad, even claiming to have confirmed her account by talking to other self-proclaimed victims and—to get the other side of the story—their lawyers. The jury verdict against her on all counts was given in a short AP report, demurely placed on page A13.

"Then, when nearly every news outlet was pillorying Rolling Stone magazine’s preposterous cover story about a gang rape at a University of Virginia fraternity, the Times stood alone in finding no flaws with the chronicle. (Sample sentence from the original article: “’Grab its motherf*cking leg,’ she heard a voice say. And that’s when Jackie knew she was going to be raped.”) The most the paper would allow was that others had doubts, noting that the magazine’s account had “come under scrutiny.”

"After every gang-rape saga blows up in its face, the Times runs and hides, waits a few years, then rushes to embrace another fraud.

"Jane Doe’s recent lawsuit against Cornell puts the Times right on schedule to fall flat on its face again. Doe claims that, two years ago, she was gang-raped at a fraternity there. Sadly, the accused rapists aren’t white this time, but they’re in a fraternity and that’s close enough.

"Let’s see how the paper’s doing.

The War On Excellence

 American Free News Network

. . . "A nation cannot indefinitely lead in AI, quantum computing, aerospace, robotics, cyber defense, and advanced weapon systems if it fails to produce enough mathematicians, scientists, engineers, technicians, and informed citizens.

A recent Wall Street Journal editorial underscored “America’s failing education system is the biggest handicap in the innovation race with China.”

A Gallup poll last month showed widespread aversion with the quality of K-12 education increasing by 12 points over the last two years to 67%." . . .

. . . "The proposed Education Freedom Tax Credit that was authorized by 2025’s “Big Beautiful Bill” as the nation’s largest school choice undertaking is one of them. Beginning in 2027, homeschooled and private K-12 students could receive federally supported education scholarships.   More.

In ‘Caliphornia,’ a dangerous bill is about to be passed that will force your children to be indoctrinated with Islamic ideology in the classroom   

Another fraud perpetrated by Weingarten concerns a book she wrote last year, Why Fascists Fear Teachers: Public Education and the Future of Democracy,

Human swastika formed by students at Bay Area Branham High School   . . . "The disturbing scene was photographed and shared in a since-deleted Wednesday social media post that featured an antisemitic 1939 quote from Adolf Hitler.

“If the international Jewish financiers in and outside Europe should succeed in plunging the nations once more into a world war, then the result will not be the Bolshevization of the earth, and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe,” read what appeared to be an Instagram caption.

US radicals who traveled to France to join cop-bashing protests reveal plans to ‘raise hell’ on our shores   Pictured; Rapper and his political whore:

. . . "CodePink has been accused of radicalizing a new generation of activists by spending millions of dollars to teach anti-American rhetoric.

Elsewhere, the Singham-linked Party for Socialism and Liberation, based in the US, has committed to joining French protesters in their “struggle for a socialist future”.

“We in the United States stand with you in your struggle against capitalist austerity,” the group proudly wrote on Instagram.

Instagram

Not the Democrat Party of Roosevelt and Kennedy; Nowhere Close

Bill Ackman Once Funded Democrats. Now He Has a Brutal Assessment of What They’ve Become.  . . . "I think the Democratic Party is in the worst place it's ever been, in the 250-year history of the country," Ackman told Katie Miller. "I think it's become like this crazy, radicalized, you know, anti-American thing. I think it's — and by the way, I think there's some very high-quality Democrats, you know, senators and, sure, some congressmen — but the party itself, I think, is in a very bad place."

"And I think the problem with people who've chosen to be a politician for a career, you either have to get with the party in order to continue, or you get primaries," Ackman added. "You know, actually, Senator Schumer, I had a good relationship with him over the years. I thought he was a good man. But in recent years, I felt he's just trying to keep his job." 

"And, you know, that's the really low point for politicians when they'll compromise on their values, and they'll support, you know, a quasi-terrorist, perhaps running for Senate in Michigan, because they have to for the party," Ackman said. "Stuff like that to me is, or terrorist supporter, is not, that's, I find that pretty, deeply concerning." . . .

Pollster admits to fabricating data for ‘social experiment’ to expose flaws of industry | US news | The Guardian   "A polling firm has admitted to using fabricated data in surveys that were picked up by national media outlets in the US, claiming the project was a “social experiment” designed to expose the lack of scrutiny over the sector." . . .

Failed Senate Candidate Says Fake Poll ‘Killed’ Her Campaign - Newsweek

. . . "Democrats are up in arms after a so-called polling firm that projected far-left candidates

as strong contenders in several primaries admitted that it had fabricated its polling data.

"Wedgewood Polling, which billed itself as an election survey company, released a statement Tuesday night admitting it used "fabricated numbers" for an "experimental project to demonstrate the vulnerabilities, lack of oversight, and overall low barrier to entry in the modern political polling industry."

"The group's polls were cited by Abdul El-Sayed's campaign amid a high-profile primary race against Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow and U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Mich. The nonpartisan polling aggregator Political Polls also cited Wedgewood in the Wisconsin gubernatorial race, showing socialist Francesca Hong having an edge over Republican candidate Rep. Tom Tiffany, R-Wis.

"McMorrow said Wedgewood's numbers led to her donations drying up and reporters having "hounded" her with calls to drop out of the race." . . .

Will Common Sense Doom the Wealth Tax for California? Updated:

UPDATE: Mark Zuckerberg threatened to leave California over wealth tax

. . . "Because of his concerns over the wealth tax, Zuckerberg told Meta that he was "evaluating relocating his primary residence outside California and that steps toward any such relocation, including any listing of his residential real estate in California on the market, would be public and inevitably noted and commented upon by company employees and, accordingly, raise questions for management of the company going forward," the filing states." . . .

California’s Wealth Tax Meets the 2nd Law of Demand 

"As Adam Smith said, there is a great deal of ruin in a nation. A wealth tax, temporary or permanent, will likely deepen California’s fiscal hole. Such a tax chases out current wealth creators and discourages future wealth creation. What is unseen from this tax is all the entrepreneurs who may choose to form businesses in Texas, Nevada, or elsewhere rather than California." 

• "Proposition 40 is called a one-time tax, but the way it is funded and California’s tax history suggest it will last.
• People adapt to a tax over time, so a permanent wealth tax would bring in less revenue each year while its costs rise.
• Comparisons to Massachusetts’s millionaire surtax do not hold, because Proposition 40 taxes total wealth rather than income above a threshold.
• \The biggest cost is unseen: entrepreneurs who build their businesses in Texas, Nevada, or elsewhere instead of California.

California’s Proposition 40 would impose a wealth tax on the residents of the state, if passed. Despite being a one-time tax, its supporters hope that its passage will kick-start a wave of wealth tax measures across beyond just California. If these taxes become permanent, then their negative consequences will worsen over time while the benefits will shrink, for the simple reason that people will find new ways to avoid the tax. In economics, this passage of time effect is called the Second Law of Demand.

Colloquially called a “billionaire’s tax,” Proposition 40 would impose a one-time 5% tax on the net assets (gross assets minus debt) of people residing in California on January 1, 2026." . . .Jon Murphyis a Research Fellow at the Independent Institute and Assistant Professor of Economics at Nicholls State University (Louisiana).