The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today condemned the racist, anti-Muslim extremist group, the Zionist Organization of America, and its CEO Morton Klein for a “dishonest and disgusting” attack on Vice President Harris over her expressions of sympathy for college students protesting the genocide in Gaza.
In an interview with The Nation published on July 8th, writer Joan Walsh asked Harris about the college campus protests and the war on Gaza.
At one point, Harris said, “They are showing exactly what the human emotion should be, as a response to Gaza. There are things some of the protesters are saying that I absolutely reject, so I don’t mean to wholesale endorse their points. But we have to navigate it. I understand the emotion behind it.”
Earlier today, the Zionist Organization of America issued a racist statement attacking the vice president because of remarks she reportedly made in an interview. The statement accused Harris of endorsing “Arab Islamist criminality,” which are clear racist and Islamophobic dog whistles.
SEE: ZOA Statement Attacking Vice President Harris
Klein is notorious for his use of the term “filthy Arab,” his support for the Trump administration’s Muslim Ban and his advocacy of the religious profiling of Muslims.
In a statement, CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell said:
“We strongly condemn Morton Klein and the Zionist Organization of America for the dishonest, disgusting and transparently political attack on Vice President Kamala Harris using racist and Islamophobic dog whistles.
“We are not surprised that Mr. Klein—who is notorious for making racist and bigoted remarks about Arabs and Muslims—would try to smear Vice President Harris because she indicated that she understood some of the college students who respectfully and peacefully protested the Gaza genocide.
“We encourage Vice President Harris to stand firm amid attacks from racists and bigots who seek to silence any Americans who dare to express even the mildest sympathy with Palestinian humanity.”
BACKGROUND
In an interview with The Nation published on July 8th, writer Joan Walsh asked Harris about the college campus protests and the war on Gaza and wrote:
“Undeniably the toughest issue Harris faces on the campaign trail is the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, which is taking a huge political toll on Biden’s standing with younger voters. She has gotten credit for being a step ahead of the president in her public statements, criticizing Israel’s relentless bombardment and the resulting humanitarian crisis in Gaza with an eloquent anguish Biden has not matched.
But Harris’s words sit uneasily alongside the administration’s actions. Biden has been unyielding in his military support for Israel, even as the death toll in Gaza climbs ever higher and the global condemnation of the war deepens. Harris doesn’t set the administration’s foreign policy agenda, and it’s unclear how hard she’s pushed internally for Biden to shift course on Gaza. In public, though, her team is eager to play down any notion of a split between her and the president.
“The difference is not in substance but probably in tone,” one of her advisors on the conflict told me.
I asked Harris about that question of tone.
“Listen, I strongly believe that our ability to evaluate a situation is connected to understanding the details of that situation. Not speaking of myself versus the president, not at all. From the beginning, I asked questions. OK, the trucks are taking flour into Gaza. But here’s the thing, Joan: I like to cook. So I said to my team: You can’t make shit with flour if you don’t have clean water. So what’s going on with that? I ask questions like, What are people actually eating right now? I’m hearing stories about their eating animal feed, grass… so that’s how I think about it.
“Similarly, I was asking early on, what are women in Gaza doing about sanitary hygiene. Do they have pads? And these are the issues that made people feel uncomfortable, especially sanitary pads.”
The young people who have mobilized against the destruction of Gaza are unlikely to be mollified by these answers. What does she say to them?
“They are showing exactly what the human emotion should be, as a response to Gaza. There are things some of the protesters are saying that I absolutely reject, so I don’t mean to wholesale endorse their points. But we have to navigate it. I understand the emotion behind it.”
CAIR’s mission is to protect civil rights, enhance understanding of Islam, promote justice, and empower American Muslims.
La misión de CAIR es proteger las libertades civiles, mejorar la comprensión del Islam, promover la justicia, y empoderar a los musulmanes en los Estados Unidos.
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CONTACT: CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com