Ilhan Omar: Thank you to Fox News for standing up for me against Jeanine Pirro

If you had “Ilhan Omar and Fox News form alliance against Jeanine Pirro” on your 2019 Bingo card, come collect your winnings.

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She neglected to add that we should, of course, question the national allegiance of those who support the Jewish state, a point on which she’s previously made herself clear.

Here’s the Pirro clip if you missed it earlier. The strangest part of this critique of Muslims who wear the hijab is Pirro feeling she has to look to the Koran to explain why a Democrat would be anti-Israel. It’s true that the party’s leadership is pro-Israel; it’s by no means true that all non-Muslim Democrats are. Given Omar’s progressive alignment, it’s possible if not probable that she’d have as much antipathy to Israel had she been born a Christian in the U.S. and grown up to be radically left as she has now.

“If it’s not rooted in the party, where is she getting from?” From … any progressive group’s platform on Israel? You think Ilhan Omar got her spiel about AIPAC and “the Benjamins” from the Hadiths? What Pirro really means is where did Omar’s anti-semitic dual-loyalty smear come from, as that’s not garden-variety leftist cant about Israel. But you don’t need to point to a hijab to explain that either. The point of last week’s argument in favor of a strong House resolution against anti-semitism is that that stereotype recurs in all sorts of anti-semitic cultures and subcultures, not all of them Muslim. Or left-wing.

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Anyway, Fox News was unhappy, which is what triggered Omar’s statement of gratitude today: “We strongly condemn Jeanine Pirro’s comments about Rep. Ilhan Omar. They do not reflect those of the network and we have addressed the matter with her directly.” Muslim Fox employees were unhappy too:

Pirro responded:

“I’ve seen a lot of comments about my opening statement from Saturday night’s show and I did not call Rep. Omar un-American,” she said. “My intention was to ask a question and start a debate, but of course because one is Muslim does not mean you don’t support the Constitution. I invite Rep. Omar to come on my show any time to discuss all of the important issues facing America today.”

Pirro’s point was that an observant hijab-wearing Muslim, not necessarily all Muslims, treats shari’a rather than the Constitution as the supreme law of the land rather than. Omar can and should speak for herself on why she wears the hijab, whether she feels compelled to for religious reasons or does it voluntarily to honor her faith (doubtless she’d note that women of other faiths, like Orthodox Judaism, also wear hair coverings without having their allegiance to the Constitution questioned). But if Pirro wants to broach interesting conflicts between religion and politics, she’d do better to ask how Omar reconciles her faith’s view of traditional gender roles with her identification with the Democrats’ progressive wing. Is she a skeptic of LGBT rights or an enthusiastic supporter? Judging from her campaign website, her political identity takes precedence over her religious one.

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Here’s Tulsi Gabbard, who still hasn’t figured out yet if Assad is a war criminal, shilling for Omar last night. She claims that she too has been accused of dual loyalty owing to her own faith. Oh really? Dual loyalty to who? Last I checked, Assad isn’t Hindu.

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