Anti-Semitism at the New York Times [Updated]

The Democratic Party, following in the steps of Britain’s Labour Party, is sinking ever deeper into anti-Semitism. Now it’s the Democrats’ house organ, the New York Times. On April 25, the international edition of the Times published this blatantly anti-Semitic cartoon attacking Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump:

The weirdest aspect of the cartoon (although not the most offensive) is the depiction of Trump as a Jew. Wasn’t he was supposed to be a Nazi? I suppose no one expects consistency from liberals, but this seems a little extreme.

The Times retracted the cartoon and issued an apology:

No doubt the people who run the Times view this incident as an anomaly. The tide of anti-Semitism is rising on the Left, but it will have to get worse before outlets like the Times recognize that they have a problem.

UPDATE: Scott points out that the Times retracted (deleted) the cartoon and said it shouldn’t have been published, but the paper’s statement doesn’t actually contain an apology. That is true: I suppose the Times couldn’t bring itself to apologize to either Netanyahu or Trump–that would have been more bitter than wormwood–but perhaps it could have apologized to Jews in general, or to, as it so often put, “whoever was offended.” For whatever reason, no such apology has yet been forthcoming.

STEVE adds: I would love to know the inside story of who on the Times staff approved the cartoon for publication. Back when the Times had Daniel Okrent and his successors as an ombudsman we might have found out, but that position has been abolished. I have a hunch: it was younger millennial editors—the same kind of people who ousted James Damore from Google—who have marinated in “anti-Zionist” ideology in college over the last couple decades, and who have no clue that such an image is as offensive as the n-word to decent Americans, or who know it is offensive but don’t see any problem with it, because Israel=South Africa, or something. I wonder whether anyone will be fired, demoted, or suspended for this. I doubt it. But we’re never going to find out.

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