“The anti-Semitic threats targeting our Jewish community and community centers are horrible, and are painful, and a very sad reminder of the work<br />that still must be done to root out hate and prejudice and evil,” he told reporters at the National Museum of African American History and Culture.<br />Around the time Jewish community centers were being threatened, when parents were receiving terrifying come-get-your-kid phone calls, when water aerobic<br />class participants were sent outside to huddle in the cold, our president was twisting himself into rhetorical pretzels to avoid a simple condemnation.<br />He was shouting down reporters, reframing the issue, celebrating himself as “the least anti-Semitic person you’ve ever seen in your entire life,” offering variations on the theme of “some of my best friends are Jewish,”<br />and reminding us all of his Electoral College victory.<br />They said that American Jews did not deserve his reassurance,<br />that the threats against places where we lift weights and send our kids to finger-paint weren’t important enough to require his swift condemnation, like Arnold Schwarzenegger’s poor ratings, or that time the cast of “Hamilton” addressed Mike Pence during a curtain call<br />If synagogue is where Jews feel the most Jewish — praying in a foreign language, celebrating holidays<br />that aren’t always on the office calendar — the J. C.C.
