Three years after Hamas invaded Israel and slaughtered roughly 1,200 people, leading Democrats marked October 7 by remembering the murdered Israelis… but then immediately called out Palestinian Arabs who suffered in the war that they launched while condemning Israel.
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) began appropriately. He described “Hamas terrorists intent on destroying Israel” who murdered, kidnapped and raped innocent civilians. Then he turned the anniversary toward Palestinians, calling civilian deaths and the devastation of Gaza “reprehensible,” demanding the “creation of an independent Palestinian state” and condemning Israeli settler violence.
Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) similarly remembered Hamas’s “heinous terror attack,” the 1,200 murdered and the hostages. Then came the turn: “Three years into the brutality of the war in Gaza,” followed by demands to stop the bombing, deliver aid and secure Palestinian self-determination.
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) devoted most of his statement to the massacre and hostages, but his conclusion expanded the October 7 commemoration to “the aid and well-being of the Palestinian people,” Gaza’s devastation, reconstruction and Palestinian statehood.
Apparently, commemorating a terrorist massacre now requires remembering the people who suffered when the country that was attacked went to war.
Well… only when it comes to the massacre of Jews.
Just four weeks ago, Markey commemorated the 25th anniversary of 9/11. He remembered the nearly 3,000 people murdered, the families in Massachusetts who lost loved ones, America’s resilience and the need to prevent another terrorist attack. He used the anniversary to demand better funding for the TSA.
Afghans and Iraqis never entered his statement.
Jeffries has followed the same convention. His 9/11 statement remembered the 2,977 people murdered by Al Qaeda and then extended the remembrance to first responders who became sick from exposure at Ground Zero. He noted that more FDNY responders had died from 9/11-related diseases than were killed in the attack itself.
Iraqis and Afghans never entered his statement.
Schumer went even further this September. In a lengthy address marking 25 years since 9/11, he remembered the dead, their families, sick first responders, people who developed cancer after working at Ground Zero, the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan and America’s resilience.
Iraqis and Afghans never entered his statement either.
And there were plenty of them to remember.
Brown University’s Costs of War project estimates that more than 940,000 people were killed directly in the major post-9/11 war zones, including more than 432,000 civilians. When indirect deaths from destroyed health systems, infrastructure, food insecurity and other consequences of war are included, Brown estimates 4.5 million to 4.7 million people died. More than 38 million people were displaced. Brown says the number wounded or made ill was higher still.
Yet nobody apparently told Jeffries, Markey or Schumer that a September 11 remembrance had to be balanced by those that Americans killed.
Because they knew that September 11 belongs to the people murdered on September 11. It belongs to the passengers who boarded airplanes that morning, the people who went to work in the World Trade Center and Pentagon, the families who never saw them again and the firefighters and police officers who ran toward burning buildings.
There are other days to debate Afghanistan, Iraq, American military policy and the enormous suffering those wars produced. But not the anniversary of the heinous jihadi terrorism.
These leading Democratic politicians know that. But they don’t care to apply the same decency when Jews are slaughtered and raped.
Jews slaughtered in their homes must share their anniversary with an accounting of their country’s subsequent conduct. The young people murdered at a music festival in Israel must make room for Gaza policy. The women sexually assaulted by Hamas terrorists must share the day with discussions of Palestinian statehood. The hostages dragged into Gaza become the introduction to a statement about Palestinian suffering.
These LEADING DEMOCRATS REVERSED THEIR BASIC HUMAN INSTINCT FOR COMPASSION in just a couple of weeks when the victims were Jews.
Why, when the victims are Jews, must the anniversary of their massacre become a day to remember everyone except just them?
ACTION ITEM
Contact Hakeem Jeffries (202) 225-5936
Contact Chuck Schumer (202) 224-6542
Contact Ed Markey (617) 565-8519
