GOP leaders denounce Marjorie Taylor Greene, conservatives hit the Squad over Israel

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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., has gone too far for the Republican leadership — again.

Already stripped of her committee assignments, the congresswoman has unleashed a new storm of criticism with her remarks about the evil Nazi regime.

Her latest rhetorical attacks are so beyond the pale that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., under growing pressure after five days of silence, felt compelled to denounce her.

But this is just one aspect of an increasingly ugly environment, including physical assaults against Jews in New York City and Los Angeles, that are the poisonous byproduct of the latest war between Israel and the Palestinians.

Greene, in savaging the House mask mandate, told reporter David Brody on an outfit called "Real America’s Voice" that "we can look back at a time in history where people were told to wear a gold star, and they were definitely treated like second-class citizens, so much so that they were put in trains and taken to gas chambers in Nazi Germany. And this is exactly the type of abuse that Nancy Pelosi is talking about."

Yes, she compared the speaker of the House to Hitler’s mass murderers.

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She also tweeted this: "Vaccinated employees get a vaccination logo just like the Nazi’s forced Jewish people to wear a gold star."

McCarthy said in a statement Tuesday that "Marjorie is wrong, and her intentional decision to compare the horrors of the Holocaust with wearing masks is appalling. The Holocaust is the greatest atrocity committed in history. The fact that this needs to be stated today is deeply troubling."

McConnell, in his own statement, called the remarks "outrageous and reprehensible."

Greene, a Donald Trump supporter who has renounced some of her Q’anon beliefs, is clearly losing support on the right. Author and podcaster Ben Shapiro, for instance, called her comments "demented nonsense … insulting and insane."

Not surprisingly, Greene isn’t backing down. She blamed "the media and the Democrats," adding: "I'm sorry some of my words make people uncomfortable, but this is what the American left is all about."

Oh, and she retweeted — and later deleted — a supporter calling McCarthy a "moron" and "feckless [C-word]."

But conservatives are also increasingly focusing on Democratic left-wingers who harshly criticize Israel — and whether that crosses the line into anti-Semitism.

I need to make an important distinction here. There is nothing inherently wrong with criticizing Israel’s policies or expressing sympathy for the plight of the Palestinians. Some American Jews have been slamming the Netanyahu government for years. There is vigorous debate within Israel itself.

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In my view, the Israelis in this last conflict were again defending themselves against rocket attacks from the Hamas regime — designated by the U.S. as a terrorist group — that does not recognize their right to exist. Whether the retaliatory bombings were proportionate is a matter for debate.

The Biden administration is under increasing pressure from such Squad members as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., who have called Israel an "apartheid state." Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., has accused Israel of "terrorism." The aforementioned Ben Shapiro argued that "the media attention on [Greene’s] bizarrely nutso Holocaust analogy are completely silent by the Squad’s de facto support for genocidal anti-Jewish terrorist group Hamas."

Ocasio-Cortez is among those trying to block additional U.S. military aid to Israel, saying "we have directly contributed to the death, displacement and disenfranchisement of millions."

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., in a New York Times op-ed, accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's administration of "racist behavior."

A National Review editorial says the American left has gone beyond mere criticism of Jerusalem and adopted a "virulent strain of anti-Israel rhetoric," even falsely accusing the Israelis of using U.S. military aid to target civilians.

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"There is little political upside for Democrats to call out the Squad. Polls show a party that has lurched leftward and become increasingly antagonistic towards the Jewish state," the magazine says. 

Tragically, the Israeli-Hamas conflict has produced more than a war of words in this country. There have been more than two dozen anti-Semitic incidents in recent weeks, ranging from beatings to vandalism at synagogues. President Joe Biden condemned the "despicable" acts.

Anti-Semitism often bubbles up from beneath the surface when there is turmoil in the Middle East. The inflammatory rhetoric here at home isn’t helping.