U.S. Jews’ despair over Pittsburgh atrocity compounded by Trump’s complicity and Netanyahu’s hypocrisy

U.S. Jews’ despair over Pittsburgh atrocity compounded by Trump’s complicity and Netanyahu’s hypocrisy

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Chemi Shalev writes: When Trump said Saturday that the attack in Pittsburgh might not have been as bloody if the synagogue had hired armed guards, he was essentially blaming the Jewish victims for their own death; proving, in the process, how detached he is from the sentiments of the liberal Jewish majority, which abhors the unflinching Republican support for guns and their owners. Trump’s insensitive assertion proved to anyone who still harbored doubt that he is eminently unqualified to reassure…

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Pittsburgh synagogue shooting is a moment of reckoning for American Jews

Pittsburgh synagogue shooting is a moment of reckoning for American Jews

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Jay Michaelson writes: After the 9/11 attacks, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said that countries now had to choose between fighting terror and abetting it, that there was no neutral ground. In his metaphor, you were either sitting in the smoking section, or the no-smoking section. In the wake of the worst attack on Jews in American history, all of us, but especially American Jews like me, face a similar decision. We either support Donald Trump and the movement of…

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Why the Tree of Life shooter was fixated on the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society

Why the Tree of Life shooter was fixated on the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society

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Masha Gessen writes: A couple of hours before opening fire in a Pittsburgh synagogue, Robert Bowers, the suspected gunman, posted on the social network Gab, “HIAS likes to bring invaders in that kill our people. I can’t sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics, I’m going in.” HIAS is the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, and Bowers had posted about it at least once before. Two and a half weeks earlier, he had linked to a HIAS…

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George Washington’s letter to the Jewish congregation of Newport, Rhode Island

George Washington’s letter to the Jewish congregation of Newport, Rhode Island

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On August 18,1790, during his second year in office as America’s first president, George Washington wrote: If we have wisdom to make the best use of the advantages with which we are now favored, we cannot fail, under the just administration of a good Government, to become a great and a happy people. The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a…

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‘He felt that somebody was finally talking to him’: How the package-bomb suspect found inspiration in Trump

‘He felt that somebody was finally talking to him’: How the package-bomb suspect found inspiration in Trump

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The Washington Post reports: The first thing that stood out about Cesar Sayoc was his vehicle. As far back as 2002, lawyer Ronald Lowy recalled, the windows of Sayoc’s white Dodge Ram van were covered in stickers of Native American regalia. Though Sayoc was Filipino and Italian, he claimed to be a proud member of the Seminole tribe, Lowy said. The lie was one of many Sayoc would spread about himself over the years. He falsely claimed to have worked…

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Cesar Sayoc’s path on social media: From food photos to partisan fury

Cesar Sayoc’s path on social media: From food photos to partisan fury

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Kevin Roose writes: [B]efore Mr. Sayoc’s accounts were taken down [by Facebook and Twitter], The New York Times archived their contents. And a closer study of his online activity reveals the evolution of a political identity built on a foundation of false news and misinformation, and steeped in the insular culture of the right-wing media. For years, these platforms captured Mr. Sayoc’s attention with a steady flow of outrage and hyperpartisan clickbait and gave him a public venue to declare…

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Trump’s incendiary rhetoric has emboldened Cesar Sayocs all over America

Trump’s incendiary rhetoric has emboldened Cesar Sayocs all over America

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Michael D’Antonio writes: Trump campaigned using taunts and suggestions that all the Cesar Sayocs could have heard as calls to violent action. When a protester interrupted a rally, Trump announced that he would “like to punch him in the face” and waxed sentimental about the days when protesters would be “carried out on stretchers.” He referenced a “Second Amendment” response to Hillary Clinton’s possible election and offered to pay the legal bills for those who assault his protesters. Trump allies…

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America’s #1 rabble-rouser

America’s #1 rabble-rouser

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Rick Wilson writes: No one in American political life has even a fraction of his power to inspire behavior and action. No one. It’s time we recognize that Trump’s unique social media presence is a weapon of radicalization. No one else in the American political landscape stokes the resentments, fears, and prejudices of his base with equal power. Trump never misses a chance to miss a chance to be bigger and better. He never fails to close the door on…

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Trump fumes after mail bomber ‘interrupts’ his campaign message

Trump fumes after mail bomber ‘interrupts’ his campaign message

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Politico reports: The would-be terrorist who failed to harm CNN and George Soros did succeed at one thing: ruining President Donald Trump’s week. Trump had hoped to capitalize on growing Republican enthusiasm in the final weeks of the midterm campaign — stoking fears of a Central American migrant caravan and hoping his Thursday unveiling of a plan to lower prescription drug prices would hold the news media’s attention heading into the weekend. But even Trump can’t shape the media narrative…

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There’s no path to victory in Afghanistan — there never was

There’s no path to victory in Afghanistan — there never was

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Fred Kaplan writes: This month, for the first time, the U.S. armed forces are recruiting young men and women who weren’t yet born when the invasion of Afghanistan took place. The war has been going on for 17 years now (17-year-olds can enlist with parental consent), making it the longest war in American history. Yet we are no closer than we have ever been to accomplishing our objectives, in part because those objectives have been so sketchily, inconsistently, and unrealistically…

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What’s a Muslim to do about Hajj?

What’s a Muslim to do about Hajj?

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Aymann Ismail writes: As excruciating details have leaked over the past two weeks about the killing and reported dismemberment of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi government agents, the most high-profile public backlash has come in the form of defections from a glittery upcoming conference, the Future Investment Initiative, planned by Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, along with dozens of other politics, business, and media figures, have pulled…

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Saudi influence inside Washington

Saudi influence inside Washington

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Ben Freeman writes: Before the horrific murder of Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi Consulate in Turkey, Saudi Arabia had amassed one of the largest and well-funded influence operations in the United States. It had more than two dozen lobbying and public relations firms on its payroll. Its lobbyists lined congressional campaign coffers on the very same day they met with senators and representatives to discuss Saudi interests, and the Saudis were pumping cash into think tanks and elite American universities…

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Dramatic slowdown in global growth of internet access will amplify existing inequalities

Dramatic slowdown in global growth of internet access will amplify existing inequalities

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The Guardian reports: The growth of internet access around the world has slowed dramatically, according to new data, suggesting the digital revolution will remain a distant dream for billions of the poorest and most isolated people on the planet. The striking trend, described in an unpublished report shared with the Guardian, shows the rate at which the world is getting online has fallen sharply since 2015, with women and the rural poor substantially excluded from education, business and other opportunities…

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An alternative history of Silicon Valley disruption

An alternative history of Silicon Valley disruption

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Nitasha Tiku writes: A few years after the Great Recession, you couldn’t scroll through Google Reader without seeing the word “disrupt.” TechCrunch named a conference after it, the New York Times named a column after it, investor Marc Andreessen warned that “software disruption” would eat the world; not long after, Peter Thiel, his fellow Facebook board member, called “disrupt” one of his favorite words. (One of the future Trump adviser’s least favorite words? “Politics.”) The term “disruptive innovation” was coined…

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