Anti-Defamation League Continues Pushing False Equivalency
Muslims are not the new Jews. Islam poses a unique and existential threat to the United States. The ADL is wrong. Here is the statement.
“Donald Trump’s suggestion that we use a database to track Muslims is deeply troubling and reminiscent of darker days in American history when others were singled out for scapegoating,” the ADL said in a statement. “No American should be singled-out by security officials on the basis of immutable characteristics, such as religion. Such a proposal is not only inimical to our cherished civil liberties but it also wildly misses the goal of finding a rational balance between civil liberties and the security measures necessary to protect those liberties.”
The Jewish group also voiced concern at recent comments by Senator Ted Cruz proposing that the country admits only Christian refugees, as well as remarks by Ben Carson comparing Syrian refugees to ‘rabid dogs.’
Jeb Bush also suggested admitting Syrian Christians instead of Muslims. “At a minimum we ought to be bringing in people that have — orphans or people that clearly aren’t going to be terrorists. Or Christians,” Bush said in South Carolina. “There are no Christian terrorists in the Middle East; they’re persecuted.”
But the ADL, explicitly, denounced Carson and Cruz, probably since they are running 2nd and 3rd to Trump in recent national polls. “It is also regrettable that some prominent candidates, including Ted Cruz and Ben Carson, have also made remarks crossing the line into scapegoating Syrian refugees. When leading presidential candidates compare Syrian refugees to “rabid dogs,” or call for the creation of a database of Muslims, or recommend a ban on all Muslims entering the United States, they are playing to our basest instincts,” the ADL said. “We are better as a nation than what we have shown, and today we call on Americans to reject hatemongering and xenophobia. What we have been hearing is unacceptable. Yes, we can and must protect ourselves, but we must do so without sacrificing our fundamental principles of freedom and liberty.”