Rep. Gwen Moore (D-Wis.) says President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to serve as the U.S. ambassador to Israel “lacks any foreign policy experience.”
Moore specifically ripped David Friedman for comparing liberal Jews to Nazi collaborators.
“From his blind support for settlements in the West Bank and flagrant opposition to a two-state solution to his unconscionable and frighteningly casual use of holocaust imagery to vilify progressive American Jews, Mr. Friedman lacks the experience and temperament necessary to serve as our nation’s ambassador to Israel,” she said in a statement Friday.
{mosads}Friedman wrote in June that liberal American Jews are far worse than kapos — a Holocaust-era term referring to Jews who cooperated with the Nazis.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) also criticized Friedman in a statement Friday, saying the appointment has “dangerous consequences” for both nations.
“Mr. Friedman’s appointment is even more disturbing given his hateful rhetoric in describing, for example, some supporters of a two-state solution as ‘worse than kapos,’ ” Nadler said.
“Using Nazi imagery, such as the term kapo — a reference to Jews who cooperated and/or assisted the Nazis during the Holocaust — when referring to Jews or Israel today, no matter the circumstance, is broadly deemed to be anti-Semitic and should be condemned in the same way it would be if someone who was not Jewish were to use it.”
Trump announced Thursday his plans to nominate Friedman to represent America as the nation’s diplomat in Israel. The decision has been met with backlash, including from the Jewish advocacy group J Street, which called the nomination “reckless.”
“Senators should know that the majority of Jewish Americans oppose the views and values this nominee represents,” the organization said in a statement.
Friedman, a bankruptcy lawyer who Trump called “a long-time friend and trusted adviser,” has written that a two-state solution between Israelis and Palestinians is “an illusion.”
He also argued in an editorial for the website Arutz Sheva 7 that “Hillary Clinton poses a much more serious threat to Israel than Barack Obama.”