Both Muslim and Jewish advocacy groups in America on Wednesday condemned President Donald Trump’s calling Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer a “Palestinian,” and using the word as an insult.
Two things: one, Trump’s delivery was flawless, his voice deadpan, when he said during an Oval Office meeting with Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin (a pro-Hamas antisemite): “Schumer is a Palestinian, as far as I’m concerned. He’s become a Palestinian. He used to be Jewish. He’s not Jewish anymore.”
Trump: “Schumer is a Palestinian as far as I’m concerned. He’s become a Palestinian. He used to be Jewish. He’s not Jewish anymore. He’s a Palestinian.” pic.twitter.com/uc7xX4RQGi
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 12, 2025
Two: I can pinpoint the exact day when Chuck Schumer, who used to represent Brooklyn in the House became a Palestinian – except back then I only accused him of treason. It was March 13, 2024, and then-Majority Leader Schumer suggested the only avenue open to Israel included new elections and the removal of PM Benjamin Netanyahu from office.
How fitting that in the end it was Chuck Schumer who got demoted when his party lost every single branch of government to Trump’s Republicans.
“This is so part of my core, my soul, my neshama,” he told the NY Times. “I said to myself, ‘This may hurt me politically; this may help me politically.’ I couldn’t look myself in the mirror if I didn’t do it.”
“It came from here,” he said, pointing at his gut.
A PALESTINIAN BY ANY OTHER NAME
Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American Islamic Relations, proclaimed: “President Trump’s use of the term ‘Palestinian’ as a racial slur is offensive and beneath the dignity of his office.”
It’s funny because it’s true: Trump didn’t say, “dirty Palestinian,” or “stupid Palestinian,” or even “terrorist Palestinian.” He just said, “Palestinian,” and everybody recognized it was a putdown.
I suppose it also works with “Jew.” It’s all in the intonation…
Amy Spitalnick, CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, and Halie Soifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America also rebuked the president for saying “Palestinian.”
Mind you, these three ladies did not criticize Trump for suggesting Schumer wasn’t Jewish. I suppose it attests to their identity values…
Politico’s Jake Traylor and Grace Yarrow felt obliged to point out that “Schumer is Jewish and not of Palestinian heritage.”
On March 17, Rachel Timoner, the clergy at Congregation Beth Elohim in Park Slope, Brooklyn, where Senator Schumer spends Yom Kippur and where his daughter got married, told Politico that “In this speech, he said what most of us think.”
“I think that what Senator Schumer said was brave and right,” Timoner told Politico. I’m not sure what kind of bravery was required for the Senator from New York to advocate the overthrow of an elected prime minister, but I know that by “right” she means this:
“Part of what we need to address is the long silence of the Jewish establishment about the occupation of Palestinians, and the ways that the Netanyahu government has sold the Israeli people on the idea that they can both have peace and allow settlers to run rampant over the human rights of Palestinians. And those things don’t go together.
“So that’s what I was really applauding in Senator Schumer’s speech was that he was saying, yes, we must get to the end of this war. And what we’ve really got to do is get to the place where both Israelis and Palestinians can live in safety and freedom.”
See? President Trump was not wrong. Chuck Schumer and the people around him are, indeed, Palestinians.
Good to know.
