2 min read
It should not have come as a surprise. After saying of Muslims, "we should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity"; labelling President Barack Obama a "retard"; and describing the "backbone of the Democratic party" as "a typical fat implacable welfare recipient", it was probably only a matter of time before Ann Coulter turned her attention to the "f-ing Jews".
Perhaps the right-wing provocateur - a ubiquitous TV pundit, author and newspaper columnist to whom Salon magazine awarded the accolade "the most deliciously vicious of all the haters" - wanted to detract attention from the roughing up her favoured candidate, Donald Trump, was receiving in last week's debate among Republican presidential hopefuls.
If that was her intention, Ms Coulter's Twitter tirade - in which she responded to pro-Israel remarks by several candidates with the words: "How many f-ing Jews do these people think there are in the United States?" - certainly paid off. While her Tweets managed to rouse a small army of antisemites to adopt the hashtag #IStandWithAnn, swap Holocaust jokes and rail against the "Jewish supremacy", they also sparked a media storm and a wave of condemnation.
But the apparent surprise that the Republicans could have among their most fervent cheerleaders someone capable of making what the Anti-Defamation League termed "borderline antisemitic" remarks is, perhaps, progress of sorts.
Until recently, the language of antisemitism was common currency on the American right. In the 1930s, millions of Americans tuned in to hear the "radio priest", Father Charles Coughlin, rail against Jewish bankers. Although ostensibly targeting Communists, many of the victims of Senator Joe McCarthy's witch hunts in the 1950s were Jews. And, while Richard Nixon complained about a "Jewish cabal" that was out to get him in the 1970s, his former aide, Pat Buchanan was repeatedly panned for remarks such as "Capitol Hill is Israeli occupied territory" when he ran for the Republican presidential nomination in the 1990s.
Only 13 years ago, the veteran conservative journalist, William Buckley, devoted two issues of The National Review to an examination of the right's antisemitic underbelly.
But times have changed. Today, polls show the Republicans' evangelical base is the most fervently pro-Israel section of the American electorate, while Mr Obama's presidency has seen a sharp rise in the number of Jews voting Republican.
Indeed, as Ms Coulter indelicately highlighted, alongside their desire to express devotion to Ronald Reagan, Republican presidential candidates have been falling over themselves to declare their support for Israel.
Should Hillary Clinton secure the Democrat presidential nomination next spring she is, therefore, unlikely to be able to attack her Republican opponent - as her husband did when running against George Bush Snr in 1992 - for being a fairweather friend of Israel. That stance enabled Bill Clinton to win the Democrats' highest share of the Jewish vote in nearly five decades.
For many, Mr Bush's attitude was encapsulated by the Coulteresque alleged remark of his secretary of state, Jim Baker: "F-ck the Jews. They didn't vote for us anyway."
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