Senator Cruz Warns About Rising Antisemitism on the Right
There is a danger that is very real, and we've talked about antisemitism. Listen, about a decade ago, antisemitism began rising on the left, and the Democrat Party did nothing. And in the decade that followed, it has consumed the Democrat Party. I do not believe this is exaggeration to say there is a real and meaningful pro-Hamas contingent of the Democrat Party in Washington, and the remainder of the Democrats are terrified of the pro-Hamas contingent. We know that. But the danger that I want to highlight to you tonight is not antisemitism on the left. It is antisemitism on the right. And I'm here to tell you in the last six months, I have seen antisemitism rising on the right in a way I have never seen it in my entire life. Listen, CUFI [Christians United for Israel] is extraordinary. The work that CUFI does is desperately, desperately needed. But I'm here to tell you the church is asleep right now. If I pick up my phone and send out a tweet, if I say good morning, within minutes, I will have hundreds of blatantly antisemitic responses. When Prime Minister Netanyahu was here a few months ago, I sat down with him for a couple of hours. I raised this issue with him, and his first reaction was he said: Well, that's Qatar. That's Iran. They're paying for it. It's astroturf. And I said, Mr. Prime Minister, yes, but no. Yes, Qatar and Iran are clearly paying for it, and there are bots and they are putting real money behind it. But I am telling you, this is real. It is organic. These are real human beings and it is spreading. In the last year, we had three prominent voices on the right, publicly muse: Gosh, maybe Hitler wasn't that bad a guy after all. Yes he was—he was the embodiment of evil. And I asked Prime Minister Netanyahu, I said, imagine how different American political history would've been if Rush Limbaugh had been an antisemite instead of a philosemite. We would have a fundamentally different country if Rush Limbaugh had spent years spreading poison. I want to tell especially folks that are no longer teenagers or in your 20s, this poison of antisemitism on the right, it is spreading with young people. It is gaining traction. Part of it is philosophical. There's an isolationism. So they will argue, what business do we have supporting Israel? Why should America support Israel? It's their problem. Let them deal with it. And let me give you an answer as someone elected to represent 31 million Texans and fight every day for your jobs, your freedom, and your safety and security, the United States supports Israel not because we are helping out a down-on-his-luck neighbor. We're not engaged in a charity act. The United States supports Israel because it is unequivocally in the national security interest of the United States to support Israel.