Israeli Trump Backer Suggests ‘Leftists’ Set Up Deadly Charlottesville Car-Ramming

Image by Getty Images

By Dave Goldiner August 14, 2017

President Trump’s top supporter in Israel blamed “leftist thugs” for the violence in Charlottesville and defended the president for failing to directly condemn white supremacists.

Marc Zell, head of Republicans Abroad in Israel, also called Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee a “great man” — and said he suspects liberal counter demonstrators were somehow behind the car-ramming attack that killed one person and injured many others.

“I will not be surprised if they find that the incident was deliberately provoked by the left,” Zell told Haaretz.

Zell strongly took issue wiht the widespread criticism of Trump for fanning the flames of hatred with divisive rhetoric and for his failure to unequivocally condemn white nationalist violence, Trump’s supporters present a diametrically different point of view.

“Trying to blame the President for these events is ridiculous,” said Marc Zell, head of Republicans Abroad in Israel. “Even before the events escalated, he called for calm and restraint on all sides.”

Noting that the demonstration was a response to the city’s plan to remove a statue of Lee, Zell said it was wrong to whitewash history.

“Both the North and the South had terrible sides to them, but you can’t remove a statue because it offends some people,” he said. “That’s left-wing violence.”

Dave Goldiner is the Forward’s director of digital media. Dave is a veteran journalist who has spent two decades working at newspapers in the United States and Africa. A native New Yorker, Goldiner wrote for the New York Daily News, where he covered some of the biggest stories of our time, including the attacks of September 11, along with thousands of stories of hope and heartbreak. He also studied and worked in Southern Africa and has written for publications in South Africa and Zimbabwe. He holds masters degrees in journalism and public administration from Columbia University. Dave can be reached at [email protected], or follow him on Twitter @davegoldiner

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

The coming year promises to be filled with more complex and historic developments. We are entering an era where independent, fact-based Jewish journalism will be more important than ever. We need to be ready for whatever 2025 will bring, and with your help, we can be.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO