Image by wikimedia commons

By Nathan Guttman August 16, 2017

New York Rep. Lee Zeldin, one of only two Jewish Republicans in the House of Representatives, was among the few who stood up for President Trump after his Tuesday comments blaming “both sides” for the Charlottesville events.

“It is not right to suggest that President Trump is wrong for acknowledging the fact that criminals on both sides showed up for the purpose of being violent,” Zeldin wrote in a Facebook post, “That particular observation is completely true.” Zeldin, who represents the East End of Long Island, added that there is “an element of our country” that has pledged to oppose and resist Trump on every issue, “and to this population the President cannot say or do absolutely anything at all that they won’t criticize as long as he is in the office he was elected to serve in last November.”

Perry Gershon, a Democrat seeking to unseat Zeldin, seized on Zeldin’s statement and called for his removal from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council because he backed Trump’s comments. “Zeldin must condemn these attacks for what they are – racist and anti-Semitic. Until he does, he should be removed from the US Holocaust Memorial Council,” Gershon said in a statement.

Antisemitism Notebook

Your weekly guide through the news and the noise of how rising antisemitism and disputes over how to address it are shaping American Jewish life.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

Contact Nathan Guttman at [email protected] or on Twitter @nathanguttman

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.

This year, we have stood together in strength and sorrow. Our Forward team has worked around the clock to help you find clarity amid the chaos.

If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.

Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism. 

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

$36 $500

$120 $180 Other amount