I only followed in passing the incident where Ted Cruz was booed off the stage at a gathering to support Christians in the Middle East after saying that Israel was the best friend Christians have in the Middle East.
The Daily Caller reported:
Sen. Ted Cruz was booed offstage at a conference for Middle Eastern Christians Wednesday night after saying that “Christians have no greater ally than Israel.”Cruz, the keynote speaker at the sold-out D.C. dinner gala for the recently-founded non-profit In Defense of Christians, began by saying that “tonight, we are all united in defense of Christians. Tonight, we are all united in defense of Jews. Tonight, we are all united in defense of people of good faith, who are standing together against those who would persecute and murder those who dare disagree with their religious teachings.”Cruz was not reading from a teleprompter, nor did he appear to be reading from notes.“Religious bigotry is a cancer with many manifestations,” he continued. “ISIS, al-Qaida, Hezbollah, Hamas, state sponsors like Syria and Iran, are all engaged in a vicious genocidal campaign to destroy religious minorities in the Middle East. Sometimes we are told not to loop these groups together, that we have to understand their so called nuances and differences. But we shouldn’t try to parse different manifestations of evil that are on a murderous rampage through the region. Hate is hate, and murder is murder. Our purpose here tonight is to highlight a terrible injustice, a humanitarian crisis.”“Christians have no greater ally than Israel,” he said, at which point members of the crowd began to yell “stop it” and booed him.
Here’s a fairly full video:
Here’s the clip of the shout-down:
Some of the attacks on Cruz on Cruz after the event were so extreme to the point of bizarre, that I had to wonder what was going on here.
David Benkoff at The Daily Caller claimed Demagogue Ted Cruz Is A Danger To The GOP.
Someone at The Week called it the most cynical, despicable political stunt of the year.
Really? Stating the obvious to a crowd that didn’t want to admit the obvious was dangerous demagoguery and a despicable political stunt?
I’m with Caroline Glick on this one:
Glick writes at her website, Of politicians and moral courage:
Cruz’s action was an act of moral leadership. He stood before his audience of fellow Christians and told his co-religionists that their hatred of Jews and Israel is un-Christian. He told them as well that their bigotry blinds them to their own plight and makes them reject their greatest ally in securing their future in the Middle East. Cruz’s strategy for fighting Islamic oppression of Christians involves uniting all those oppressed and attacked by jihadists. In all honesty, it is the only policy that has a chance in the long term of securing the future of the Christians of the Middle East. For Cruz to reach this conclusion, he first had to possess the moral clarity to recognize that Christian Jew-hatred is a major obstacle to securing the future of the Middle East’s Christians. In other words his strategic vision is anchored in moral courage.
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