The Issue: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez crying after the passage of a bill funding Israel’s Iron Dome.
“AOC’s crying shame,” (Liel Leibovitz, Sept. 25), tells the truth in a nutshell: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez broke down and wept over the passage of a bill she didn’t have the courage to vote against.
We can’t put an end to her play-acting and cynicism, but we should be able to end the dishonesty of voting “present.”
We elect representatives to decide, do we not? Or do we elect them to sit on the sidelines sucking their thumbs and saying “don’t ask me” whenever their vote yea or nay might offend some of their constituents?
Bill Marsano
Manhattan
Leibovitz’s much-needed critique of AOC could have been retitled “The Crying Shame of the Jews.”
I have long been baffled by my brethren’s continuing support for anti-Semitic entities, such as those currently in Congress, plus other anti-Jewish groups. They are all embedded in our new religion — woke-ism.
Our enemies must be overjoyed by our self-destructive moves.
Samuel Frazer
Fort Myers, Fla.
In 2018, Joe Raddle photographed Ocasio-Cortez’s dramatic pose outside a mostly empty parking lot in Tornillo, Texas, where she photogenically demonstrated her “tearful” concern for illegal-entry children.
But in 2021, she shed no tears over the illegal-entry children thrown over walls and abandoned in the desert in consequence of President Biden’s border policy.
However, she did produce tears as a result of the trauma she endured while voting “present” on a bill to fund the Iron Dome — a defensive technology that saves the lives of children in Israel.
Perhaps Ocasio-Cortez hopes her politically activated tear ducts will win her an Emmy. After all, selective self-promotion won an Emmy for a fellow New York politician.
Julia Lutch
Davis, Calif.
AOC’s “present” vote concerning the purely defensive Iron Dome that saves Jewish lives threatened by thousands of Hamas’ rockets is inconsistent with her demonstrated anti-Semitism.
A “present” vote is the refuge of legislative cowards. Her crocodile tears were to placate her Jew-hating progressive constituents.
Richard Sherman
Margate, Fla.
AOC cried on the floor of the House because it passed a bill approving funding for a defensive-shield system that has already saved thousands of innocent lives in Israel from unprovoked missile attacks.
She claims she cried because the bill was passed hastily, ignoring the fact that the bill was only necessary after she and her Squad hastily pushed to remove the funding only days earlier from a broad budget package.
She also claims she cried out of solidarity with the Palestinian people of Gaza, who will somehow be disadvantaged by Israel’s defensive shield, ignoring the fact that their government could decide to build a functioning society, rather than attacking Israel with missiles, terror tunnels and incendiary balloons.
Elliot Press
Bergenfield, NJ
Ocasio-Cortez once stated in an interview that she is “not the expert” on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. That was laid bare last week.
The progressive wing of the Democratic Party has a reflexive bias against Israel. To them, everything that benefits Israel is bad.
What they don’t care to acknowledge is that Iron Dome is a defensive technology, tasked solely with saving civilian lives.
To that end, perhaps members of the Squad should brush up on international law: firing rockets aimed at killing civilians is a war crime.
Second, what progressives ignore is that the US-Israeli relationship is a symbiotic one. Most of the funding afforded to Israel boomerangs back to the US defense industry, benefiting the US economy and supporting US jobs.
Israel shares invaluable technology and intelligence with the United States, including the Iron Dome system.
Daniel Dolgicer
Manhattan
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