At a moment when anti-Jewish sentiment is at an all-time high, the last thing you might expect to hear is a super-charged statement from Rachel Campos-Duffy, a co-host on Fox News, during her appearance on last Monday’s afternoon show, Outnumbered.
Among the many segments explored within the hour-long broadcast that day was the recent threat made by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who, during his campaign, ran on the promise of arresting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should he ever set foot in New York City.
Now, as the annual address of the UN General Assembly, scheduled for September, approaches, the Democratic Socialist mayor has voiced the possibility of having Netanyahu arrested.
This is despite the fact that “Federal US law grants diplomatic immunity to visiting heads of state, overriding city or state laws. Additionally, the NYPD cannot enforce International Court (ICC) warrants on US soil, as the US is not a member of the ICC.”
On Outnumbered, after an initial clip showing Mamdani opining on why he believes Netanyahu should be arrested, a response by Israel’s prime minister was displayed: “Mr. Mamdani should focus on fixing the damage his policies have caused New York. Mamdani appears interested in diverting public attention from his follies and attacking the leader of the Jewish state and the only democracy in the Middle East.”
Two other posts, one from House Republicans and one from Permanent Israeli Representative to the UN, Danny Danon, both blasting Mamdani’s incendiary rhetoric, also appeared on screen.
But it was the comments of Rachel Campos-Duffy which only served to inflame a familiar libel – tantamount to the assertion that “Israel asked for what they got.”
Campos-Duffy began by suggesting that both Mamdani and Netanyahu should “stay in their own lane.”
Criticizing Mamdani for “wading into foreign policy that he has no control over,” she continued by saying that “Bibi has a big war to take care of and should maybe stay out of American politics as well.”
In an attempt to smooth over an obvious blunder, co-host Lisa Booth lightheartedly said, “I think, specific to this context only, if a mayor of a foreign country was talking about arresting you, you’d probably have an opinion on it.”
To Booth’s point, it’s hard to conflate Netanyahu’s justified reaction to an antisemitic mayor, whose fondest dream is to take credit for arresting Israel’s top leader, with accusing him of involving himself in American politics.
But Campos-Duffy didn’t stop there.
To make matters worse, she said she’d “spoken to a lot of Jewish people who think that Netanyahu bears some responsibility for the rise of antisemitism, due to some of his policies in terms of the war and how it’s been executed.”
One can only wonder who those “Jewish people” are to whom she spoke. Do they live in the US where first-hand information on Israel’s defensive actions are, at best, very limited?
Are they skewed in their political leanings, included amongst those who see Israel through a very unfavorable lens? Perhaps those Jews were individuals who voted for the Democratic Socialist mayor. No one really knows, because she never identified them.
What we do know is that Campos-Duffy is far from an authority on Israel and the events which followed the worst tragedy on our soil in the history of our nation.
Why, then, would she rely upon individuals who state that Netanyahu bears some responsibility for a dormant diabolical hatred which globally exploded towards the Jewish homeland, only after it suffered a barbaric massacre?
From there, Campos-Duffy pivoted to, perhaps, the most insensitive claim of all – stating that “the highest number of child amputees in any modern-day conflict is in Gaza.”
What she had forgotten is that had the tragedy of October 7 never occurred, any child who underwent amputation would still have their arms and legs.
But that claim was, undoubtedly, based on findings by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) as well as international human rights groups who reported that information.
Never mind that it was disclosed that UNRWA workers were directly involved in the October 7 massacre, confirmed by both the UN and international watchdogs that they did indeed participate in the atrocities, or that UN workers have consistently lied about the women who were raped on that fateful day.
Does Campos-Duffy realize that she is playing right into the enemy’s hands, using skewed information to back up an unsubstantiated claim about which she has no personal knowledge?
And what toxic effect do such inflammatory remarks have on the millions of viewers worldwide who look to Fox News as a beacon of fair and balanced reporting, at a time when few news outlets can be relied upon due to their own jaundiced view of Israel?
Crossing the line
As a long-time fan of Fox News, it’s truly disappointing that a co-host, who regularly appears weekends on Fox & Friends, would be so careless as to repeat highly vicious and slanderous remarks about Netanyahu, how the war was executed, and then connect them to children who have suffered the loss of limbs.
Does she not see how these reckless statements could incite more hatred of Israel, which always extends to Diaspora Jews who share the same ethnicity as their Israeli counterparts, making them equally despised?
Campos-Duffy, hired to report the news, should take her own advice of staying in her lane, because opining on highly charged accusations, such as attributing the rise of antisemitism to Netanyahu, is a real addition of fuel on an already raging wildfire.
Crossing the line of opinion, it casts blame on the Jews for their own demise, a regrettable position which most seasoned journalists, commentators, or television presenters would never make, knowing how such irresponsible words could get them into hot water!
There is a large constituency of Jewish people in America, Israel, and throughout the world where Fox News is aired who, undoubtedly, were highly offended and incensed by Rachel Campos-Duffy.
They are due a sincere apology for not having thought through the ramifications of what was said.
While she may not have intended her words to be interpreted as they were, Campos-Duffy cannot hide from her gaping lack of knowledge on the Middle East.
Going forward, she should remember that Israel is most definitely not her lane!
The writer is a former Jerusalem elementary and middle school principal. She is also the author of Mistake-Proof Parenting, available on Amazon, based on the time-tested wisdom found in the Book of Proverbs.