Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By simmons on December 27, 2016

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The statement appears at the end of an article on the ADL, Stephen Bannon: Five Things to Know.

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The five things are:

The first two claims are false. The next two claims are true, and innocuous. The final claim is exculpatory.

The ADL further explains:

While there is a long fact pattern of evidence that Breitbart served as a platform for a wide range of bigotry and there is some controversy related to statements from Mr. Bannons divorce proceedings in 2007, we are not aware of any anti-Semitic statements made by Bannon himself. In fact, Jewish employees of Breitbarthave challenged the characterization of him and defended him from charges of anti-Semitism. Some have pointed out that Breitbart Jerusalem was launched during his tenure.

Nevertheless, Bannon essentially has established himself as the chief curator for the alt right. Under his stewardship, Breitbart has emerged as the leading source for the extreme views of a vocal minority who peddle bigotry and promote hate.

The statement that Breitbart served as a platform for a wide range of bigotry is completely false, and reflects the ADLs left-wing ideological orientation rather than objective reality. The statement that Bannon is the chief curator for the alt right is alsocompletely false, and defamatory.

The ADL, which calls itself the nations premier civil rights/human relations agency, launched a defamatory campaign on Sunday against Breitbart News and Bannon, the companys Executive Chairman, when Bannon was named Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor by President-elect Donald J. Trump. (Bannon has been on leave from Breitbart since his appointment in August as CEO of the Trump presidential campaign.)

In a statement noting that the ADL strongly opposes Bannons new White House appointment,ADL president Jonathan Greenblatt a former aide to President Barack Obama called Bannon a man who presided over the premier website of the Alt Right, a loose-knit group of white nationalists and unabashed anti-Semites and racists.

Thatis a completely false accusation.

Breitbart.com is not the premier website of the Alt Right. The only supposed alt-right content on the site, among tens of thousands of articles, isone widely-cited journalistic article, An Establishment Conservatives Guide to the Alt-Right.

As one author more familiar with the alt-right noted recently, the main alt-right sites are /r/altright, Stormfront, and 4chans politics board not Breitbart News.

Given the wide international interest in the presidential election, and the evident popularity of Trump among some portions of the alt-right (and unpopularity on the far-left), Breitbart has attracted wider attention beyond the companys core audience of center-right and conservative readers.

But Breitbart is not an alt-right publication, and the daily news content of the website speaks for itself. Moreover, there are no white nationalists and unabashed anti-Semites and racists working at, or published by, Breitbart.

On Wednesday morning, nationally syndicated talk show host Dennis Prager who has written a widely-respected book on antisemitism called the accusations against Bannon libel and said that the ADL had damaged itself with the false claims.

Reacting partly tothose false claims, hundreds of demonstrators gathered at the Los Angeles City Hall on Wednesday evening to stage ademonstration against Bannon, including signs referring to Bannon as a Nazi.

Also on Wednesday, the ADL initially denied press credentials to Breitbart News Adelle Nazarian, who was to cover a conference on antisemitism in New York on Thursday.

Nazarian, who is Jewish, is an experienced journalist who has coveredantisemitism and foreign affairs for Breitbart News, and most recently covered the 2016 presidential campaign as part of the national traveling press corps.

Late Wednesday, the ADL reversed its decision andcredentialed Nazarian for the event.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. His new book,See No Evil: 19 Hard Truths the Left Cant Handle, is available from Regnery through Amazon. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

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