Pro-Israel Jewish Leaders Slam New York Times over Political Editor’s Antisemitism

Pro-Israel Jewish leaders slammed the New York Times on Thursday in the wake of a Breitbart News report that detailed how a senior political editor, Tom Wright-Piersanti, had a history of racist and antisemitic tweets.

Breitbart News’ Matt Boyle noted that Wright-Piersanti had tweeted “Crappy Jew Year” on Jan. 1, 2010, among other antisemitic statements; and had also made fun of Indian-Americans repeatedly. Ironically, the Times had printed an editorial Thursday accusing President Donald Trump of antisemitism for saying that Jews who voted for a Democratic Party that protected antisemitic officials were “disloyal” (to themselves, not to the United States).

On Thursday, Wright-Piersanti erased tweets, locked his account, and tweeted: “I have deleted tweets from a decade ago that are offensive. I am deeply sorry.” Former New York state assemblyman Dov Hikind, a Democrat who has occasionally campaigned for pro-Israel Republicans , tweeted: “Apology not accepted. Deleting tweets doesn’t equal a change in ideology. Go ahead and write a full length mea culpa, explain the errors of your thinking and how/why it changed, and maybe then we’ll believe you’re not the Antisemite reflected in your previous tweets!”

The Republican Jewish Coalition dinged the Times for its hypocrisy, noting that while it was attempting to frame Trump as a racist and antisemite, it had racism and antisemitism in its midst:

And the Zionist Organization of America, the country’s oldest pro-Israel organization, demanded that Wright-Piersanti be fired:

Hours after the Breitbart News story ran, the Times indicated that its editor’s tweets violated its standards, but had not indicated a course of action. Earlier this year, the Times came under fire for publishing an antisemitic cartoon. Last year, it hired Sarah Jeong, a writer with a history of racist anti-white tweets, to its editorial board.

The White House also responded to the story Thursday, telling Breitbart News it was “disgusted” by the Times.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He earned an A.B. in Social Studies and Environmental Science and Public Policy from Harvard College, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. He is also the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, which is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.