During Monday's edition of CNN Tonight With Don Lemon, the host lost control of a discussion about what Republican presidential candidates Ben Carson, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz have said about not accepting a Muslim as the nation's commander in chief.
Referring specifically to Carson's comment on the potential for a Muslim president -- which he said he would not support because of Islam’s ties to rigid Sharia law -- Rula Jebreal, a foreign policy analyst, slammed the GOP candidates, going so far as to assert that if someone took a gun into a mosque and killed the people inside, the Republicans “would have blood on their hands.”
Jebreal told Lemon she’s very disturbed by anti-Muslim sentiment fomenting on the right, between the man who asked Trump about “America's Muslim problem" and Carson saying Muslims should have to reject the tenets of their faith if they want to be president.
Lemon stated that part of the problem is the fact that “moderate Muslims are not condemning Muslim extremism,” and Jebreal fired back that she doesn't know where Carson is living. “I don't know what television he's watching, but he is into total denial.”
“Not only that, he's talking about crimes committed in Iran, in Saudi Arabia,” she noted. “What do Muslims in America have to do with that? Why do they need to be criminalized because of that?”
When another panelist tried to join the discussion, Jebreal insisted on continuing because her topic was “very important.”
The analyst noted:
Would we ever accept a presidential candidate that would apply the same rules, would say the same things about Jews and blacks? We would never tolerate them, would never respect them, would never expect it, even accept them.
We would shun them aside, but we accept it against Muslims because sadly, in the Republican base, this is what is appealing to them today.
“What happened with Trump,” Jebreal continued, is “we are discussing the first part of what was said and Trump endorsed, which is we have a problem called Muslims, but there is a second part: how to get rid of them.”
“And in the realm of possibility, in a country that is very armed,” she added, “that somebody that will be carrying weapons will go to a mosque tomorrow or after tomorrow and will start shooting people. And then these people will have blood on their hands, all of them: Carson, Trump and Ted Cruz.”
While Lemon tried to conclude the discussion, he had to speak over Jebreal, who kept right on talking.
“We certainly don't want that to happen,” the anchor stated, “but it's interesting a lot of people were offended by his remarks, but I have to say that his campaign has raised $600,000 to $700,000. They've raised $20,000,000 in the last quarter, $600,000 to $700,000 just after his Muslim comment.”
“That’s the Republican base,” Jebreal growled.
The analyst was allegedly fired as an MSNBC commentator after she called the network “ridiculous” for having a disproportionate amount of pro-Israel guests while she was on the network’s short-lived Ronan Farrow Daily program.
As NewsBusters reported in July of 2014, Jebreal complained about Secretary of State John Kerry’s off-air comments about Israeli operations in Palestine revealing a gap between “American officials' public versus private thoughts when it comes to Israel.”
When Jebreal was asked: “Why can't American leaders be more honest?” she angrily responded that was because of “AIPAC (the American Israel Public Affairs Committee) and because of the money behind it and because of (wealthy businessman) Sheldon Adelson and because of all of us in the media,” which is “disgustingly biased” against the Palestinians.
Just two days later, Jebreal used her time on the weeknight All in Chris Hayes program on MSNBC to spew false talking points on pro-Israel bias.
And in early August of that year, CNN’s New Day morning show followed up on a discussion regarding Israel and the media with another segment that featured co-host Chris Cuomo interviewing “pro-Palestinian pundit Rula Jebreal” on the topic, and the on-screen headline read “Is Media Coverage Pro-Israel?”
Now that Jebreal has publicly introduced the idea of someone entering a mosque and shooting the people inside, she would undoubtedly have to share the blame if such an incident ever occurs.
