When someone plays into his hands, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu never misses an opportunity to lob the ball into his rival’s court. It happened again March 10, when television presenter and model Rotem Sela wrote on her Instagram account that Israel is a state of all its citizens and that Arabs, too, are people. Later that day Netanyahu set her right and reminded his many followers that Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people, and only of the Jewish people (as stated in the Nationality Law adopted last year by his ruling coalition).

Just two days prior to the storm Sela precipitated, Netanyahu received a handsome political gift from Washington and did not even bother tweeting his thanks. President Donald Trump said the Democratic Party had become “anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish” after lawmakers refused to discriminate between anti-Semitism and other hues of racism, including Islamophobia.

Trump’s March 8 condemnation of the Democrats followed a House vote supporting a broad resolution slamming bigotry of all kinds, without directly condemning Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., for tweeting that she “should not be expected to have allegiance/pledge support to a foreign country in order to serve my country in Congress or serve on committee.” She also hinted that the pro-Israel lobby buys lawmakers’ support with money, or in her own words, support for Israel in the United States was “all about the Benjamins” (in reference to US $100 bills carrying the image of Benjamin Franklin). Leading Jewish organizations accused Omar of anti-Semitism and demanded that Congress explicitly and unequivocally condemn the comments of the young Muslim representative.

On the other hand, heads of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, among them three presidential hopefuls, declared their support for Omar and accused her critics of hypocrisy. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., claimed the resolution, which Democrats adopted unanimously, does not relate specifically to Omar’s remarks but rather to every expression of hatred, including hatred of Muslims. Jewish members of Congress did not conceal their disappointment with the resolution’s final language and Republicans scored brownie points with donors to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.