Why did Obama say something so stupid?

I keep meaning to post this. Earlier this week, there was an interview in the New Yorker in which President Obama claimed that Islamic anti-Semitism is a product of 'recent decades' (i.e. if only we got rid of Israel, the Muslims would love the Jews). That statement is factually incorrect.

“Obama reveals that he has no idea, or doesn’t want to give the impression that he has any idea, about the reality of Islamic anti-Semitism,” said Robert Spencer, the author of many books on Islamic ideas and director of Jihad Watch.

“Anti-Semitism is hard-wired into Islam,” from its origins before 700, said Andrew Bostom, author of three books about Islam, including “The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism,” which lists centuries of anti-Semitic hatred, murders, pogroms and apartheid-like discrimination.

Intellectuals, politicians and diplomats are loath to admit the centrality of anti-Semitism in Islamic beliefs, because it fuels conflict with Israel and the West and it can’t be fixed by Westerners, Bostom said. ”You’re dealing with an intractable situation, and people hate intractable situations,” he said, adding “diplomats are the worst.”

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Obama’s “course of decades” comment “ignores the numerous anti-Semitic teachings of the Quran and other Islamic texts — most notably the Quran’s designation of the Jews as the worst enemies of the believers,” Spencer said.

For example, Spencer cited the fifth chapter of the Quran, which declares that “If [Jews] believed in Allah and the Prophet and that which is revealed unto him, they would not choose them for their friends. But many of them are of evil conduct. Thou wilt find the most vehement of mankind in hostility to those who believe (to be) the Jews and the idolaters.”

The Jew-hatred in the Quran is critical, said Bostom, because orthodox Muslims believe the Quran is a word-for-word copy of a divine book resting on a table in “jannah,” or the Islamic version of heaven. Most Christians believe most of their Bible is open for interpretation, but for Muslims, the Quran is “permanent and perfect. … It applies to all time, it is eternal, it is a pure, divine, eternal form of reality,” Bostom told The Daily Caller.

And why is the President so anxious to deny reality and claim that Islamic anti-Semitism is all Israel's fault? Well, aside from the usual 'blame Israel' meme, there's something more at work here.

Obama’s attempt to ignore Islam’s anti-Semitism reflect a broader effort by liberals to excuse Muslims for their beliefs, said Bostom. By exculpating Islam, liberals can blame Europeans, imperialism and Israel for the Arabs’ wars and various problems, and allow themselves to play the role of modern peacekeeper, he said.

Yes, that would explain it. Read the whole thing.