Christiane Amanpour, chief international anchor for CNN, infuriated many social-media users, pundits and politicians over the weekend after she compared the White House’s conduct to Nazi actions in the runup to the Holocaust. Citing the anniversary of Kristallnacht—the pogrom against Jews in Germany and Austria in November 1938—she likened U.S. President Donald Trump’s criticism of the media and legal efforts to contest the recent election to the Nazi attacks on Jews during that event.
“This week 82 years ago, Kristallnacht happened,” Amanpour said in the monologue. “It was the Nazis’ warning shot across the bow of our human civilization that led to genocide against a whole identity, and in that tower of burning books, it led to an attack on fact, knowledge, history and truth. After four years of a modern-day assault on those same values by Donald Trump, the [Joe] Biden-[Kamala] Harris team pledges a return to norms, including the truth.”
Amanpour was heavily criticized for drawing this comparison, leading to calls for her removal by both Jews and non-Jews who were shocked at the ease with which she compared Nazi Germany to what has been widely considered to be a very pro-Israel administration in Washington.
“This is @camanpour on @CNN comparing Trump’s tenure to Nazi Germany. How the hell is this sort of prejudice tolerated on mainstream media? Third rate rubbish,” Ben Habib, a former European Parliament member for the Brexit Party in Britain said on Twitter.
The Orthodox Jewish Public Affairs Council, an organization that defends Jewish interests, tweeted: “Despicable. @camanpour compares verbal fact-checking of a POTUS to a Nazi pogrom in which dozens of Jews were murdered.”
CNN has clashed with the Trump administration repeatedly over the past four years due to the latter’s criticism over the network’s alleged biased coverage.
As of Sunday morning, CNN had yet to respond.
This article first appeared in Israel Hayom.
