[Make sure to read Robert Spencer’s contributions in Jamie Glazov’s new book: Barack Obama’s True Legacy: How He Transformed America.]

Every aspect of this story is bad, and each horrifying aspect is competing with the others for which can have the most negative consequences for the American people. After Jews suffered attacks in Chicago, the Biden regime reached out not to Jewish leaders, but to Muslim groups, including open supporters of Hamas. The Muslims, however, enraged at the regime’s continued (albeit hollow) support for Israel, refused to show. Then a Biden regime wonk lied brazenly and denied that one of the worst of the Muslim groups was even invited. This is the state of our staggered, sputtering republic in the fourth year of this radically anti-American and anti-democratic regime.

This latest imbroglio started when Politico reported Thursday that “Illinois leaders in the Palestinian communities angry over how President Joe Biden has handled the Middle East war have turned down a request by the White House to meet in Chicago today.” We can see who is claiming the moral high ground, and who has the upper hand. After Hamas brutally and gleefully murdered 1,200 Israelis on Oct. 7, 2023, Islamic groups and their leftist allies immediately began to claim victimhood at any sign of Israeli self-defense, fabricatingcasualty numbers before a world that was all too eager to be fooled, and even preposterously claiming that Israel was conducting a “genocide” when independentobservers have dubbed the IDF “the most moral army in the world.”

Despite all that, Muslim and leftist leaders around the world know that making wild claims about Israel and affecting a posture of aggrieved victimhood can win them ready concessions from the U.S., the European Union, and the United Nations, and so they’ve been striking victim poses aggressively since Oct. 7. It has worked. The Biden regime is on its heels, desperately worried by threats from the likes of Nihad Awad of the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the winsome Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Ramallah) to withhold the Muslim vote if the regime doesn’t betray Israel. And so it has been doing just that, step by step, in slow motion: $100 million to Gaza, $10 billion to Hamas’ financiers, the Islamic Republic of Iran, and ever-increasing pressure on the Netanyahu government.

Meanwhile, the regime keeps trying to placate the Muslim and Arab groups inside the U.S.: “Tom Perez, a senior adviser to the president, and other advisers had planned to sit down in three separate meetings with various Palestinian, Arab and Muslim leaders and elected officials to talk about tensions in the Middle East. The private meetings were to come on the heels of similar gatherings in Detroit.” The professional victims, however, stayed in character: “But most folks contacted turned down the request, according to six people we talked to. Any meeting being held will be with a smaller group of players.”

Not only did they refuse to meet with White House apparatchiks, but they continued to excoriate the regime for its alleged support of Israel. One Muslim spokesman declared that his group considered “anyone — Palestinian, Muslim, Arab — who takes a meeting with the White House to be an absolute sell-out.” One of those who declined to attend was Ahmed Rehab of Hamas-linked CAIR, who explained: “We believe a thousand percent in civic engagement. We preach it. But this is an unusual moment and requires an unusual response. We have made clear that a ceasefire is needed.”

The outreach to CAIR, whose top dog Awad infamously said that he was “happy” about Hamas’ Oct. 7 jihad massacre, embarrassed even the Biden regime apparatchiks. Jewish Insider correspondent Gabby Deutsch stated: “WH spox @AndrewJBates46 told me that CAIR was *not* invited to WH mtgs in Chicago w/ Muslim Americans—& that the group is NEVER invited to WH mtgs.”

This just piled embarrassment upon embarrassment. Unfortunately for the wretched regime wonk Bates, CAIR has been frequently invited to the Biden White House, and has posted press releases detailing the meetings. But the idea of the regime kowtowing to an organization with actual Hamas ties is too much even for Biden’s handlers, and so Bates was apparently instructed to lie about the meetings, exposing the Biden team as both dishonest and pro-Hamas.

Even worse is the timing. Richard Goldberg of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies pointed out that “since Friday: Pro-Hamas antisemitic rioters in Chicago intimidated the House of Blues to cancel a Jewish singer’s sold-out show. The venue cited security concerns. Loyola University told Jewish students they could no longer allow a survivor of the Nova music festival massacre to speak on campus. The university cited security concerns. Jews were attacked while trying to enter a theatre to watch footage of the Nova music festival massacre. Jews are not even allowed to mourn the massacres without being attacked in the city of Chicago. The mayor says nothing. The president says nothing. But the White House is sending staff to meet with the organizers of these violent riots and assaults instead of defending the Jews they are trying to drive underground.”

That’s right. And if this is happening more or less out in the open, albeit with inept and half-hearted attempts to cover it up, imagine the betrayals that are going on behind the scenes.