“The outcry against Justice Minister Amir Ohana, which basically boils down to 'a gay man who holds right-wing views is not possible,' expresses a view I find very disturbing,” wrote Maariv reporter Shay Lahav on Saturday, “as if a person’s sexual definition is all that he is.”
Lahav added that “this is as if saying it’s impossible that a man might like other men and also think that the Palestinians are not a real partner for peace or that God exists…tolerance ends when someone thinks differently.”
Ohana, the first openly gay minister in Israeli history, was met with criticism from the LGBT community, which attacked him for failing to stand up for the community’s struggles.
“From the day we began our activities with Pride in the Likud, the most deadly and lethal arrows that were fired at us were from neither the Right nor the religious groups, but from the so-called LGBT community,” he said.
In fact, he added, “it is not certain that we have the characteristics of a community.”
While many in the LGBTQ community feel strongly committed to a set of liberal values which include helping other people in that community and others, for example, gay men supporting shelters for homeless transgender teenagers or refugees, it is also true that it is quite possible to be an LGBTQ person and to hold right-wing or even racist views.The late American-Jewish lawyer Roy Cohen, featured as a character in the 1991 play “Angels in America” by Tony Kushner, was a gay man as well as being extremely conservative and right wing.
In a June 13 Vanity Fair article former US Army Lieutenant Colonel, billionaire Jennifer Pritzker publicly slammed US President Donald Trump for his policy against including transgender people in the US armed forces.
A former contributor to Republican causes, she said she will not finance people who wish to destroy her and those like her.
An LGBTQ activist who wished to remain anonymous told Vanity Fair that the fact Pritzker only turned on Trump when he began attacking transgender people in the armed forces is “horrendous.”