On January 25, 1904, the founder of the modern political movement of Zionism, Theodor Herzl, was received in the Vatican for an audience with Pope Pius X. Herzl, after disdaining to kneel before the pontiff and to kiss his hand, requested Vatican approval for the return of Jews to the Land of Israel, to Zion. The request was rejected, and the reason was theological.
Herzl was meticulous in detailing the pope’s words. Pius X told him, and I quote from the new Koren Toby Press Library of the Jewish People edition, edited by Gil Troy, “The Jews have not recognized our Lord, therefore we cannot recognize the Jewish people.” He also added, “We cannot prevent the Jews from going to Jerusalem, but we could never sanction it. Jerusalem must not get into the hands of the Jews.”
Herzl, not one to yield, pressed the holy father and inquired what his position was regarding the then Muslim Turkish possession of the Holy City, since they, too, do not recognize Jesus. Unfazed, the pope responded, “It is not pleasant to see the Turks in possession of our holy places. We simply have to put up with that. But to support the Jews in the acquisition of the holy places, that we cannot do.”
The theological confrontation did not end there. The pope pressed on with his anti-Jewish view, saying, “The Jewish religion was the foundation of our own, but it was superseded by the teachings of Christ, and we cannot concede it any further validity. The Jews, who ought to have been the first to acknowledge Jesus Christ, have not done so to this day.” Jews therefore bore themselves their own responsibility for being persecuted and for the rejection of their national duty and obligation to return to Zion.
Herzl admits to his diary that he so much wished to quip, “That’s what happens in every family. No one believes in his own relatives.” Instead, he replied, “Terror and persecution may not have been the right means for enlightening the Jews.”
A century and a quarter later, a soon-to-be dismissed member of the White House Religious Liberty Commission, Carrie Prejean Boller, wearing a Palestinian flag pin, attended a meeting of the Council last week. Although the agenda was to be focused on antisemitism, Boller took advantage of the event.
Boller’s justification for being a member of the commission, according to its website, is that, besides being pretty in 2009 and being selected Miss California, she authored an autobiography entitled Still Standing: The Untold Story of My Fight Against Gossip, Hate, and Political Attacks. However, in today’s awkward reality, she seems to be able to initiate poisoned political attacks.
'Catholics do not embrace Zionism': Carrie Prejean Boller
Reminiscent of the forced disputations Jews of the medieval ages underwent – after Pope Innocent III had infused the spirit of the Inquisition into Christendom, assisted by Jewish apostates – the former beauty queen announced to those assembled, “As a Catholic, I don’t agree that the new, modern State of Israel has any biblical prophecy meaning at all.” She then said, “I’m a Catholic, and Catholics do not embrace Zionism, just so you know, so are all Catholics antisemites?”
Prejean Boller is newly Catholic, having converted from being an Evangelical in April 2025. The infamous Candace Owens, an ally and supporter, converted to Catholicism in April 2024. Nick Fuentes, another outrageous antisemite, is also Catholic. Is there a trend developing? At the very least, they are all feeding off of each other and collaboratively promoting the vilest of charges against Jews.
Following the outrage Prejean Boller generated, she retweeted Candace Owens’ reaction, who subtly inverted matters, posting that “Zionists are naturally hostile to Catholics because we refuse to bend the knee to revisionist history and support the mass slaughter and rape of innocent children for occult Baal worshipers.”
Like the progressive Left, as well as a good part of its liberal wing, they claim only to be against Zionism but keep slipping into old-time antisemitism. One of their slogans is their opposition to “Zionist supremacy in America.” That, of course, is a regeneration of the headlines of Henry Ford’s Dearborn Independent rag-sheet, such as: “Jewish dictatorship of the United States during war” or “Jewish supremacy in the motion picture world.”
But there is one element now different from those days.
As noted by The Wall Street Journal, Sameerah Munshi, another member of the commission’s advisory board, was recording Prejean Boller’s exchanges and left together with her after texting during the hearing. Were we witnessing the newly developing right-wing Christian nationalist antisemitic crusade in collusion with the radical Islamist supremacy movement?
Checking Munshi’s Instagram account will reveal accusations that Israel is engaging in genocide in Gaza, starving its population, and torturing the children of Palestine. We are witnessing the transnational movement of the new Red-Green-Brown alliance from Europe to American soil, an illogical linkup first described by Alexandre del Valle as “a red-brown-green... ideological alliance” in Le Figaro in April 2002.
In some unfathomable fashion, a section of American Christianity, not large but powerful, as Tucker Carlson is proving, has latched on to radical Islam and ancient antisemitism and, perhaps, its money. They are on a lemmings’ march to some future cliff when they will realize that they will be turned upon by their present friends.
To those Christians comfortable in their hate, employing the rallying call “Jesus is King!”, they should recall that on the cross upon which Jesus was crucified was carved “Iesus Nazarenus, Rex Iudaeorum”, that is, “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews,” which recalls what was said by the Magi, as recorded in Matthew 2:2 – “King of the Jews.” At that time, Jews lived in their own country, called Judea, under Roman occupation.
Judea today, the reconstituted State of Israel, is no longer “capta,” as Roman coins phrased its vanquishing, but quite victorious, liberated, and free.
The writer is a researcher, analyst, and commentator on political, cultural, and media issues.