Nine months after anti-Semitic remarks forced her to resign from her post as a White House correspondent, Helen Thomas remains unrepentant, demanding an apology from President Barack Obama and defending her assertion that Zionists own the White House and Congress.
Speaking at the annual spring convention of College Media Advisers in New York City on Tuesday, Thomas said, "I want an apology from the president," Editor and Publisher reported Friday.
Obama criticized her comments in an interview during a Jewish Heritage Month celebration event at the White House last year when Thomas said Israelis should "get the hell out of Palestine" and "go back home to Poland, Germany, America and everywhere else."
Thomas, who was the oldest and longest-serving member of the White House press corps, resigned the following week.
The president later called Thomas' comments "offensive," saying, "She made the right decision [to resign]."
In an interview with Playboy magazine for their April edition, Thomas said she knew she had "hit the third rail" when she began speaking about Jews in the interview last June.
"I've had it up to here with the violations against the Palestinians," Thomas said. "Why shouldn't I say it? I knew exactly what I was doing -- I was going for broke. I had reached the point of no return. You finally get fed up."
The 90-year-old, who revealed former President Jimmy Carter called her to express sympathy following her resignation, also told Playboy she stood by a speech she made last year in which she said, "We are owned by the propagandists against the Arabs. There's no question about that. Congress, the White House and Hollywood, Wall Street, are owned by the Zionists."
"I want you to look at the Congress that just came in," Thomas told the magazine. "Do you think [New York Democratic senator Charles] Schumer and Lehtinen -- whatever her name is -- in Florida [Republican representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a strong supporter of Israel] are going to be pro-Arab? No. But they're going to be very influential. Eric Cantor, the majority leader of the Republicans, do you think he's going to be for the Arabs? Hell no! I'm telling you, you cannot get 330 votes in Congress for anything that's pro-Arab."
But Thomas became emotional when the reporter asked what she thought her obituary would say.
"Oh, I know what they're going to say: 'anti-Semite,'" said Thomas, beginning to cry. "I'm a reporter. I know damn well what they're going to say because they have their print, they have their ink. They don't give a damn about the truth. They have to have it their way, and they'll be writing my obituary."
