Always anxious to play the role of the victim, even when an ugly right-wing mob came dangerously close over the weekend to unleashing violence while protesting the proposed Islamic community center in downtown New York, the Weekly Standard rushed to the defense of a mosque rally videographer of dubious distinction.

The whole item is brief, so I'll post it in full [emphasis added]:

At Sunday's Ground Zero mosque protest, I spoke to one man who had been with the counter-protesters, Joey “Boots” Bassolino, immediately after the police pulled him out from the crowd. What happened, I asked? “There was a guy standing up, a Pakistani guy, who had identified himself as a Pakistani, and he said: 'We're not going to sit there and back these Zionist Jews,'” Bassolino recounted, still clearly a little shaken up.

“And I'm like, whoa, wait a minute. What's up with the racism? And they're like, 'what's racist about that?'” The guy behind Bassolino yelled “f*** you,” reached forward, grabbing his camera and hitting it. "So I kicked him in the shin," Bassolino said. Bassolino, a disabled U.S. army veteran, claims that he's an “objective” observer and was in the group of counter-protesters to “document what was going on.”

“These are people that are supposedly protesting racism, yet you get people standing up there on a soap box yelling about 'Zionist Jews.' What the hell is that? That's racism to me, man,” Bassolino explained to me.

Here's the video Bassolino uploaded to YouTube. The remark about “Jewish Zionist Israel” is at the 3:55 mark:

First of all as you'll see from the video, Bassolino was not “pulled” from the crowd by the police. He was escorted out by police, who had set up strict rules about keeping anti-mosque protesters and pro-mosque protesters separate that day. And second, watch the video and see who Bassolino “kicked in the shin.”

He kicked a very old man. I kid you not.

But Bassolino is the one who The Weekly Standard wants hold up as a symbol of someone being oppressed by bigots, while TWS pays no attention to these people.

UPDATE: Not surprisingly, overexcited right-wing bloggers are lying about what's plainly visible on the YouTube clip.

For instance, Dana Loesch writes:

As you see in the video the man simply standing and videotaping the rally is assaulted and attacked by the crowd who grow into a jeering angry mob. One of the most unbelievable things I've ever witnessed.

Of course, Bassolino was never “attacked” or “assaulted” by the crowd, although he did kick an old man. Loesch simply made up the first part and ignored the second. (Did I mention she's a right-wing blogger?)