Jeremiah Wright, the pastor emeritus at Trinity United Church of Christ (TUCC) in Chicago, is once again at the center of a controversy after making inflammatory statements about Jews and Zionists.

Wright blamed Jews for the fact that he has been out of touch with President Barack Obama in an interview with the Daily Press, a Newport News, Virginia-based newspaper, on June 9. Wright noted that "them Jews aren't going to let him talk to me."

In the same interview, Wright asserted that Israel is committing ethnic cleansing in Gaza, which he described as "a sin and a crime against humanity," and expressed his belief that the Obama Administration would have sent a U.S. delegation to the 2009 Durban Review Conference in April if not for fear of losing "the Jewish vote, the A-I-P-A-C vote, that's controlling him."

Wright later stated that he misspoke and that he did not mean to refer to Jews, but rather Zionists. "I'm not talking about all Jews, all people of the Jewish faith, I'm talking about Zionists," Wright said. 

Wright's initial comments and subsequent effort to distinguish between Jews and Zionists is reminiscent of his past inflammatory comments, which propelled him into the spotlight during Obama's primary run, and which he maintained had been taken out of context by the media and others.