WASHINGTON -- The Anti-Defamation League on Monday condemned a flier circulating in Memphis that says U.S. Rep. "Steve Cohen and the Jews Hate Jesus," saying it "attempts to incite tension" between African-Americans and Jews.

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The flier, which provides the name and telephone number of Rev. George Brooks of Murfreesboro, Tenn., has been in circulation since at least last Thursday. On Monday, Brooks took responsibility for the broadside.

He said he sent the flier because the 9th Congressional District is "about 90-something percent black." According to the latest U.S. Census, in 2000, the district was 59.7 percent black.

On Monday, Cohen, a Memphis Democrat, said he doesn't know who Brooks is or why someone in Murfreesboro -- well outside his district -- would want to incite discrimination.

"It obviously needs to be condemned and people need to be vigilant against all forms of racism," said Cohen. "I had in my last campaign repeated efforts to sway votes against me because of my religion and my race, but the people of the 9th District rejected that and gave me overwhelming support."

Cohen faces a challenge by Pinnacle Airlines labor lawyer Nikki Tinker, an African-American, in the Aug. 5 Democratic primary.

Tinker did not respond to a reporter's call on Monday but her Washington-based spokesman, Cornell Belcher, said Tinker's campaign was not involved in the flier.

"Oh, my God; are you kidding me? Are you even calling me asking that?" asked Belcher. "This is an absurd question. Of course we wouldn't have anything to do with that. I don't even know what you're talking about but, no, we would have nothing to do with that."

The Anti-Defamation League, which fights anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry, released a statement in Atlanta Monday condemning the flier, saying, it "makes an outrageously false claim about Jews' attitudes toward Jesus, and it attempts to drive a potentially dangerous wedge and incite tensions between African-Americans and Jews in Memphis."

This is the most recent incident in which Cohen opponents have claimed a white man cannot adequately represent the interests of the predominantly black 9th District.

Last August, the Black Baptist Ministerial Association took Cohen to task for his support of the Hate Crimes bill vote he'd cast months earlier. When he was given an audience before the group, one minister, Robert Poindexter of Mt. Moriah Baptist Church, asserted, "He's not black and he can't represent me."

Cohen was one of three white candidates in a 15-candidate field when he won the Democratic Primary in 2006.

-- Bartholomew Sullivan: (202) 408-2726