Deconstruct This

What was he thinking?

The video shows the opening of a speech by General Jim Jones - U.S. National Security Advisor - to a recent meeting of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Was he just trying to break the ice? Or is there some deeper significance here?

By the way, in response to complaints by the ADL that the joke was anti Semitic, and by the Forward that it was in bad taste, General Jones apologized.

Still, jokes often tell us something serious about the attitudes of those that tell them and those that laugh at them. Trouble is I have no idea what exactly that something deeper is, in this case. Any ideas?