Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson, Ariz., in a rampage that left six dead and 14 wounded.

In an eight-minute video posted online, the former Alaska governor and potential Republican presidential contender for 2012 accused critics of her political rhetoric of mounting a “blood libel” against her.

The phrase conveys a long history of victimization for Jews, and its use drew rebuke from a variety of critics.

Rabbi Ira Stone of Congregation Beth Zion/Beth Israel in Center City said he believed it was unlikely that either Palin or her circle of advisers knew what the term meant. “The phrase obviously resonated with them,” he said. “We have to assume that they purposely attempted to redefine it in terms of her own suffering, which is really kind of obscene. To use the term to describe a political controversy, as opposed to the reality of the blood libel and the suffering it has caused Jews, is very insensitive.”

But Palin also found defenders.

“There is nothing improper and certainly nothing anti-Semitic in Sarah Palin using the term to characterize what she reasonably believes are false accusations that her words or images may have caused a mentally disturbed individual to kill and maim,” said Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz, commenting on the online site operated by conservative gadfly Andrew Breitbart.

Palin’s video had the trappings of a presidential-level address, with an American flag prominently in the frame and Palin speaking at length in a calm tone – noticeably different from her self-styled Mama Grizzly approach while campaigning last year for congressional and gubernatorial candidates she endorsed.

It also served as another example of Palin’s undeniable star quality. On the same day President Obama traveled to Arizona to speak at a memorial service, Palin commandeered much of the news media, securing the kind of coverage denied to other potential GOP candidates.

Mitt Romney, who is overseas on a tour of the Middle East, and Mike Huckabee both issued statements on the shootings this week that largely went unnoticed.

Ken Khachigian, a speechwriter for Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan and a longtime GOP strategist in California, said he was struck by Palin’s bearing in the video, saying the former vice presidential candidate “appeared more grown up.”

In her message, Palin did little to scale back her rhetoric in the face of accusations that her use last year of a map “targeting” Democrat Giffords’ Arizona congressional district and others with symbols apparently of rifle crosshairs helped foster a climate of violence.