Prominent Democrats Turn on Rashida Tlaib as She Escalates Anti-Israel Vitriol By Caroline Downey
Prominent Democrats have turned on “Squad” member Representative Rashida Tlaib (D., Mich.) over her hostility to Israel and her embrace of genocidal language.
The radical progressive first faced condemnation from Democrats in Congress and her home state of Michigan after she posted a video accusing the Biden administration of being complicit in Israel’s alleged genocide against Palestinians.
Tlaib said, “We will remember in 2024,” followed by the text, “Joe Biden supported the genocide of the Palestinian people.”
Instead of reversing course, Tlaib has leaned further into her anti-Israel commitments in recent days, even going so far as to defend a genocidal chant popular among pro-Palestinian protesters.
“From the river to the sea is an aspirational call for freedom, human rights, and peaceful coexistence, not death, destruction, or hate,” Tlaib wrote in an X post on Friday. “My work and advocacy is always centered in justice and dignity for all people no matter faith or ethnicity.”
Democratic Michigan attorney general Dana Nessel responded by saying Tlaib’s defense of the hateful slogan crossed the line.
“@RashidaTlaib, I have supported and defended you countless times, even when you have said the indefensible, because I believed you to be a good person whose heart was in the right place,” Nessel wrote on X.
“But this is so hurtful to so many,” she said. “Please retract this cruel and hateful remark.”
Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen of Nevada agreed that the phrase has violent connotations targeting the Jewish people.
“@RepRashida is wrong,” she said on X on Sunday. “‘From the river to the sea’ is a call for eliminating the state of Israel that rejects a two-state solution & puts Jews in danger. We must reject extremism, no matter which side of the aisle it comes from. America’s support for Israel remains unwavering.”
Democratic Florida representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz blasted Tlaib for justifying the provocative language heard at recent demonstrations.
“This phrase means eradicating Israel and Jews,” she said. “Period. Dressing it up in a new PR ploy won’t change that. Only a return of hostages, eliminating Hamas and liberating Gaza from oppressive terror will save civilian lives and secure the peace, justice and dignity you seek.”
Michigan senate president pro tempore Jeremy Moss slammed Tlaib for twisting the real meaning of the phrase, which demands Israel forfeit its land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea to Palestinian control. Hamas explicitly dedicates itself to the extermination of the world’s Jews in its founding charter.
“This is not how Jews view the phrase ‘from the river to the sea,’” Moss said. “This is not how Hamas views the phrase ‘from the river to the sea.’ Hamas uses it as a rallying cry. And they don’t simply want to displace Jews in Israel. They want Jews dead.”
On Sunday, Senator Bernie Sanders rejected his colleagues’ calls for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas conflict, saying it’s unrealistic when dealing with a barbaric enemy like Hamas. Israel has refused to accept a cease-fire until all of its over 240 estimated hostages are freed, concerned that Hamas could exploit a hiatus in hostilities.
“I don’t know how you can have a permanent cease-fire with an organization like Hamas, which is dedicated to turmoil and chaos and destroying the state of Israel,” Sanders, the independent Vermont senator who caucuses with Democrats and is one of the Senate’s most liberal members, countered during an appearance on CNN Sunday. “I think what the Arab countries in the region understand is that Hamas has got to go.”
Support for Israel, and opposition to Tlaib and the “Squad”, has come from surprising sources within the Democratic party. Breaking with the far-left flank, Senator John Fetterman (D., Pa.) in October dismissed public demands for a cease-fire and scolded fellow progressives for reflexively accepting a since-debunked claim that Israel bombed a hospital in Gaza. Tlaib blamed Israel at a pro-Palestinian rally at the Capitol for the hospital blast after initially blaming Israel in an X post immediately after news of the explosion.
“It’s truly disturbing that Members of Congress rushed to blame Israel for the hospital tragedy in Gaza,” Fetterman wrote on X. “Who would take the word of a group that just massacred innocent Israeli civilians over our key ally?”
Israeli and U.S. officials later concluded that Palestinian militants were behind the strike, a finding which was confirmed by multiple independent news outlets.
In interviews with National Review, several prominent Jewish leaders and Jewish Democrats in Detroit expressed frustration with Tlaib’s unwillingness to denounce Hamas, her parroting of Hamas talking points, and her drawing equivalence between Israel’s response to terrorism and Hamas’s butchery of innocent civilians.
David Kramer, a prominent Michigan businessman and Jewish leader who is active in Democratic politics, said Detroit Jews are “beyond disappointed” with Tlaib. Rabbi Asher Lopatin, the head of Detroit’s Jewish Community Relations Council for the last four years, gave up trying to build a working relationship with Tlaib, because of her “shameful, shameful” anti-Israel comments and actions in the wake of Hamas’s brutal attack.
Tlaib also has fundraising ties to at least three Hamas-linked activists, including one who served prison time for his connection to the terror group, National Review previously reported. Salah Sarsour, Rafeeq Jaber, and Abdelbaset Hamayel hosted meet-and-greet fundraisers for Tlaib during her congressional campaign in 2018, according to a report released in late October by the Canary Mission, a website that compiles dossiers on antisemitic activists and organizations. Before that, they were leaders or funders of U.S.-based Hamas front groups, including the Islamic Association for Palestine, the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, and the American Muslim Society, which were once found liable for financing terrorists.
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