Israeli President Isaac Herzog is to address a joint meeting of Congress on July 19 to commemorate the 75th anniversary of Israel’s statehood and to reaffirm his nation’s special relationship with the United States.
And Congresswoman Ilhan Omar – in a rambling tweet thread including the below – has promised to take out the trash:
Regarding her first allegation Israel banned her and Rashida Tlaib from entering Israel, this is partially true, but not because they are Muslim, as she is strongly implying. According to reports at the time, Israeli PM Netanyahu did so shortly after then US President Trump called on his ally not to let them in per Israel’s anti-BDS backers’ law, which enables Israel to ban those advocating BDS against the Jewish state. Their religion is entirely irrelevant.
After Talib sent a letter to Israel’s then Minister of Interior Aryeh Deri, pleading with him to allow her in so she could visit her 90-year-old sity (grandma), saying, “it might be my last chance to meet her,” he approved her request as a gesture of goodwill on a humanitarian basis. Yet she then decided not to come anyway, preferring instead to bash Israel.
By the way, she was made persona non grata by Mahmoud Abbas, but I am sure if he visited the US to address Congress, she would not be announcing a boycott of the event.
Regarding her second allegation that President Herzog’s address comes on behalf of the “most right wing government in Israel’s history”, at a time when the government is openly promising to “crush” Palestinian hopes of statehood, this is also not entirely true. PM Netanyahu allegedly made these comments, but he has never been anything but open about his opposition to a palestinian Arab state. President Herzog, on the other hand, is more to the left than PM Netanyahu, and is very much pro two-state solution.
In other words, while Omar tries to smear our government as being anti-Muslim, she shows herself to be the bigot by painting all Israeli officials as a hive mind based on the words of one.
As for her tweet attacking us for killing 8 palestinian Arabs in Jenin, they were all terrorists (it turned out to be 12, and the additional 4 were also all terrorists).
So Ilhan, I support your decision not to attend President Herzog’s address since you and your fellow antisemitic liar Rashida are not fit to breath the same air as him.
