Sanders Helps Tlaib Host Nakba Day Event After US Speaker Ban

By Staff, Agencies 

US Senator Bernie Sanders [D-VT] hosted an event planned by Rep. Rashida Tlaib [D-MI] to commemorate the Nakba Day [The Catastrophe], referring to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948.

US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy blocked Tlaib from holding the event at the US Capitol Visitor Center.

However, Sanders let her hold the event in the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Hearing Room, which he chairs and where McCarthy does not have the authority to block an event. 

Tlaib said, “we have a right to tell our stories of the Nakba of 1948...because the Nakba never ended.” Tlaib acknowledged Sanders’ help, calling him her “aamu” [Arabic for uncle], in the Senate. The senator, from Vermont, didn’t attend the event.

“No child should ever have to worry what will fall from the sky,” Tlaib added.

The US senator accused “Israeli” police of a “sustained campaign of terror”, and of being an apartheid entity and that US aid supports ethnic cleansing.

Rep. Cori Bush [D-MO] attended the event, as well. Bush tweeted earlier this week that “not a single dollar of US aid should go to funding ‘Israeli’ apartheid.”

Tlaib tweeted photos from the event with the caption: “Let the headlines read 'McCarthy tries to erase Palestine but fails.”