Comparing Palestinian human rights advocates to terrorist white nationalists is fundamentally a lie. Palestinians want equality, human dignity & to stop the imprisonment of children ⬇️. White supremacy is calling for the *domination* of one race w/ the use of violence. https://t.co/vSPTxIZBTq pic.twitter.com/zHQbn1hmEr
— Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) August 5, 2019
“Comparing Palestinian human rights advocates to terrorist white nationalists is fundamentally a lie,” tweeted Tlaib on Monday, one day after two mass shooting attacks claimed the lives of more than 30 people in the United States. “Palestinians want equality, human dignity & to stop the imprisonment of children.
“White supremacy is calling for the *domination* of one race w/ the use of violence.”
Tlaib was responding to a statement made by CNN’s Jake Tapper that Palestinian rhetoric is similar to that of US President Donald Trump.
"You hear conservatives talk all the time – rightly, in my view – about the tone set by, well, the Arab world," said Tapper. "The Palestinians and the way they talk about Israelis, justifying – in the same way you're doing, no direct link between what the leader says and the violence to some poor Israeli girl in a pizzeria – but the idea you're validating this hatred."
"You can't compare the ideology of Hamas with anything else," added Tapper, "but at the same time, either tone matters or it doesn't."Activist Linda Sarsour also responded to Tapper. She tweeted, "Somehow Jake Tapper still finds a way to bring the Arab world and Palestinians into a conversation about WHITE SUPREMACISTS murdering innocent people. Disgusting. But hey, when someone shows you who they are, believe them."
Somehow Jake Tapper still finds a way to bring the Arab world and Palestinians into a conversation about WHITE SUPREMACISTS murdering innocent people. Disgusting. But hey, when someone shows you who they are, believe them. https://t.co/6R8jVwNvZy
— Linda Sarsour (@lsarsour) August 5, 2019
Earlier this week, JTA writer Eric Mandel wrote a column where he claimed that American policymakers are too often unaware of what Israeli and Arab experts and officials say behind closed doors, even to one another.
“When Israelis and Arabs talk off the record, what they say differs markedly from their public statements,” he wrote.
On Monday, Trump delivered a speech in which he said that, “In one voice, our nation must condemn racism, bigotry and white supremacy. These sinister ideologies must be defeated. Hate has no place in America.”
However, a report released last week showed that the majority of Americans think the US president is racist himself.
According to a poll by Quinnipiac University, more than half (51%) of US voters think Trump is racist.
When broken down by race, 46% of white voters think that Trump is racist, as compared with 50% who say he is not and 4% who were undecided. Some 80% of black voters and 55% of Hispanic voters say he is racist.