House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has announced that he will block an educational event on the Nakba from occurring in auditorium of the Capitol Visitor Center.
“Nakba 75 & the Palestinian People” was organized by a number of advocacy groups, including the Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU), Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR), and Jewish Voice for Peace Action (JVP Action). Its featured special guest was set to be Rashida Tlaib (D-MI).
“To uplift the experiences of Palestinians who underwent the Nakba, and educate Members of Congress and their staff about this history and the ongoing Nakba to which Israel continues to subject Palestinians, we’ve partnered together to host this congressional and community educational event to be followed immediately afterward by dinner,” reads the description.
“Congress approves billions of dollars in military funding and weapons equipment to the Israeli military every year that is used to continue the killing and displacement of Palestinians,” said Political Director of Jewish Voice for Peace Action Beth Miller. “Just one day ago, U.S.-sourced Israeli warplanes were used to bomb residential apartment buildings in Gaza, killing 13 Palestinians including 4 children,” said This event is a critically important opportunity to educate members of Congress about what our money has supported both historically and to this day.”
“This event in the US Capitol is canceled,” McCarthy tweeted. “Instead, I will host a bipartisan discussion to honor the 75th anniversary of the US-Israel relationship.”
In a statement Rep. Tlaib condemned McCarthy’s move and noted that the event would still take place.
“Speaker McCarthy wants to rewrite history and erase the existence and truth of the Palestinian people, but he has failed to do so,” it reads. “This event is planned to bring awareness about the Nakba and create space for Palestinian Americans who experienced the Nakba firsthand to tell their stories of trauma and survival.”
“The Nakba is a well-documented historical event that is recognized by the United Nations,” she continued. “We cannot allow the same people who want to ban books and erase history simply because they’re uncomfortable with the truth to silence Palestinian voices…We fully plan on moving forward with this event and we will continue to ensure that Palestinian voices are heard. We will not be silenced.”
The news was celebrated by Anti-Defamation League (ADL) CEO Jonathan Greenblatt. “Grateful Speaker McCarthy took rapid action,” Greenblatt tweeted. “There’s room to talk about the issues — but not at an event co-sponsored by people who traffic in #antisemitism and #hate.”
Greenblatt also linked to a letter that the ADL had sent to McCarthy alerting him to the situation. “This event is happening tomorrow,” it reads. “I ask that greater scrutiny be given to such events, including this one, in the Capitol Complex to ensure that that Congressional controlled areas are not being used to espouse discriminatory and hateful rhetoric. I appreciate your attention to this matter.”
Greenblatt also sent the letter to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-CA).
Despite framing itself as a civil rights organization, the ADL has made anti-Zionism one of its primary focuses. At its National Leadership Summit earlier this month Greenblatt delivered a speech that ignored right-wing antisemitism but repeatedly referenced critics of Israel.
The Nakba refers to the 1948 displacement of 750,000 Palestinians that occurred as a result of massacres carried out by Zionist militias. On May 15 each year, Palestinians mark the tragedy and the United Nations will commemorate Nakba Day for the first time this year. Last year Tlaib introduced a resolution to recognize the Nakba and the rights of Palestinian refugees. “The Nakba is well-documented and continues to play out today,” she tweeted at the time. “We must acknowledge that the humanity of Palestinians is being denied when folks refuse to acknowledge the war crimes and human rights violations in apartheid Israel.”
Tlaib, the only Palestinian-American member of Congress, has consistently been attacked by Republican lawmakers and members of her own party. In a joint statement on McCarthy’s actions to Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) said that “bipartisan support for the U.S.-Israel relationship has always been unbreakable and will remain strong for decades to come. Efforts to rewrite history and question the Jewish State’s right to exist will never succeed in Congress.” They added, “malicious narratives perpetuated by some of our colleagues do nothing but sow divisiveness and hate.”
Note: Despite McCarthy’s attempt to cancel the event, it took place on the night of May 10 in the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee hearing room. “Let the headlines read ‘McCarthy tries to erase Palestine but fails'”, Tlaib tweeted shortly after it concluded.
I wish that Nakba remembrance was also accompanied by Naksa remembrance:
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20220605-remembering-the-naksa/
Remembering the Naksa…On 5 June 1967, Israel launched a pre-emptive strike against Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and Syria. After knocking out the air defences of these countries, it occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, as well as the Syrian Golan Heights and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. Thus, it had taken control of the final 22 per cent of historic Palestine that it wasn’t able to occupy in 1948. Nearly 400,000 Palestinians were added to the hundreds of thousands of refugees displaced in 1948 and their homes and villages were razed to the ground by the Israelis. Around half were being displaced for the second time in less than 20 years. Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Palestine was ongoing (as it is to this day).
Mc Carthy showed total dishonor to the Capitol by supporting those who attacked it and now he wants to further dishonor it by doing the bidding for a war criminal and fraudster.Namely netandyahoo.
When has the US congress ever had a speaker as crooked as this traitor.
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In many other instances of Palestine solidarity censoring the collaborating parties are generally desperate to hide their tracks behind obscure university by-laws, ambiguous scheduling requirements, missed deadlines or other forms of arcane proceduralism. Not Speaker McCarthy: he is proud of his Nakba denialism and willingness to accommodate domestic Zionism censorship because they are, for him, pure political gold.
Zionists live in perpetual fear that the story of the Nakba will be normalized in the American discourse. Someone should tell them that the truth about the Nakba, like the stories of Wounded Knee, My Lai, Lidice, Oradour-sur-Glane and other heinous crimes against humanity cannot be, and will not be, repressed forever.
Question for Any Zionist: Is it antisemitic according to IHRA to highlight the political underhandedness of elected American officials who subvert the Constitution in service to an alien, foreign ideology such as political Zionism?
View here 440 Palestine posters on the subject of the Nakba
The apartheid, ethnic cleansing, mass murdering, mass land stealing state of Israel reaches into the US Capitol building with a dictatorial command. A very impressive display of power.
On a side note, since the Israelis have been documented to use bribery, blackmail, and assassination, e.g.
“Israeli attack on Gaza kills entire families in effort to assassinate resistance leaders”
https://mondoweiss.mystagingwebsite.com/2023/05/to-assassinate-resistance-leaders-israel-kills-entire-families-in-gaza/
“On anniversary of Shireen Abu Akleh’s death, new report details Israel’s history of killing reporters with impunity”
https://mondoweiss.mystagingwebsite.com/2023/05/on-anniversary-of-shireen-abu-aklehs-death-new-report-details-israels-history-of-killing-reporters-with-impunity/
therefore I would suggest Rashida Tlaib be given a personal security detail. I would not want her to meet Shireen Abu Akleh’s fate.
[Note to moderator: If you feel the side note goes “too far” please edit it in whole or part rather than delete the entire comment. You can also remove this note to you.]
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MAD respect for Congresswoman Tlaib!
As reprehensible as Speaker McCarthy’s action was this episode contains the kernel of a valuable lesson. His immediate intervention on behalf of domestic Zionism is an exact re-enactment of previous efforts to cancel, ban, outlaw, complicate or otherwise prevent Palestine solidarity from manifesting itself positively in the discourse such as in government or corporate circles or in academia.
Whenever it is in its interest to do so political Zionism will tap the “discretionary authority” of powerfully placed proxies to carry out its censorship program. Think Harvard Kennedy School and Zionist Proxie Dean Douglas Elemendorf. Think University of Illinois and Zionist Proxie Chancellor Phyllis Wise. Think San Francisco State University Zionist Proxie President Lynn Mahoney.
I could add here scores of similar examples of “the Palestine Exception” in action thanks to Palestine Legal which is doing a magnificent job of documenting all these insults to the Constitution.
The value of proxies lay in the fact that they triangulate the mechanics of censorship often leaving few or no fingerprints. Speaker McCarthy was not concerned with either fingerprints or criticism: He wanted organized Zionism to know he was “defending” Israel.
He likely picked up a phone and made a call to some Congressional scheduling office and, brandishing his powers as Speaker, imperiously ordered the cancellation of the Nakba 75 & the Palestinian People program. Not content to merely disappear this Palestine educational event he went on to demonstrate his abject fealty to Israel by saying: “Instead, I will host a bipartisan discussion to honor the 75th anniversary of the US-Israel relationship.” This pandering amounts to nothing less than open, blatant racism masquerading as political courage.
(cont.)