Tipsheet

Rashida Tlaib Doubles Down on Slogan Calling for Jewish Genocide

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  November 03, 2023 9:00 PM

As we covered earlier this week, a pro-Hamas digital ad was recently posted to the MEANS TV X account (formerly known as Twitter) that tagged Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and featured footage of pro-Hamas activists demonstrating around the country. In Michigan, they were chanting "from the river to the sea," a genocidal slogan calling for the destruction of Jews and Israel. Tlaib herself shared that ad on Friday.

Tlaib's own post similarly claimed that the American people are not with Biden in his support for supporting Israel, while doubling down on her call for a ceasefire.

As the ad started gaining attention, many pointed to the part of the ad with demonstrators calling for genocide. In addition to the over 3,000 replies and 760 quoted reposts taking issue with Tlaib sharing the ad, many screenshots circulated on the platform. 

After her post received considerable outrage, Tlaib responded, with a particularly poor defense of using the genocidal term, which triggered thousands of replies.

"From the river to the sea is an aspirational call for freedom, human rights, and peaceful coexistence, not death, destruction, or hate," she claimed. Tlain even went on for some self-congratulations, as her post claimed her "work and advocacy is always centered in justice and dignity for all people no matter faith or ethnicity."

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Such a defense is very much at odds with the rest of the digital ad's message, though, as it shows other footage from other pro-Hamas demonstrations throughout the country.

The October 7 terrorist attack that Hamas unleashed against Israel resulted in 1,400 Israelis killed, most of them civilians. It was the bloodiest day in Israel's history, with the most Jews killed since the Holocaust. Hamas targeted men, women, children, and the elderly. Not even babies and Holocaust victims were spared gruesome deaths, the details which still continue to come out. Hamas also targeted people for kidnapping, rape, and torture. Americans have been included in the death toll and those held hostage.

"This rallying cry has long been used by anti-Israel voices, including supporters of terrorist organizations such as Hamas and the PFLP, which seek Israel’s destruction through violent means. It is fundamentally a call for a Palestinian state extending from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, territory that includes the State of Israel, which would mean the dismantling of the Jewish state," the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) explained in a post from last week. "It is an antisemitic charge denying the Jewish right to self-determination, including through the removal of Jews from their ancestral homeland."

As Mohammad Tawhidi, known as the "Imam of Peace" also explains in calling Tlaib out as "a liar," the literal Arabic chant for the phrase is "from the water to the water, Palestine will remain Arab," which he says "is a genocidal call to ethnicall cleanse the land from all non-Arabs," which includes Jews. 

Just earlier this week the Republican-controlled House had the opportunity to censure Tlaib via a resolution from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). It failed after 22 House Republicans helped Democrats kill it with a vote to table the motion.

There have been several trends on Friday to do with Tlaib's posts and her support for the call to genocide, including "Rashida" and "Tlaib," as well as "From the River to the Sea."