Lengthy Island GOP Rep. Anthony D’Esposito will introduce a decision on Tuesday formally condemning the usage of the slogan “from the river to the ocean, Palestine can be free” as antisemitic, in response to a duplicate completely obtained by The Put up.
D’Esposito, who represents the hotly contested Fourth Congressional District, will file the movement on the heels of a censure decision in opposition to Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) earlier this month, which cited the “Squad” rep’s use of the phrase on social media.
“The widespread use of the mantra calling for liberation ‘from the river to the ocean’ is extraordinarily troubling contemplating that it’s a blatant name for the destruction of America’s biggest ally, Israel, in addition to the Jewish individuals who reside there,” D’Esposito mentioned in an announcement.
“The truth that this antisemitic rallying cry is being freely proclaimed on the campuses of America’s schools and universities demonstrates the troubling prevalence of antisemitic thought in our nation’s establishments of upper studying,” he added.
“Antisemites using the ‘from the river to the ocean’ chant are usually not involved with constructing an enduring peace within the Center East, however are as an alternative preoccupied with seeing the eradication of Israel and the Jewish folks,” the lawmaker went on.
“My decision presents Congress with a chance to formally condemn those that advance antisemitism by utilizing this chant. Anybody who requires the eradication of Israel and the Jewish folks have to be resoundingly rejected.”
Tlaib was censured 234-188, with 22 Democrats voting in assist of it and condemning the congresswoman’s use of the phrase to name for the eradication of Israel.
Brooklyn and Manhattan Democrat Rep. Dan Goldman later mentioned he requested Tlaib why she had used the “hurtful antisemitic trope” and later defended it as “an aspirational name for freedom, human rights, and peaceable coexistence, not loss of life, destruction, or hate.”
“I reached out to Consultant Tlaib privately … to speak to her the damage and hurt her phrases have prompted and the way they’ve been obtained by many within the Jewish neighborhood,” he mentioned in a Nov. 8 assertion posted to X. “I urged her to make a public clarification, however she refused.”
Goldman additionally blasted Tlaib for having “promoted misinformation that infected violence all over the world, together with in opposition to United States embassies” throughout Israel’s ongoing warfare with Hamas terrorists.
D’Esposito’s decision denounces the phrase as “an antisemitic name to arms with the objective of the eradication of the State of Israel, which is situated between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.”
It additional cites the greater than 1,200 victims, largely civilians and together with at the very least 33 Americans, killed by Hamas jihadists on Oct. 7, in addition to the practically 240 folks taken hostage again to the Gaza Strip.
Hamas invaded a music pageant and massacred a whole bunch of attendees, raping and murdering ladies and beheading infants throughout the massacre — atrocities that are all talked about within the decision.
It factors out the loss of life toll marked the best variety of Jewish folks murdered in a single day for the reason that Holocaust.
D’Esposito’s movement additionally notes that “the mantra seeks to disclaim Jewish folks the proper to self-determination” and has been utilized by different terrorist teams equivalent to Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah.
Hamas’ 2017 constitution requires the “full and full liberation of Palestine” by “resistance and jihad” by making use of the phrase as effectively — and the fear group’s politburo chief, Ghazi Hamad, has since promised the assault wouldn’t be their final.
Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi earlier this month invoked the phrase to name for the “institution of the Palestinian state” as a rightful final result of the warfare.
Former Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden and Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein additionally invoked “from the river to the ocean” in earlier calls to “liberate” the Palestinian territories.
US demonstrators have additionally shouted the phrase throughout protests in main US cities, together with an October occasion on Capitol Hill that Tlaib participated in.
“[S]tudents attending establishments of upper schooling have chanted and proceed to chant this slogan for the reason that barbarous October 7 massacres, but all of the whereas, their fellow Jewish college students are being harassed and intimidated,” D’Esposito’s decision additionally notes.
“[T]his chant has been used lately by violent protesters all through the US and the world,” it states.
The decision is anticipated to obtain bipartisan assist and vote on the Home flooring earlier than the top of the yr, in response to a supply conversant in the matter.
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