During an online forum on Wednesday organized by American Muslims for Palestine and Americans for Justice in Palestine Action, Muslim American Rep. Rashida Tlaib declared that supporting “Israel’s apartheid government” is incompatible with “progressive values.”
“I want you all to know that among progressives, it’s become clear that you cannot claim to hold progressive values, yet back Israel’s apartheid government, and we will continue to push back and not accept that you are progressive except for Palestine,” Tlaib said
Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, said in response: “In one sentence, Rep. Rashida simultaneously tells American Jews that they need to pass an anti-Zionist litmus test to participate in progressive spaces even as she doubles down on her antisemitism by slandering Israel as an apartheid state.”
Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA), a longtime progressive, told the Jewish Insider the real incompatibility with progressive values is “creating a litmus test that would exclude the Jewish community from the progressive movement.”
New York Democrat Jerry Nadler, who is Tlaib’s fellow member at the Congressional Progressive Caucus, tweeted: “I fundamentally reject the notion that one cannot support Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish and democratic state and be a progressive.”
“The outrageous progressive litmus test on Israel by [Tlaib] is nothing short of antisemitic,” Debbie Wasserman Schultz wrote on Twitter. “Proud progressives do support Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish and democratic state. Suggesting otherwise is shameful and dangerous.”
Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) who has championed Israel’s LGBT rights and who has described himself as the embodiment of a pro-Israel progressive, wrote: “There’s nothing progressive about advocating for the end of Israel as a Jewish State,” he said on Twitter. “Nothing progressive about opposing the Abraham Accords, which promotes peace. Nothing progressive about opposing Iron Dome, which protects civilians from indiscriminate rocket fire.”