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Inside the Anti-Israel Congressional Black Caucus Event That Whitewashed Hamas, Rejected Zionism

US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) raises her fist as US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) addresses a pro-Hamas demonstration in Washington, DC. Photo: Reuters/Allison Bailey

An anti-Israel panel event held during a conference hosted by the US Congressional Black Caucus in Washington, DC on Thursday urged the audience to show “solidarity” with the Palestinian cause while rejecting Zionism and justifying the Hamas terror group’s atrocities against the Israeli people.

The event, titled “Nobody’s Free Until Everybody’s Free: The Struggle for Black & Palestinian Liberation,” discussed the necessity of black and Palestinian Americans joining forces to dismantle the Jewish state. The panelists — US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO), George state Rep. Ruwa Romman, progressive journalist Mehdi Hasan, and left-wing academic Marc Lamont Hill — attempted to draw parallels between the historical discrimination faced by African Americans with the alleged mistreatment of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.

Speaking in front of a standing-room-only crowd, Bush lamented the looming one-year anniversary of the so-called “genocide” and “ethnic cleansing”  in Gaza, the Palestinian enclave ruled by Hamas. She argued that the “violence and turmoil” the Palestinian population has endured at the hands of Israel has “continued for decades.” Notably, Bush made no mention of Hamas’s Oct. 7 slaughter of roughly 1,200 people and kidnapping of some 250 hostages in southern Israel which kickstarted the ongoing war in Gaza.

Hasan, a prominent critic of Israel, told the crowd that “”here are no words” that would adequately describe the Palestinian plight in Gaza. 

“The best writers in the world cannot do justice to what we have seen with our own eyes over the last year,” Hasan said. “It is difficult to sit in the United States of America knowing as we speak, right now, that people are being killed in Gaza. Children are having limbs amputated in Gaza. Women are having C-sections without anesthetic in Gaza. People are being literally starved to death in 2024 by a US-armed and enabled and funded military in Gaza.”

Hasan, who was billed as the moderator of the panel, added that he was “tired” of the debate over the war in Gaza being minimized to an “Arab American” issue. He pointed out that a coalition of over 1,000 black pastors from Georgia penned an open letter to US President Joe Biden to demand a ceasefire.

“This is an issue that affects black people, brown people, young people, progressives, anyone with a heart,” Hasan said. 

Romman reflected on her ascendance into the Georgia House of Representatives, claiming that her identity as a “Palestinian American” was considered “offensive” to conservative lawmakers in her state. She also lamented the passing of House Bill 30, legislation which codified the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism.

Beyond classic antisemitic behavior associated with the likes of the medieval period and Nazi Germany, the IHRA definition includes denial of the Holocaust and newer forms of antisemitism targeting Israel such as demonizing the Jewish state, denying its right to exist, and holding it to standards not expected of any other democratic state.

Romman added that she felt “sustained” by a “beautiful multi-faith, muli-racial, multi-generational coalition that at the capitol in Georgia came and said, ‘You’re not doing this in our name.’” The lawmaker seemingly referred to Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), a controversial anti-Zionist activist organization that has voiced support for Hamas terrorism against Jews and Israelis. JVP protested against the passage of HB 30 in January, stating that it is “not about protecting Jews from antisemitism, but to weaponize the definition to prevent free speech.”

“The only way that we move forward is together, and no matter how long it takes for national-level people to get it through their heads, we cannot win in a country that continues to see the rising tide of white supremacy, without centering the people who have faced it head on,” Romman said. 

Tlaib, the only Palestinian American woman in Congress, compared her family’s experience traversing through checkpoints in the West Bank with the segregation and dehumanization that black Americans endured in the past. Over time, the lawmaker saw the “connectivity” between the black American and Palestinian experiences, she said, also sharing that her legislative work on issues regarding water in the Michigan House of Representatives inspired her to connect domestic issues to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“Cutting off water is violent,” Tlaib said. “From Detroit to Gaza, water is a human right.”

Hasan praised Bush for “sacrificing her career for the biggest moral cause.” Bush then received a roughly 30-second standing ovation from the audience. 

Bush lost her reelection campaign to St. Louis attorney Wesley Bell in August while making her opposition to Israel a key talking point of the race. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) flooded the race with a staggering $8.4 million to secure her ouster.

Wiping tears from her eyes on Thursday, Bush said that she ran for office to “save lives and do the work of those who have been directly, negatively impacted by policy violence.” Reflecting on her experience leading the 2014 Ferguson protests after the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in Missouri, Bush expressed gratitude to “our Palestinian brothers and sisters” for “putting themselves on the line for [black people.]”

Bush claimed that witnessing a white woman intervene in a violent confrontation between a police officer and a black youth inspired her to join the Palestinian cause. She added that during the Ferguson protests, a black 16-year-old chanted “F—k the police” to a law enforcement officer, angering and provoking an attack from the officer. 

“He just kept saying it, and this police officer just got so mad, just at the words, he didn’t touch anyone,” Bush said. “He didn’t touch him, and the police officer picked up his baton and was coming up to crack him over the head.”

“There was this white woman. She reached up in the air, and she caught the baton in the air,” Bush continued. “And she just held it, and the police officer was looking like ‘what just happened?’”

Bush said that the police officer walked away from the confrontation. 

“And I just remember in that moment thinking, ‘This is what we have to be!’”

Bush has a long history of telling highly dubious stories. She previously told the press, for example, that teachers at her private school sprayed whipped cream on her homework and accused her of cheating on the entrance exam because they did not believe she could score the highest out of any applicant. The lawmaker wrote on her campaign website that her son was born with translucent skin and his ears inside his head. Bush also originally claimed that she caught a falling woman during the Ferguson protests, but then amended the story to claim she caught a falling baby from a car window. She also claimed to have chased down an armed man on foot to prevent him from murdering his family and committing suicide. 

“If we save one life in Gaza, if we save one family in Gaza, it was worth it, and I wouldn’t change it. I wouldn’t take it back,” Bush stated, seemingly describing herself as a martyr for losing re-election this year while attacking Israel.

Bush’s conduct in the immediate aftermath of Hamas’s’ atrocities on Oct. 7 drew widespread outrage. Only nine days after the massacre, Bush called for an “immediate ceasefire” between Israel and the Palestinian terrorist group. As the war dragged on, her rhetoric toward Israel sharpened, with the congresswoman accusing the Jewish state of committing “genocide” in Gaza and “apartheid” in the West Bank. Bush has also accused Israel of inflicting a “famine” in Gaza without providing evidence.

Hill, an academic and anchor on Al Jazeera — a media outlet funded by the Qatari government, which hosts several top Hamas leaders — said that he has “paid a price” to publicly advocate against Israel. He stated that there is a “long history” of African Americans siding with the Palestinian cause, noticing parallels with their own experience in the United States. The left-wing pundit stated that radical black activists such as Malcolm X and the Black Panther Party all supported the anti-Zionist movement. 

“They try to tell you that [Martin Luther King Jr.] was a Zionist. King wasn’t no Zionist. What King said was that he believed that Israel had a right to exist, but not to exist as an ethno-nationalist apartheid state,” Hill said. 

Arguing that anti-Zionist activists are part of a long tradition of “freedom fighters” and “liberators,” Hill implored the US federal government to revoke all economic and diplomatic assistance to Israel, including support at the United Nations Security Council. He also argued that defeating Zionism is a necessary stepping stone on the path to ultimately dismantling capitalism.

“Stop it! Tell the truth! Stand up for freedom!” he said. “Do the work of liberation! Until Palestine is free, until Sudan is free, until Congo is free, until Haiti is free, not one single one of us free! Free Palestine, from the river to the Motherf—king sea!” Hill said, triumphantly pumping a balled fist in the air. 

From the River to the Sea, Palestine shall be free” — a popular slogan among anti-Israel activists — has been widely interpreted as a call for the destruction of the Jewish state, which is located between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

The Algemeiner asked the panelists why there was no mention of Oct. 7 or Hamas when discussing the causes of the ongoing war in Gaza. The outlet also asked whether the panelists believe Hamas should surrender in exchange for the sake of preserving Palestinian life.

“I feel like we have this reflexive take in American media politics where we have to say, ‘What about Hamas?’” Hill said in response in a mocking tone, adding that invoking the terrorist group is “unnecessary” and “excessive.”

“Hamas hasn’t surrendered because they’re still under brutal occupation. Hamas hasn’t surrendered because Israel has never given the Palestinian people one minute, one moment of self-determination, freedom, or liberation,” Hill said. 

“And so, when you talk about Hamas, when you talk about Oct. 7, you [should] also talk about Oct. 6. Because, history didn’t start on Oct. 7,” he continued.

Hill went on to say that although it is against his “moral code” to maim, rape, and slaughter thousands innocent civilians or abduct hundreds of innocent bystanders, as Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists did on Oct. 7, he believes that it is not his “job to tell people how to liberate themselves.”

“The question presumes, and it is undergirded by a kind of orientalist, white supremacist idea that Palestinians are these unyielding, barbaric, uncivilized, premodern people that are incapable of negotiation.”

The academic then defended Hamas as a “democratically-elected organization that has been systematically undermined.” He urged the audience not to talk about Hamas “like they’re some irrational crazy people,” arguing that the Islamist group’s actions are motivated by a “backdrop of Israeli settler-states that sexually abuse people, that steal land, that kill people.”

“Let’s have a real conversation about Hamas, not the neoliberal, dishonest, orientalist conversation about Hamas,” Hill concluded. 

Hill has a long history of peddling anti-Israel narratives and calling for explicit violence against the Jewish state. In 2018, Hill was fired from his position as a CNN contributor for calling for “free Palestine from the river to the sea,” a phrase which according to critics implies a genocide or mass expulsion of Jews from Israel. He has also voiced support for the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement (BDS), an initiative which seeks to isolate Israel from the international community as the first step toward its eventual destruction. The pundit additionally praised antisemitic Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan — a hate preacher who has referred to Jews as “termites” and called Nazi leader Adolph Hitler “a very great man.” In 2019, Hill skewered mainstream media outlets as “Zionist” organizations, a nod to the antisemitic conspiracy theory notion that Jews control the media. The progressive activist also pushed an unsubstantiated claim that Israel is “poisoning” Palestinian drinking water.

Following the panel, The Algemeiner was pulled aside by a pair of individuals connected to the event and grilled about the publication’s position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and whether it supported “black solidarity with the Palestinian community.”

The post Inside the Anti-Israel Congressional Black Caucus Event That Whitewashed Hamas, Rejected Zionism first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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North London Synagogue, Nursery Targeted in Eighth Local Antisemitic Incident in Just Over a Week

Demonstrators against antisemitism in London on Sept. 8, 2025. Photo: Campaign Against Antisemitism

A synagogue and its nursery school in the Golders Green area of north London were targeted in an antisemitic attack on Thursday morning — the eighth such incident locally in just over a week amid a shocking surge of anti-Jewish hate crimes in the area.

The synagogue and Jewish nursery were smeared with excrement in an antisemitic outrage echoing a series of recent incidents targeting the local Jewish community.

“The desecration of another local synagogue and a children’s nursery with excrement is a vile, deliberate, and premeditated act of antisemitism,” Shomrim North West London, a Jewish organization that monitors antisemitism and also serves as a neighborhood watch group, said in a statement.

“This marks the eighth antisemitic incident locally in just over a week, to directly target the local Jewish community,” the statement read. “These repeated attacks have left our community anxious, hurt, and increasingly worried.”

Local law enforcement confirmed they are reviewing CCTV footage and collecting evidence to identify the suspect and bring them to justice.

This latest anti-Jewish hate crime came just days after tens of thousands of people marched through London in a demonstration against antisemitism, amid rising levels of antisemitic incidents across the United Kingdom since the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

In just over a week, seven Jewish premises in Barnet, the borough in which Golders Green is located, have been targeted in separate antisemitic incidents.

According to the Metropolitan Police, an investigation has been launched into the targeted attacks, all of which involved the use of bodily fluids.

During the incidents, a substance was smeared on four synagogues and a private residence, while a liquid was thrown at a school and over a car in two other attacks.

As the investigation continues, local police said they believe the same suspect is likely responsible for all seven offenses, which are being treated as religiously motivated criminal damage.

No arrests have been made so far, but law enforcement said it is actively engaging with the local Jewish community to provide reassurance and support.

The Community Security Trust (CST), a nonprofit charity that advises Britain’s Jewish community on security matters, condemned the recent wave of attacks and called on authorities to take immediate action.

“The extreme defilement of several Jewish locations in and around Golders Green is utterly abhorrent and deeply distressing,” CST said in a statement.

“CST is working closely with police and communal partners to support victims and help identify and apprehend the perpetrator,” it continued.

The Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) also denounced the attacks, calling for urgent measures to protect the Jewish community.

“These repeated incidents are leaving British Jews anxious and vulnerable in their own neighborhoods, not to mention disgusted,” CAA said in a statement.

Since the start of the war in Gaza, the United Kingdom has experienced a surge in antisemitic crimes and anti-Israel sentiment.

Last month, CST published a report showing there were 1,521 antisemitic incidents in the UK from January to June of this year. It marks the second-highest total of incidents ever recorded by CST in the first six months of any year, following the first half of 2024 in which 2,019 antisemitic incidents were recorded.

In total last year, CST recorded 3,528 antisemitic incidents for 2024, the country’s second worst year for antisemitism despite being an 18 percent drop from 2023’s record of 4,296.

In previous years, the numbers were significantly lower, with 1,662 incidents in 2022 and 2,261 hate crimes in 2021.

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Germany to Hold Off on Recognizing Palestinian State but Will Back UN Resolution for Two-State Solution

German national flag flutters on top of the Reichstag building, that seats the Germany’s lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, in Berlin, Germany, March 25, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Lisi Niesner

Germany will support a United Nations resolution for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but does not believe the time has come to recognize a Palestinian state, a government spokesman told Reuters on Thursday.

“Germany will support such a resolution which simply describes the status quo in international law,” the spokesman said, adding that Berlin “has always advocated a two-state solution and is asking for that all the time.”

“The chancellor just mentioned two days ago again that Germany does not see that the time has come for the recognition of the Palestinian state,” the spokesman added.

Britain, France, Canada, Australia, and Belgium have all said they will recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly later this month, although London said it could hold back if Israel were to take steps to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and commit to a long-term peace process.

The United States strongly opposes any move by its European allies to recognize Palestinian independence.

Last week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the US has told other countries that recognition of a Palestinian state will cause more problems.

Those who see recognition as a largely symbolic gesture point to the negligible presence on the ground and limited influence in the conflict of countries such as China, India, Russia, and many Arab states that have recognized Palestinian independence for decades.

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UN Security Council, With US Support, Condemns Strikes on Qatar

Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani attends an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, following an Israeli attack on Hamas leaders in Doha, Qatar, at UN headquarters in New York City, US, Sept. 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

The United Nations Security Council on Thursday condemned recent strikes on Qatar’s capital Doha, but did not mention Israel in the statement agreed to by all 15 members, including Israel‘s ally the United States.

Israel attempted to kill the political leaders of Hamas with the attack on Tuesday, escalating its military action in what the United States described as a unilateral attack that does not advance US and Israeli interests.

The United States traditionally shields its ally Israel at the United Nations. US backing for the Security Council statement, which could only be approved by consensus, reflects President Donald Trump’s unhappiness with the attack ordered by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“Council members underscored the importance of de-escalation and expressed their solidarity with Qatar. They underlined their support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Qatar,” read the statement, drafted by Britain and France.

The Doha operation was especially sensitive because Qatar has been hosting and mediating negotiations aimed at securing a ceasefire in the Gaza war.

“Council members underscored that releasing the hostages, including those killed by Hamas, and ending the war and suffering in Gaza must remain our top priority,” the Security Council statement read.

The Security Council will meet later on Thursday to discuss the Israeli attack at a meeting due to be attended by Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani.

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