Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit and address to a joint session of the US Congress on Wednesday was met with a personal protest in the chamber by the sole Palestinian American member of Congress, while some lawmakers gave the Israeli prime minister a standing ovation, others stayed away, and demonstrations by thousands of protesters took place outside.
The Michigan representative Rashida Tlaib, a leading progressive Democrat and fiercely outspoken opponent of Israel’s war in Gaza, held up a sign that said “war criminal” as Netanyahu was speaking. She also wore a Palestinian flag pin and a keffiyeh, the black and white scarf that has been linked with the Palestinian struggle for over half a century.
The other side of her sign displayed during the controversial address in Washington read: “Guilty of genocide.”
Tlaib was accompanied by an invited guest, Hani Almadhoun, a Palestinian who has lost more than 150 members of his extended family since Israel launched its war with the aim, as Netanyahu has often repeated, of “destroying Hamas”, after the group led a surprise attack on southern Israel from Gaza last October.
“After witnessing his sister forced to eat animal feed, he and his family were determined to start a soup kitchen to feed their starving neighbors,” Tlaib wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
Before Netanyahu’s address, on a press call, a coalition of progressives, human rights advocates, former officials in the Biden administration, and some Democratic lawmakers gathered to denounce his invitation to Capitol Hill.
They called for a US arms embargo on Israel and demanded a ceasefire.
The Democratic House members Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Greg Casar of Texas, Pramila Jayapal of Washington and Cori Bush of Missouri joined the call. They were among the dozens of Democratic members of Congress who boycotted Netanyahu’s speech.
“This war, this genocide, has persisted for months as the United States has sent bombs that have claimed the lives of elders, babies, parents, students, journalists and loved ones,” Pressley said on the call.
“The United States must immediately halt the transfer and sales of offensive weapons to the state of Israel. We must put an end to this unjust war. We must stop the genocide.”
In late June, a senior Biden administration official said Washington has sent $6.5bn worth of security assistance to Israel since 7 October.
In his remarks, Casar said: “We have the vast majority of the American people with us, and the vast majority of the American people wanting to protect innocent Palestinian lives, wanting to protect innocent Israeli lives, wanting to make sure that hostages are returned, wanting to make sure the United States uses all its leverage and stops sending offensive weapons to the Israeli government to promote lasting peace.
Several former Biden administration officials who resigned from their positions in protest of the president’s policies in support of Israel also joined the call.
“We do need a new policy that reflects American interests and American values,” said Tariq Habash, a former Biden administration appointee who resigned in January. “The reality is that inviting a war criminal like Benjamin Netanyahu to Congress to address our nation’s leaders and elected officials is not in our national interests. It is not in our national interest to unconditionally supply weapons to his extremist regime that continues to kill civilians.”
Lily Greenberg, the first Jewish political appointee to resign from her position in protest of the president’s Gaza policy, said: “What’s very clear is that so many people in our government don’t understand that fighting authoritarianism at home also means we have to fight it abroad.
“We know that Trump’s coalition endangers Jews, Palestinians, and so many communities here at home and bringing Netanyahu here – a war criminal who claims to speak on the behalf of Jewish people around the world – also makes us less safe.”
Greenberg, who also worked on Kamala Harris’s brief 2020 presidential campaign, said of the presumptive Democratic nominee for president in this election: “I am encouraged by the fact that [Harris] is not attending the address this afternoon. I think it seems like a strategic choice.”
As vice-president, Harris would typically preside over a joint session during the address of a foreign leader, but was instead on the campaign trail in Indiana.
The former House speaker Nancy Pelosi also skipped the event, a Pelosi spokesperson told Axios, opting instead “to meet with Israeli citizens whose families have suffered in the wake of the October 7 Hamas terror attack and kidnappings.”.
The US senator and prominent progressive Bernie Sanders on Tuesday condemned Netanyahu’s address on the Senate floor.
He said: “It will be the first time in American history that a war criminal has been given that honor.”
