Omar: Israel's treatment of Palestinians ‘not consistent with being a democracy’
Updated: 6:55 p.m. | Posted: 6:33 a.m.
U.S. Reps Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan sharply criticized Israel for blocking them last week from a visit and for its treatment of Palestinians in the occupied territories.
The two freshmen lawmakers also remain incensed that President Trump recommended on Twitter that Israel block their trip. The decision came a short time after Trump tweeted it would show weakness for Israel to allow the visit.
Omar said the trip was intended to help her as a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
"The decision to ban me and my colleague, the first two Muslim-American women elected to Congress, is nothing less than an attempt by an ally of the United States to suppress our ability to do our jobs as elected officials," she said.
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Omar and Tlaib are outspoken critics of Israeli government policy toward Palestinians, and they support the BDS movement — which stands for Boycott, Divest and Sanction — and is aimed at pressuring Israel on the issue. That support was the main reason the government cited for banning the visit.
Omar said she prepared for the trip by speaking with many constituents with a wide range of views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. She also suggested that future U.S. aid to Israel should be linked to human rights protections for Palestinians.
"Denying a visit to duly elected members of Congress is not consistent with being an ally,” she said.
”And denying millions of people freedom of movement or expression or self determination is not consistent with being a democracy."
Omar brought some 5th District constituents along to share their own stories about travel restrictions in Israel.
Lana Barkawi of Minneapolis is a Palestinian-American who has never been able to visit her parents' homeland.
"The dispossession and displacement of Palestinians is a human rights issue. It's an issue of justic," Barkawi said during the press conference.
Tlaib actually received permission on humanitarian grounds to visit her grandmother, but she declined the offer. She explained that the conditions under which she would have been allowed to travel were unacceptable and undignified.
She said she spoke at length with her family and her grandmother about it and they decided together to decline the offer.
"You don't let anybody tell you you're 'less than' or humiliate you solely on your faith or your ethnicity. And as a United States congresswoman, I could not do that to my grandmother."
Critics of the two congresswomen have pointed to the pro-Palestinian group that was sponsoring the trip. The group has been accused of anti-Semitism.
Tlaib said she was surprised by the information. She said other members of Congress had previously worked with the same group on trips to Israel.
"We're also taken aback and learned from everybody else that there were some issues regarding it,” she said. “I think especially Ilhan Omar and I are extremely careful in vetting because there is a close eye in policing our actions that are so much more weighted on us and any other member."