I watched about ten minutes of Netanyahu’s speech to the US Congress on Wednesday and then I had to turn it off. I couldn’t handle the outright lies he pandered to a deceivingly full Congress, until I saw Elon Musk in the crowd and realized that only a fraction of the audience were Congresspeople, the others were fillers likely paid to give awkward standing ovations after every third sentence.
Image is easily created and twisted in these political circuses. You wouldn’t know from the full house that roughly half of Congress’ Democrats boycotted the speech. And for good political reason, considering Netanyahu is accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court and the United States is currently violating its own Leahy Law by providing the Israeli military with weapons despite their record of committing human rights violations.
Among those who boycotted the speech were Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Nancy Pelosi. As I watched, I thought of Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian-American representative in Congress. I assumed she was also boycotting the speech, and hoped she was somewhere surrounded by love and care to block out the genocidal vitriol.
But, a few hours later while skimming social media, I saw a viral image of Rashida, sitting in Congress, proudly wearing her kuffiyeh, and holding up a sign that said ‘war criminal’ on one side and ‘guilty of genocide’ on the other.
I cannot even begin to imagine how she felt in that moment. And I had absolutely no expectation of her to be present in that hall. But I am extremely grateful for and humbled by her strong, calm presence and voice of dissent from inside the belly of the beast. Thank you Rashida for exuding bravery, resistance, and truth.
An honourable mention also goes to Democratic Representative Jerry Nadler who attended the speech as well, inconspicuously trolling Netanyahu by reading a book titled “The Netanyahu Years,” a sharp critique by Israeli journalist Ben Caspit with varying descriptions of the Israeli Prime Minister as “a Republican U.S. senator,” a “political coward” and the self-anointed guardian of the security of the Jewish people.
And of course, a huge thanks to the thousands of protestors outside of Congress who refused to be complicit, calling for the arrest of Netanyahu and to cut all US military aid to Israel.
We will overcome.
