POLITICS MAY 13, 2019 / 8:00 PM / UPDATED 2 HOURS AGO

Democratic leaders back Muslim lawmaker after Holocaust comments

Susan Cornwell
3 MIN READ

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Democratic leaders on Monday rallied behind a freshman lawmaker on Monday after President Donald Trump and other Republicans attacked her over comments about the Holocaust and Palestinians.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer both issued statements on Twitter saying Trump and other Republicans should apologize to Representative Rashida Tlaib, a Palestinian-American from Michigan and one of two Muslim women in Congress. Presidential candidate and senator Bernie Sanders also weighed in.

On the Yahoo News podcast “Skullduggery” last week, Tlaib was asked about her support for a one-state solution to the conflict between Israel and Palestinians.

In a rambling answer, she said: “There’s kind of a calming feeling I always tell folks when I think of the Holocaust, and the tragedy of the Holocaust, and the fact that it was my ancestors, Palestinians, who lost their land and some lost their lives, their livelihood, their human dignity, their existence in many ways, have been wiped out, and some people’s passports.

“I mean, just all of it was in the name of trying to create a safe haven for Jews, post-the Holocaust, post-the tragedy and the horrific persecution of Jews across the world at that time, and I love the fact that it was my ancestors that provided that, right, in many ways. But they did it in a way that took their human dignity away, right, and it was forced on them,” she said.

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