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Benjamin Netanyahu is racist, says Democratic hopeful Beto O’Rourke
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/apr/08/benjamin-netanyahu-is-
racist-says-democratic-hopeful-beto-orourke


Remarks come two days before elections in which Netanyahu hopes to win fifth
term as PM

Israelis prepare to go to the polls: what you need to know

Oliver Holmes Jerusalem correspondent

Mon 8 Apr 2019 09.01 BST Last modified on Mon 8 Apr 2019 17.45 BST
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Benjamin Netanyahu is racist, says Beto O`Rourke – video

The secret of Netanyahu’s success? A simple tale of good versus evil
Ayelet Gundar-Goshen
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Netanyahu hopes to win a fifth term in office in elections on Tuesday. He
intends to form a coalition with the support of ultranationalist factions,
including Jewish Power, whose members have called for the expulsion of
Arabs.

Embedded video

The Hill

@thehill
Beto O`Rourke: `The US-Israel relationship is one of the most important
relationships that we have on the planet. And that relationship, if it is to
be successful, must transcend partisanship in the United States, and it must
be able to transcend a Prime Minister who is racist.`

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O’Rourke, a former Texas congressman, condemned Netanyahu for siding with a
“far-right racist party in order to maintain his hold on power”. He said the
Israeli leader had defied any prospect for peace after making a last-minute
election pledge this weekend to annex Jewish settlements in the Palestinian
territories.

Netanyahu said over the weekend that he would prevent the establishment of a
Palestinian state in the occupied West Bank by “controlling the entire
area”.

O’Rourke also cited Netanyahu’s 2015 election-day stunt, in which he warned
that Palestinian citizens of Israel were “heading to the polling stations in
droves”, a move seen at the time as a rallying cry to rightwing voters.

O’Rourke’s comments reflect an emerging schism within the Democratic party
over criticism of Israel’s actions. A cohort of young progressive lawmakers
have been openly critical of the Israeli government, in a break from a
tradition of blanket support from both sides of the US political divide.

Israelis go to the polls: what you need to know
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Donald Trump, who has expressed support for Netanyahu during the election
campaign, has sought to make Israel a partisan issue. He hopes to appeal to
Jewish voters in the US who have traditionally backed Democrats by painting
his rivals as unsupportive of Israel.

Talking to the Republican Jewish Coalition on Saturday in Las Vegas, the US
president said a Democratic victory in 2020 could “leave Israel out there”.

In the same speech he was accused of using antisemitic tropes of dual
loyalty to Israel, referring to Netanyahu as “your prime minister” while
speaking to American Jews.

The prominent American Jewish Committee criticised the comment: “Mr
President, the prime minister of Israel is the leader of his (or her)
country, not ours. Statements to the contrary, from staunch friends or harsh
critics, feed bigotry,” it tweeted.



https://www.timesofisrael.com/democrats-presidential-hopefuls-say-slamming-
netanyahu-isnt-anti-israel/



Democratic presidential hopefuls excoriate Netanyahu, say it isn’t anti-
Israel
Israeli PM ‘a racist,’ says Beto O’Rourke, while Bernie Sanders blasts
premier as an ‘extreme right-wing leader,’ and Pete Buttigieg pans his
pledge to annex part of the West Bank
By RON KAMPEAS
8 April 2019, 10:03 pm 1
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Democratic presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg speaks to the media at the
National Action Network`s annual convention in New York City, April 4, 2019.
(Spencer Platt/Getty Images/via JTA)
Democratic presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg speaks to the media at the
National Action Network`s annual convention in New York City, April 4, 2019.
(Spencer Platt/Getty Images/via JTA)
JTA — Three candidates for the Democratic Party’s presidential nod said this
weekend, ahead of Israel’s elections, that criticizing Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu does not make you anti-Israel.

Pete Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders and Beto O’Rourke all took shots at
Netanyahu, who is in a tight contest with Benny Gantz of the newly formed
Blue and White party, ahead of Tuesday’s vote. O’Rourke went so far as to
call Netanyahu a “racist.”


Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and a dark horse in the
Democratic presidential stakes, chided Netanyahu for saying he would annex
parts of the West Bank if he is re-elected.

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“This provocation is harmful to Israeli, Palestinian, and American
interests,” Buttigieg said Saturday on Twitter, attaching a Haaretz news
article reporting Netanyahu’s pledge made in a TV interview.


Presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke speaks during a gathering of the
National Action Network on April 3, 2019, in New York. (Don Emmert / AFP)
“Supporting Israel does not have to mean agreeing with Netanyahu’s
politics,” Buttigieg said. “I don’t. This calls for a president willing to
counsel our ally against abandoning a two-state solution.”

Buttigieg, who last year visited Israel with the American Jewish Committee’s
Project Interchange, has so far mounted a surprisingly effective campaign,
raising $7 million in his first quarter and surpassing the 65,000 donor
minimum to participate in the party’s presidential candidate debates.

Also Saturday, Sanders likewise said opposing Netanyahu did not make a
candidate anti-Israel. The Vermont senator, an independent, is leading in
the polls and is in Iowa mounting his second bid to win the Democratic nod.

“I think that Benjamin Netanyahu is an extreme right-wing leader in Israel,”
Sanders told Marc Daniels, a Jewish activist who tracks presidential
campaigns. “I do not support his policies, and I think that to speak out
against Netanyahu is not to be anti-Israel. And what I believe is that we,
in fact, need a two-state solution to the Middle East ongoing crisis and
that the United States needs to have an even-handed policy.”


Sen. Bernie Sanders speaks at a news conference on Capitol Hill in
Washington, January 30, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
O’Rourke, a former Texas congressman who has drawn substantial fundraising,
also was campaigning in Iowa, when he told reporters that he believed
Netanyahu was racist for forming an alliance with a far-right party that has
its roots in the teachings of Meir Kahane, the late racist rabbi.



“The US-Israel relationship is one of the most important relationships we
have on the planet,” O’Rourke said, “and that relationship, if it is
successful, must transcend partisanship in the United States, and it must be
able to transcend a prime minister who is racist.”


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