The Patriot Post® · 'From the River to the Sea' Is Jihad, Not Peace

“From the river to the sea” is a chant begun 50 years ago by the Palestinian Liberation Organization, and it means the elimination of Israel in favor of a lone Palestinian state on the land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. Let’s just say it’s not a peaceful slogan.

Yet that’s exactly what anti-Semitic, Hamas-supporting — and supported — Squad member Rashida Tlaib wants you to think. The Michigan Democrat posted a video Friday of various pro-Palestinian marches all over the country. One of the groups chanted “from the river to the sea” while marching peacefully.

“Mr. President,” Tlaib said midway through, “the American people are not with you on this one.” By “this one,” she means Joe Biden’s statement opening the video: “We stand with Israel.”

Tlaib concludes, “We will remember in 2024,” and the video closes with this graphic of what she’ll remember: “Joe Biden supported the genocide of the Palestinian people.”

That is reprehensibly false. After Hamas slaughtered hundreds of innocent civilians on October 7, Israel began to fight back. Yet Biden has repeatedly warned Israel about not inflicting civilian casualties and even disgracefully called for a “humanitarian pause” in Israel’s response that would be detrimental to its mission, but there’s the small matter that Israel is not and has not ever been committing genocide.

Civilian deaths caused by the Israel Defense Forces are unintentional and primarily because Hamas jihadists set up bases in hospitals, schools, and mosques, hiding behind civilians and deliberately creating casualties for propaganda purposes.

Who wants to commit genocide? The people chanting “from the river to the sea.”

Hamas, founded in 1987, has in its charter the explicit mission to eradicate Israel, and the phrase “from the river to the sea” is found in its constitution. Hamas is an acronym of the Arabic phrase Ḥarakah al-Muqāwamah al-ʾIslāmiyyah (HMS), which means “Islamic Resistance Movement.” The Arabic word ḥamās means “zeal,” “strength,” or “bravery.” In Hebrew, that word (sometimes spelled chamas) means “violence” and “wrong.”

One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter, according to Tlaib and company.

Faced with more blowback for her obviously hateful anti-Semitism, Tlaib tried desperately to explain, “From the river to the sea is an aspirational call for freedom, human rights, and peaceful coexistence, not death, destruction, or hate.” Even if we give her the benefit of the doubt about what she means (and we probably shouldn’t), it does not follow that it’s what Hamas means. Hamas’s genocidal jihadists shout such things while slaughtering as many Israeli women and children as they can.

“From the river to the sea” is why the Palestinians have repeatedly rejected Israel’s land-for-peace overtures over the years.

It’s time we broke down the history of “From the river to the sea.”

It’s explicitly ugly and overtly genocidal—Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran make that very clear. pic.twitter.com/P9H6Fq847s

— Tony Kinnett (@TheTonus) October 18, 2023

Even many of Tlaib’s fellow Democrats are rebuking her. Tlaib is Muslim, and her Michigan Democrat colleague Elissa Slotkin, the only Jewish member of the state’s delegation, reminded her: “The phrase ‘from the river to the sea’ is one of division & violence, & it is counterproductive to promoting peace. None of us, especially elected leaders, should amplify language that inflames a tense situation & makes it harder for our communities to find common ground.”

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel told Tlaib that even though she had “supported and defended you countless times, even when you have said the indefensible,” the congresswoman should “retract this cruel and hateful remark.”

Democrat-turned-Independent Senator Kyrsten Sinema likewise explained: “[The phrase] means eradicating the state of Israel. It’s about eliminating Jews. It’s hate speech. It’s antisemitism.”

Of course, part of the Jews’ increasing problem with Democrats is the Left’s moral equivocation about Israel and Hamas. Some 45 House Democrats voted against sanctions for Hamas jihadists and their supporters.

Bernie Sanders mildly rebuked Tlaib, but also added to the problem. “People who are saying, ‘Israel, right or wrong, we’re for you all the way,’ that’s not going to work,” Sanders said. “You have got a right-wing government in Israel which is racist.”

Barack Obama also blamed Israel. “What Hamas did was horrific, and there’s no justification for it,” he said, but “what is also true is that the occupation, and what’s happening to Palestinians, is unbearable.” He added that “nobody’s hands are clean” and “all of us are complicit to some degree.” He can speak for himself about being complicit, given that he’s directed so much money to Hamas and its state sponsor, Iran, over the years.

Speaking of money, the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Office of Inspector General gets the “Keen Sense of the Obvious Award” for the week for reporting Friday that humanitarian assistance to Palestinians could “fall into the hands of foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs) including, but not limited to, Hamas.”

Democrats have a long history of being “useful idiots” for Marxist causes. The oppressor/oppressed division so foundational to Marxism is precisely the justification for leftists who support Hamas. In their false construct, Israel is the oppressor, and the Palestinians are the oppressed. They’ll issue the perfunctory caveat that saying so doesn’t “justify” what Hamas did, but they nonetheless wink and nod at the jihad found in innocuous-sounding but bloody chants like “from the river to the sea.”

(Updated)