MAHER MAULS PRO-PALESTINIAN PROGRESSIVES

You can't learn history from Instagram!': Bill Maher lashes anti-Israel supermodel Bella Hadid and says she'd 'run screaming to Tel Aviv if she had to live in Gaza for one day' in fiery debate with NY Times columnist 

 

By James Gordon 

Daily Mail

May 29, 2021

Bill Maher got into a fiery debate over the recent Israel-Gaza conflict on Friday night and took aim at the 'liberal media' over its news coverage before turning on progressives including supermodel Bella Hadid.

 

               Bella Hadid raised her fist at pro-Palestinian protest 4 years ago

 

'One of the frustrations I had while I was off is that I was watching this war go on in Israel … and it was frustrating to me because there was no one on liberal media to defend Israel, really,' Maher, 65, began. He was referring to a recent COVID-19 diagnosis that forced him off the air last week. 

'We've become this country now that we're kind of one-sided on this issue. And I'd also like to say off the bat I don't think kids understand, and when I say kids I mean the younger generations – you can't learn history from Instagram!' the 65-year-old Maher added. 'There's just not enough space.'

'Well, Gaza fired 4,000 rockets into Israel. What would you say Israel should have done instead of what they did?' Maher asked.

'International lawyers are pretty clear that they have a right to defend themselves … but there is a sense that their response was probably a war crime because they did not sufficiently avoid civilian casualties,' Kristof explained.

'But they purposely put the rockets in civilian places. That's their strategy,' Maher responded.

Maher then went into a detailed explanation that countered a oft-repeated narrative that Israel 'stole' the land.  

'The Jews have been in that area of the world since about 1200 B.C., way before the first Muslim or Arab walked the Earth. ... I mean, Jerusalem was their capital. So if it's who got there first, it's not even close,' Maher said. 

'The Jews were the ones who were occupied by everybody; the Romans took over at some point and then the Persians and the Byzantines and then the Ottomans. So yes, there was colonization going on there. Beginning in the 19th century, they started to return to Palestine, which was never an Arab country. There was never a country called Palestine that was a distinct Arab country. 

'Doesn't it behoove the people who rejected the half a loaf and continue to attack … Hamas's charter says they just want to wipe out Israel. Their negotiation position is 'You all die,'' Maher said. 'The two-state solution has been on the table a number of times. There could be an Arab capital in East Jerusalem now if Yasser Arafat had accepted that in 2003. He did not.

'I mean, they have rejected this and went to war time and time again,' Mayer continued, 'And, you know, as far as Gaza goes, it's amazing to me that the progressives think that they're being progressive by taking that side of it, the Bella Hadids of the world, these influencers. 

'I just want to say in February of this year, a Hamas court ruled that a unmarried woman cannot travel in Gaza without the permission of a male guardian. Really? That's where the progressives are? Bella Hadid and her friends would run screaming to Tel Aviv if they had to live in Gaza for one day.' 

   

               Bella Hadid leading recent pro-Palestinian protest

 

Kristof once attempted to defend Hadid's position and said that he didn't 'perceive' her as defending Hamas but for Gazan children who were killed during the fighting.

But Maher referred the columnist to that slogan Hadid chanted while taking part in a pro-Palestine march in New York City earlier this month. 

'From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.' 

The phrase is normally associated with the wiping out of Israel.   

Earlier in the week, Bella Hadid attended the same pro-Palestinian protest as the man arrested for allegedly beating a bystander in Times Square last week and calling him a 'filthy Jew' - and posted a picture of him on her Instagram.

The model posted a picture of Waseem Awawdeh, 23, sitting on a car amid dozens of protestors in a procession on May 16, along with several other pictures and a video of herself at the rally in New York City.

In her post including a picture of Awawdeh among other protestors, Hadid wrote: 'The way my heart feels … To be around this many beautiful, smart, respectful, loving, kind and generous Palestinians all in one place... it feels whole! We are a rare breed!!'

Police say Awawdeh was among a gang of demonstrators who four days later punched a Jewish man to the pavement then pummeled him while he was down, yelling anti-Semitic epithets.

He is charged with assault as a hate crime, gang assault, menacing, aggravated harassment as a hate crime and criminal possession of a weapon. 

A source close to Hadid said she does not know the man, did not associate with him at the protest and condemns any anti-Semitic violence.

Earlier, she shared photographs of herself at the earlier, peaceful demonstration that paraded through the Bay Bridge neighborhood of Brooklyn, in a black and white bandana and burgundy face mask, sat on the back of a truck with other protestors waving Palestinian flags. 

The supermodel has become a lightning rod for criticism from Israelis and the country's supporters after her outspoken backing of Palestinians in the conflict.

Hadid, 24, has already earned an official rebuke from the Israeli government itself after she posted a closeup of herself on social media with tears rolling down her nose, saying she felt a 'deep sense of pain' for the Palestinian people following the outbreak of fighting in Gaza.

'You cannot allow yourself to be desensitized to watching human life being taken,' Hadid wrote.

'Palestinian lives are the lives that will help change the world. And they are being taken from us by the second.'

Following that picture and after Hadid appeared at the pro-Palestinian rally in Brooklyn, the Israeli Foreign Ministry's Twitter account tweeted: 'When celebrities like @BellaHadid advocate for throwing Jews into the sea, they are advocating for the elimination of the Jewish State.

'This shouldn't be an Israeli-Palestinian issue this should be a human issue,' the Israeli ministry account wrote. 'Shame on you.'

There is no footage of Hadid calling for Israelis to be harmed, and fact-checking website Snopes labeled Israel's claim that Hadid wants to throw Jews into the sea as 'unproven.'

On her Instagram account Hadid posted on May 12 'anti-semitism is NOT okay' and 'Jewish people are not responsible for the actions of the Israeli army or the government policies of Israel.'

In a separate post which remains on Hadid's Instagram, the model wrote about her Palestinian heritage and longstanding support for demonstrators, sharing a picture of herself at a pro-Palestine protest four years ago.

'It has always been #freepalestine. ALWAYS. I have a lot to say about this but for now, please read and educate yourself,' she wrote.

'This is not about religion. This is not about spewing hate on one or the other. This is about Israeli colonization, ethnic cleansing, military occupation and apartheid over the Palestinian people that has been going on for YEARS!'