"Jesus was Palestinian of Nazareth," Linda Sarsour tweeted over the weekend, sparking a backlash.
By World Israel News Staff
American political activist Linda Sarsour is claiming that "Jesus was Palestinian of Nazareth and is described in the Quran as being brown copper skinned with wooly hair."
She tweeted the assertion over the weekend, doubling down afterward amid criticism over her claim that Jesus was from a place that did not exist in his days.
"Jesus was born in Bethlehem… Bethlehem is in Palestine," she wrote. "It's currently militarily occupied by Israel and home to a predominately beautiful Palestinian Christian community. Yes, the birthplace of Jesus is under military occupation."
"Are you that stupid?" Yair Netanyahu, son of the Israeli prime minister, retorted to Sarsour's comment.
Israel-based journalists led the way in taking Sarsour to task: "Actually, Jesus lived during the Second Temple period, prior to the Romans renaming Judea as Palestina. The chronology doesn't work out at all," tweeted Sam Sokol, a former correspondent for The Jerusalem Post.
"If Jesus – who was Jewish – was a Palestinian and lived in Bethlehem 2000 years ago, then you're saying Jews are indigenous to what is today called Palestine and Jews have a right to live in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Israel. Glad you cleared this up," wrote Michele Chabin, who contributes to USA Today and the Jewish Week.
"Not only was Jesus a Jew but until the 1960s, whenever the term Palestinian was mentioned, it referred to the Jews!" wrote Avi Abelow on Israel Unwired.
"The Palestine Post of the early 20th century was Jewish. The Palestine soccer team was Jewish! The Palestine electric company was Jewish etc.," he writes.
Morton Klein, head of the Zionist Organization of America, took the opportunity to point out the persecution faced by Christians under Palestinian Authority rule: "Bethlehem was 80% Christian, but when Israel gave it to Palestinians, Christians were harassed, jailed, threatened, lost their jobs and left town. Now it's only 10% Christian. I met with Bethlehem Christians & they cried about their life."
According to a May 2019 paper from the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, "The ongoing international neglect of the plight of the Christians under PA rule could lead to the disappearance of Christianity in the place where it emerged."
In April, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and The New York Times were also criticized for promoting the idea that "Jesus was Palestinian, and not a Jew living in Roman-occupied Judea," CBN Newsreported.
Omar reportedly faced backlash after she retweeted a comment from Omar Suleiman, an American Muslim scholar and civil rights activist who had written: "I was once asked by a relative who is a Palestinian Christian why the Christian right in America largely supports their oppression. Don't they know we're Christian too? Do they even consider us human? Don't they know Jesus was a Palestinian?"
Just hours before that tweet, The New York Times published an opinion piece that claimed, "Jesus, born in Bethlehem, was most likely a Palestinian man with dark skin," noted CBN.
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