Arizona State University cancels pro-Palestinian event with Rashida Tlaib

Nov. 17 (UPI) -- Arizona State University canceled an event featuring Rep. Rashida Tlaib after a bipartisan group of state lawmakers said her "extremist, antisemitic views are not welcome in the state of Arizona."

Tlaib, D-Mich., was slated to speak at the "Palestine is an American Issue" event co-hosted by the pro-Palestinian Arizona Palestine Network and Students for Justice in Palestine on ASU's Tempe campus.

The school said the event "was organized outside of ASU policies and procedures. Accordingly, that event will not take place today on the ASU Tempe campus."

State Reps. Michael Carbone, Alma Hernandez, Alexander Kolodin and Consuelo Hernandez said the school should not be using public dollars to support SPJ. ASU "is a safe place for Jews, both on and off campus, and the antisemitic rants regurgitated by SJP and others are not representative of Arizona values," the lawmakers said.

"She has a history of espousing such a view both before and following the deadly Oct. 7 terrorist attacks against Israel that were perpetrated by the pro-Palestinian Hamas terrorist organization. We believe that such extremist, antisemitic views should be condemned, and they are not welcome in the state of Arizona," they said.

The Arizona Palestine Network and SPJ asked followers on social media to demand the school not cancel the event.

"ASU cannot claim to hold free speech as a principle while denying Palestinians their voices on campus. Cancelling this event puts the university in direct contradiction with its charter as a university 'measured not by whom it excludes, but by whom it includes and how they succeed,'" the Arizona Palestine Network said on social media.

On Nov. 7, the U.S. House of Representatives censured Tlaib -- the only Palestinian American in Congress -- in response to her use of the phrase "from the river to the sea" and other statements that many view as controversial. Israel supporters say the "river to the sea" phrase is antisemitic, but she said it's "an aspirational call for freedom, human rights, and peaceful co-existence, not death, destruction or hate."

A week prior, Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene accused Tlaib of "leading an insurrection" on Capitol Hill because she spoke at a pro-Palestinian group and led a censure vote, which failed.