Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez retweets terror organization sympathizer

Yusuf Munayyer, head of a Palestinian rights organization, was weighing in on the Ilhan Omar antisemitism scandal.

MARCH 6, 2019 17:18

Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (photo credit: Wikimedia Commons) — Alexandria Ocasio Cortez

(photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, also known by her initials AOC, retweeted a known supporter of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a US State Department-designated terror organization.

In the tweet, first discovered by the Investigative Project on Terrorism, Ocasio-Cortez wrote, “This is disappointing to see. Just last week there was all this hubbub over an untrue mischaracterization that I was threatening primaries based on pro-ICE votes. Yet there seems to be no problem at all with a zero-tolerance stance for simply asking about US foreign policy.”

She was retweeting and responding to a tweet by Yousef Munayyer, the executive director of the US Center for Palestinian Rights (USCPR). In his tweet, he wrote, “AIPAC activist tells NYT the lobby is coming for Congresswomen @AOC, @RashidaTlaib and @IlhanMN,” quoting an excerpt from a New York Times article: “They are three people who, in my opinion, will not be around in several years.”

This is disappointing to see.Just last week there was all this hubbub over an untrue mischaracterization that I was threatening primaries based on pro-ICE votes.Yet there seems to be no problem at all with a zero-tolerance stance for simply asking about US foreign policy. https://t.co/YoOIPDSpbU
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) March 5, 2019

Rashida Tlaib is the U.S. Representative for Michigan's 13th congressional district. Ilhan Omar is the U.S. Representative for Minnesota's 5th congressional district.

In the past, Munayyer seemed to condone the efforts of PFLP on his Twitter feed, including retweeting a PFLP announcement of a terror attack in Jerusalem on June 16, 2017. The PFLP claimed that two of the three terrorists in the attack were affiliated with its organization. That attack killed Border Police Sgt. Hadas Malka.

In another tweet from July 2014, during the height of Operation Protective Edge, Munayyer reminded followers that the military wings of PFLP and other terrorist organizations, “not just Hamas, all [are] fighting against Israel in this war.”

Munayyer’s organization, USCPR, publicly posted in 2016 about mourning the death of a different PFLP terrorist.

The NGO Monitor research institute reported that USCPR rhetoric includes accusations of “apartheid,” “ethnic cleansing,” “genocide,” “war crimes,” and “colonialism,” as well as supporting a Palestinian “right of return.” The organization likewise created a “political education curriculum” titled “Together We Rise: Palestine as a Model of Resistance” meant to “strengthen liberation struggles from the U.S to Palestine.”