Comedian Bill Maher fired back at Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan) on Tuesday after the Muslim Democratic congresswoman called for a boycott of his HBO show Real Time with Bill Maher.

Tlaib suggested the cancellation of the political comedy show after Maher, a left-leaning television host who is known for his controversial statements, strongly criticized the international push to boycott Israel. The country recently denied entry to Tlaib due to her comments against Israel.

“I am tired of folks discrediting a form of speech that is centered on equality and freedom,” Tlaib tweeted last week before saying the move to stop the boycott of Israel reminded her of the pushback against apartheid protests in South Africa during the 1990s.

“Some people have one move only: boycott. Cancel. Make-go-away,” Maher tweeted before adding that House Democrats voted overwhelmingly earlier this year in favor of a resolution to condemn anti-Semitism and more specifically, the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel.

“Does Tlaib want to boycott 93% of her own party?” the comedian added in his tweet, which included a video clip from his most recent episode that aired Friday.

Maher incorrectly cited the final tally of the vote to condemn the BDS movement: it was really 398-17.

The video shows Maher blasting support for the movement to boycott Israel as “a bulls— purity test by people who want to appear woke but actually slept through history class.”

The comedian went on to say he believes the growing disdain for Israelis and Jews and conversely sympathetic sentiment toward Palestinians are partly tied to skin color.

“It’s predicated on this notion, I think — it’s very shallow thinking — that the Jews in Israel, mostly white, and the Palestinians are browner, so they must be innocent and correct, and the Jews must be wrong. As if the occupation came right out of the blue, that this completely peaceful people found themselves occupied,” Maher added.

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President Donald Trump pushed last week for the nation to ban Tlaib and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota), another first-term Muslim Democratic congresswoman who has spoken out against Israeli lobbyist groups’ heavy monetary influence on American politics. Trump went as far as to contact Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to push for the two female lawmakers to be barred from traveling to the country.

Last week, Israel’s government said Tlaib could enter the nation if she filed a humanitarian request to visit her grandmother. Although the Muslim Democrat from Michigan initially vowed not to voice her support for the BDS movement, she later changed her stance again and said on Twitter that traveling to Israel without speaking out against it would run contrary to her beliefs.

 

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