By Bethany Blankley (the middle sq.)
U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, and Inside Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas spoke Tuesday about points associated to pro-Palestinian college students within the U.S. over visas and a DHS staffer expressing help for Israel’s destruction.
Mayorkas testified earlier than the Senate Homeland Safety Committee on Tuesday, together with FBI Director Christopher Wray, who mentioned the best terrorist menace to People is violent extremists impressed by Islamic terrorist organizations resembling ISIS, al-Queda, Hamas and Iranian-funded teams.
Mayorkas spent most of his testimony on the senators’ protection after greater than 10 million individuals entered the U.S. illegally below his watch, and after the most important variety of identified and suspected terrorists have been apprehended trying to enter the U.S. the 2023 price range 12 months.
The main target of Tuesday’s listening to was on “threats to the homeland” after Hamas terrorists attacked Israel final month and after the president, Wray and others warned People {that a} terrorist menace on U.S. soil was extra seemingly than earlier than.
Earlier than the listening to, Hawley despatched a letter to Mayorkas expressing considerations a few DHS worker, Nejwa Ali, who adjudicates on immigration circumstances. Ali, a former spokeswoman for the Palestine Liberation Group, expressed help for Israel’s destruction on October 7, the day Israel was attacked.
In the course of the listening to, Hawley requested Mayorkas if he was accustomed to the mantra, “From the river to the ocean, Palestine can be free,” to which Mayorkas replied that he was. The phrase refers back to the eradication of Israel, which is bordered by the Jordan River to the east and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Hamas’s 2017 structure states: “Hamas rejects any various to the entire liberation of Palestine, from the river to the ocean.”
Hawley requested Mayorkas what the mantra means, to which he replied, “It speaks to the Palestinian eager for his homeland and a really expansive definition of his homeland on the expense of Israel’s independence.”
It “requires the elimination of Israel, would not it?” Hawley requested.
“That is proper,” Mayorkas replied.
“So my query to you is: Ought to college students who’re right here on visas collect and chant that slogan and actively advocate for the elimination of Israel and assaults on Jewish people, whether or not within the Center East or right here in the US? States, like us” Ought to these college students’ visas be revoked?” he requested.
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Hawley agrees with U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, who referred to as on the administration to “cancel and revoke visas for international nationals who endorse or embrace terrorist actions, together with those that defend or help Hamas by calling for intifada , jihad or different comparable actions to remove the Jewish state of Israel.”
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Mayorkas mentioned DHS was reviewing the authorized declare: “It’s a matter of judicial interpretation of the statute.”
“Nicely, simply as an ethical subject, ought to college students who’re right here, foreigners who’re right here on this nation, be allowed into our college system and advocating for the homicide of Jews, ought to they be allowed to remain right here comfortably?” Hawley requested. Mayorkas repeated his reply.
Hawley then requested Mayorkas about an October 7, expletive-filled tweet about Israel, during which he additionally acknowledged: “Each Jew who helps Israel, might your conscience hang-out your goals till your dying breath. Palestine can be free sooner or later.”
“That is fairly excessive rhetoric, do not you suppose?” he requested.
“Sure,” Mayorkas responded, including, “I believe there’s a distinction between embracing or endorsing terrorist ideology and odious language that does not rise to that stage.”
Hawley then identified that Ali wrote the tweet and posted a photoshopped rendering of a paraglider with a machine gun flying into Israel, the identical methodology utilized by Hamas terrorists on October 7. He requested if her messages have been “typical of people that work at DHS. ? That is an asylum immigration official posting these blatantly pro-genocidal slogans and pictures on the day Israelis are being slaughtered of their beds. What did you do about this?”
Mayorkas responded: “It’s despicable to recommend that that is emblematic of the women and men of the Division of Homeland Safety.”
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Hawley requested a number of occasions if she had been fired. Mayorkas mentioned she was employed in 2019, positioned on administrative go away and didn’t wish to talk about ongoing personnel issues.
Hawley then mentioned: “Don’t come to this listening to room when Israel has invaded and Jewish college students are barricaded in libraries on this nation and can’t be escorted out as a result of their lives are being threatened. You’ve gotten workers who have fun genocide and also you say it is despicable for me to ask the query: was she fired? I discover your actions despicable and the truth that you do not need to supply solutions to this committee is totally appalling.”
In response, Mayorkas mentioned Hawley’s query was “despicable” and represented a “hostile strategy” towards him. ‘Perhaps he would not know my very own background. Perhaps he would not know that I’m the kid of a Holocaust survivor. Perhaps he would not know that my mom misplaced virtually her total household by the hands of the Nazis. And so I discover his hostile tone utterly misplaced. I discover it disrespectful to me and my heritage, and I count on no apology. However I did wish to say what I simply mentioned.”
Throughout a Senate Homeland Safety Committee listening to on Tuesday, Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, spoke to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas about revoking the visas of scholars who advocate Israel’s destruction and whether or not a DHS staffer who expressed help for the… pic.twitter.com/wDmzwbKkrP
— Bethany Blankley (@BethanyBlankley) November 1, 2023
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Syndicated with permission from The Heart Sq..