“Ignorance and prejudice.” American broadcaster: Pakistan expelled 1.7 million Palestinians, so why doesn’t Rashida Tlaib denounce that?

London - In another confirmation of the bias and prejudice of American media outlets and media against the Palestinians with a Zionist agenda that supports Israel and a systematic, documented ignorance as well, anchor Harris Faulkner, on Fox News, recently repeatedly confused Palestinians and Afghan refugees to attack supporters of the Palestinians.

She claimed at least twice that “Pakistan is expelling 1.7 million Palestinian refugees from the country!”, and wondered “why pro-Palestinian activists do not talk about the news.” While in reality, Pakistan announced that it intends to expel hundreds of thousands of primarily Afghan refugees, not Palestinians (a completely different people, a completely different region), to its neighbor Afghanistan, as Bushra Sultana wrote on the “Media Matters” website.

The writer pointed out that more than a week after her repeated mistake, Faulkner corrected herself, saying, “I was wrong when I explicitly said that Pakistan expelled the Palestinians.” She continued, “She explained the situation in Pakistan, but she failed to point out that she had made the same mistake twice,” Sultana pointed out.

Faulkner focused her attack with her false claim on Palestinian American Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib , after the US House of Representatives decided to censure her because of her support for Palestinian rights.

Fox News anchor Harris Faulkner has repeatedly conflated Palestinians and Afghan refugees to attack pro-Palestinian supporters.

The Fox News anchor, for the first time, went on to invite Tlaib and his supporters to “contact the leader of Pakistan regarding the 1.7 million Palestinians who were just expelled from it.”

Faulkner then repeated the same claim and criticized Rashida Tlaib again, saying that if she was “truly broken-hearted about the Palestinians, why on earth doesn’t she tell the leaders of Pakistan?” “They just expelled 1.7 million Palestinians and they have nowhere to go.” She then called on Tlaib to take the necessary measures, and asked her to “contact Pakistan to obtain shelter for your people, or contact Jordan, Saudi Arabia, or Iran.” Her co-host Kayleigh McEnany responded on the show, saying: “That’s a great point.”

Faulkner, who doubled down on this false claim on Monday, issued an on-air correction during her broadcast today.

“I was wrong when I expressly said that Pakistan had expelled Palestinians, it is a mixed group of people, mostly Afghans being expelled.” 

BRICS condemns the forced displacement of Palestinians and South Africa suspends its relationship with Israel

The BRICS summit expressed its condemnation of the forced displacement of Palestinians from their lands, collectively or individually, while South Africa decided to suspend diplomatic relations with Israel and close the Tel Aviv embassy in the capital, Pretoria.

The final statement of the BRICS summit condemned all forms of forced displacement of Palestinians from their lands, whether collectively or individually.

On Tuesday, an extraordinary virtual meeting was held for the leaders of the BRICS group and the countries invited to join it, regarding the deteriorating situation in Gaza.

BRICS is a bloc founded in 2006, and includes China, Brazil, Russia, India, and South Africa. Last August, it invited 6 countries, namely Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and Argentina, to join it starting early next year.

The statement condemned "all acts of violence, provocation, incitement and destruction, including indiscriminate attacks, targeting of civilian infrastructure and war crimes targeting Israeli and Palestinian civilians."

He stressed "the necessity of protecting civilians in accordance with international laws," and called for "the release of captive civilians."

He pointed out that "attempts to forcibly remove Gazans from the region and send them to other countries constitute a violation of the Geneva Convention."

He added: "We condemn all forms of forced displacement of Palestinians from their lands, whether collectively or individually."

He stressed "the need to ensure continuous, unrestricted, urgent and safe access to humanitarian aid, and the importance of parties complying with humanitarian law."

He renewed "strong support for regional and international efforts aimed at protecting civilians and providing humanitarian aid in the region."

South Africa suspends its relationship with Israel

In this context, the South African Parliament agreed on Tuesday, by a majority vote, to suspend diplomatic relations with Israel and close the Tel Aviv embassy in the capital, Pretoria.

The draft resolution was supported by 284 deputies in Parliament, while 91 deputies voted against it.

On Monday, Israel summoned its ambassador to South Africa, Eliav Belo Tserkovsky, for consultations in protest against the recent statements of the African country’s senior officials regarding support for the Hamas movement.

On November 10, South Africa announced the recall of the Israeli ambassador to the capital, Pretoria, in protest against the Israeli attacks on Gaza. Days earlier, it had summoned all its diplomats from Israel for consultations.