Women’s March organizer and far-left activist Linda Sarsour came under fire over the weekend after she claimed that Jesus of Nazareth was a “brown copper skinned” Palestinian.
Sarsour, a long-time critic of the Jewish state, tweeted Saturday that Jesus “was Palestinian”, adding that he had “brown copper skin” and “wooly hair”.
“Jesus was Palestinian of Nazareth and is described in the Quran as being brown copper skinned with wooly hair.”
The tweet quickly drew both criticism and mockery, with social media users pointing out that Jesus was unquestionably Jewish, and that no Palestinian identity or land of Palestine existed at the time. The term Palestine was coined only in the year 132 CE, roughly a century after Jesus’ death, when the Roman empire renamed the Land of Israel ‘Syria Palaestina’.
“Are you that stupid?” Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s son, Yair Netanyahu, tweeted in response.
“On the cross above Jesus’ head was the sign ‘INRI’…which means in Latin ‘Jesus of Nazareth king of the Jews’.”
“The Bible say that Jesus was born and raised in Judea!”
In a follow up tweet, Sarsour wrote that “Palestinian is a nationality not a religion. Your point is not negated. Jews lived with Palestinians in peaceful co-existence before there was a state of Israel.”
“Folks reported my tweet that Jesus was a Palestinian. Twitter was obviously like, this doesn’t violate our standards. It’s also true. Jesus was born in Bethlehem which is in Palestine. Move on.”
“Why so upset by the truth. Jesus was born in Bethlehem aka بيت لحم in Arabic. Bethlehem is in Palestine. It’s currently militarily occupied by Israel and home to a predominately beautiful Palestinian Christian community. Yes, the birthplace of Jesus is under military occupation.”
Sarsour later added: "Palestine is not a religion. Palestinian is someone born in Palestine or a descendant of Palestinians. Palestinian is a nationality. So when someone says Jesus was born in modern day Palestine that doesn’t negate that he was a Jew. The hate is real. It breeds ignorance."
In response, Yair Netanyahu pointed out the history of the term Palestine, and its origins with the Hebrew term for the people known in the Bible as the Philistines.
"The Romans changed the name of the province of Judea to province of Palestine on 130 ad as a punishment to the Jews for their revolt. They named it after the ancient philistines that were Greeks and were already extinct at the time."
