On Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time,” host Bill Maher said that Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) is engaging in “a false equivalency” by saying that extremes on both sides of the Middle East conflict aren’t helpful because “there’s a lot more extremism on one side.”
Warnock said, “I think, at the end of the day, Israeli mothers, Palestinian mothers want the same thing, they want to be able to put their children to bed at night, for them to be safe and to awaken in a world that embraces all of them. And I think these extremes are not helpful. We’ve got to have honest conversation about all of –.”
Maher then cut in to say, “I think that’s a false equivalency. I think there’s a lot more extremism on one side. There’s a woman, Parastoo Ahmadi, she is Iranian. She got 74 lashes, 74 lashes, because she sang, she’s a singer, she sang without a head scarf on. So, let’s not forget who the other side is. Do you get 74 lashes for singing without a head scarf in Israel? No, you don’t. You just don’t. It’s just not equivalent.”
Warnock responded, “I don’t want to judge the Israelis or Palestinian people by the most extreme voices among their people. I think most people want peace. There are 7 million Israelis, 7 million Palestinian folks there in that same region. It’s a very small area, and we’ve got to figure out a way that leads to a two-state solution where we’re — both communities can live in peace with each other. So, I’ve been very consistent in condemning — I’ve had to take positions on stages, including the DNC, standing up for children in Gaza, and, at the same time, standing up for Israel’s right to exist and to live at peace with its neighbors. This idea that — I think that’s the false choice, that you’ve got to choose one or the other.”
Maher countered, “Well, but, it’s also not true that both sides want a two-state solution equally, one side’s beginning negotiating position is, you all die and from the river to the sea. From the river to the sea, is –.”
Warnock cut in to say, “We have to condemn that idea, whoever’s saying it, we have to condemn it.”
Maher responded, “Yeah, well, one side is saying it, not two sides.”
At the start of the discussion, host Bill Maher read from and praised a statement from Warnock saying he stands with Israel, echoing Dr. Martin Luther King’s defense of Israel’s right to exist, and rejecting the idea that Israel is an apartheid state.
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