Bernie Sanders expresses support for pro-Palestine protests

Bernie Sanders speaks out about US college protests against Israel’s war in Gaza while drawing attention to the need to “condemn, in every form, antisemitism, Islamophobia and other forms of bigotry”.

Mr Sanders, the independent Vermont senator, was questioned by CNN’s Dana Bash on State of the Union on Sunday over the role of antisemitism in pro-Palestine protests that have erupted across college campuses in the United States.

Reports of antisemitism have cropped up across university campuses since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October, leaving 1,200 dead. Mr Sanders said to CNN that antisemitism is a “vile and disgusting ideology”.

“But here is the reality: right now, what Netanyahu’s right-wing, extremist and racist government is doing is unprecedented in the modern history of warfare,” he said.

“We are looking at the possibility of mass starvation and famine in Gaza. When you make those charges, that is not antisemitic. That is a reality.”

As the war has continued with ongoing Israeli attacks on Gaza and more than 34,000 Palestinians being killed, antisemitic, Islamophobic and anti-Arab hate incidents have increased across the country, civil rights advocates have reported.

The continuing attack on Gaza has also seen pro-Palestine protests sweep across college campuses in solidarity with Gaza through demonstrations and encampments on campus lawns.

As tensions have escalated, hundreds of people have been arrested on differing campuses, students and professors alike, and law enforcement has launched violent crackdowns on the protests.

More than 100 people at Columbia alone amid the protest encampments, which are demanding the school to divest their financial ties to Israel over the war in Gaza.

Israeli prime minister