US lawmaker Rashida Tlaib slams racist image of her with exploding pager

Palestinian-American Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib has condemned as racist a cartoon that depicts her with a detonating pager, days after thousands of communication devices exploded across Lebanon in attacks blamed on Israel.

“Our community is already in so much pain right now. This racism will incite more hate + violence against our Arab & Muslim communities, and it makes everyone less safe,” Tlaib said of the cartoon published in conservative magazine National Review.

“It’s disgraceful that the media continues to normalize this racism,” the only Palestinian-American lawmaker in the United States Congress wrote on X on Friday.

Created by Henry Payne, the cartoon shows a woman sitting at a desk with a name card reading “Rep. Tlaib” where a device explodes. The woman remarks: “ODD. MY PAGER JUST EXPLODED.”

The illustration alludes to attacks in Lebanon on Tuesday and Wednesday when thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies exploded killing at least 37 people and wounding nearly 3,000, including civilians.

After the attacks, Tlaib shared a post by fellow Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez referring to it as a clear violation of “international humanitarian law”.