The claim was spread by pro-Israel users on social media, who often equate support for Palestine with support for the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which is a designated terrorist organization in the U.S.
Between Aug. 29 and 31, 2025, a group of Palestinian organizations hosted the “2025 People’s Conference for Palestine” in Detroit. According to the conference’s website, U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, a Detroit Democrat who is herself the daughter of Palestinian immigrants to the U.S., delivered a speech toward the end of the conference.
That claim was false. Snopes viewed Tlaib’s speech on YouTube. Nowhere in her speech did Tlaib call on supporters of Hamas to “mobilize and take over America.” Instead, Tlaib’s speech called for members of the public who oppose the acts of the Israeli military in Gaza to “mobilize.” She and many experts — including the United Nations and Amnesty International — have described those acts as a genocide.
The claim relies on rhetoric that commonly pops up in discussions about the war in Gaza. Supporters of Israel sometimes equate support for the civilian population in Palestine and opposition to genocide with support for Hamas. Some critics describe that as a false equivalence.
Many clips of Tlaib’s speech contained watermarks for Canary Mission, an anonymously run website that The New York Times described as doxing (sharing someone’s personal details for the purpose of public shaming and ridicule) people and organizations it considers to “promote hatred of the USA, Israel and Jews.” The article noted that many of the people targeted on the Canary site are students and university professors who have been “active in campus protests against Israeli government policies.”
Below is a transcript of the two most relevant excerpts from Tlaib’s speech:
