The Intercept: Dissent on Israel Not Permitted at Bernie Sanders Event

Fast forward to 2015, this past Saturday, when Bernie Sanders, an increasingly viable contender for the Democratic presidential nomination, held one of his biggest campaign rallies to date, drawing more than 20,000 people to an event at the Boston convention center. Among those visitors were a number of young activists from Boston Students for Justice in Palestine, who were curious about Sanders’ position on the occupied territories. They had a sign with them; in a playful nod to one of Sanders’ campaign slogans, it simply asked, “Will Ya Feel The Bern For Palestine?” The activists say they were well-received by other Sanders supporters in the crowd.

“They told us to either put the sign away or leave,” said Sana Hashmani, one of the student activists. “We asked why, and they said that Bernie’s campaign staff had said the sign had to go.”

In a brief cell phone video of the incident, security staff can be seen threatening to arrest the students if they didn’t leave the premises.

Two days after the students were ejected, a day after the group posted about the encounter on Facebook, a Sanders 2016 spokesperson acknowledged a campaign staffer was behind the ejection and that an error had been made. “What happened was a poor decision by a low-level staffer and doesn’t reflect campaign policy,” the spokesperson said.