Key House panel passes bill to rename West Bank as protestors removed

Liam Adams and Vivian Jones

Nashville Tennessean

USA TODAY NETWORK – TENNESSEE

'Free Palestine!' one spectator cried out from a House hearing room gallery on March 4.

Another held up a sign that read, 'I’m Israeli, ‘NO.’'

Despite official U.S. foreign policy on the matter, Tennessee Republicans are seeking to rename in state records the Israeli-occupied West Bank as 'Judea and Samaria,' exhibiting the strong Christian Zionist influence in the legislature.

House Bill 1446 mandates state agencies to stop using the term 'West Bank' in official state materials such as publications, briefings and news releases. Instead, they would be required to use the politically charged term 'Judea and Samaria.' The use of Judea and Samaria, or the Hebrew name for the region that constitutes one part of Palestinian territory in addition to Gaza, is part of a broader effort to legitimize Israeli settlements in the territory.

During a 40-minute hearing rife with interruptions from a passionate gallery, bill sponsor Rep. Chris Todd, R-Madison, presented the proposal to a House subcommittee on March 4.

Republicans on the committee passed the bill in a party-line vote of 14 to 6. Republican Rep. Rush Bricken, R-Tullahoma, abstained.

Testifying in favor of the bill, former Auburn basketball coach Bruce Pearl asked the committee to recognize that the 'Land of Judah' is referenced more than 800 times in the Bible, and 'Samaria' is referenced more than 100 times, while the term 'West Bank' is never used at all.

'The history of ethnic cleansing is tied to this label ‘West Bank,’' he said.

'It reframes an ancient holy land as a piece of riverbank geography. It’s a term that strips away Judeo-Christian heritage. Just because that term became common in language doesn’t make it right.'

Pearl chairs the board of directors of the U.S. Israel Education Association, a nonprofit that seeks to educate government officials to advance 'a strong U.S.-Israel collaboration.' The group reported recieving 73% of its funding from government sources on its 2024 tax filings. Specific funding sources are not disclosed. Former Tennessee Congressman Phil Roe also serves on the board.

'These are the lands of Abraham and David, of Jesus and the apostles,' he said, later falsely stating the state of Israel refers to the West Bank officially as Judea and Samaria. The Israeli government primarily refers to the area as the West Bank.

Nashville resident Daniel Joseph Goldberg, who previosly lived in Israel and has family residing in the West Bank, asked lawmakers to vote against the bill, noting that it’s model legislation pushed by a national group and raising questions around who paid for the bill to be drafted.

'Since the National Association of Christian Lawmakers adopted the Judea and Samaria Act, Jewish settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank has escalated month by month and day by day,' Goldberg said.

Rep. Larry Miller, D-Memphis, apologized that the committee was taking time to consider an 'embarrassing' bill as war is ongoing across the Middle East.

'We are thousands of miles away from the nation of Israel and the West Bank — thousands of miles away. And at this very moment, people are dying. They are dying on both sides. My American soldiers are dying. Palestinians are dying. Israelis are dying,' Miller said. 'And we sit here at this moment with this? For what?'

Anwar Arafat, a Palestinian American who grew up in Gaza and the West Bank and is now an imam in Memphis, asked lawmakers to oppose the bill, sharing his own experiences losing family members through the years of conflict.

'This bill tells me and my family that we do not exist,' Arafat said.

'In all 19 findings, it does not once acknowledge that Palestininans live on that land, not once. The main time the word Palestinian appears in this bill is next to the word terrorism. Three million people live in that territory today.'

Arafat argued that in the Bible the land was called 'Caanan' in the times of Abraham, Moses, Joshua and Jacob.

'If we want to be biblically accurate, I think that would be a neutral term to use,' Arafat said. 'The bill also says that it stands for Judeo Christian values and it pits those values against Islamic values when this is actually a false statement. There is no conflict here between Muslims, Christians and Jews. Islamic values are very much in line with Jewish values and Christian values.'

Todd did not answer questions after the hearing about what prompted the bill, or whether he has had any conversations about the proposal with Israel Consul General Eitan Weiss, who selects co-chairs of Tennessee’s Legislative Israel Caucus.

'Their blood is on your hands!' one woman yelled out, after Committee Chair John Crawford, R-Bristol, ordered several spectators to be removed.

Opponents of the legislation have questioned why the state government needs to comment on international border issues and by changing state statute.

During the hearing, Todd admitted that he did not know how many times, if any, state documents or texts refer to the West Bank, or how much business Tennessee does with businesses in the West Bank.

Democrats on the panel criticized the bill for attempting to wade into international matters that Tennessee, as a state with no foreign policy jurisdiction, has no authority over.

'Why would we use our taxpayer dollars on international border issues? And waste it there when we should be working on local issues?' Sabina Mohyuddin, executive director of the American Muslim Advisory Council (AMAC), said in an interview. 'Also, why would you bring in a Christian perspective on what to call that land when there are Christians living there and they call it ‘West Bank?’'

The council formed out of opposition to Islamophobia in the state legislature. Though Todd’s bill touches on a debate about Palestine that’s sensitive to members of Tennessee’s Muslim community, it also refers to 'radical Islamic ideologies that seek to undermine Western democratic principles.'

The U.S.-based Christian Zionist movement, championed by figures such as Texas televangelist pastor John Hagee, has pushed for the terminology of Judea and Samaria to lend international legitimacy to Israel’s settlements in the West Bank. An ally of the movement, U.S. ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, frequently uses the term. The settlements are illegal according to international courts, including the United Nation’s International Court of Justice.

The greater Nashville region is home to several Christian Zionist organizations, most notably Laurie Cardoza-Moore’s Proclaiming Justice to the Nations. Also, HaYovel, which provides nonlethal tactical gear to Israeli settlers in the West Bank, has strong Tennessee ties and has been at the center of local controversy.

A new Tennessee Israel caucus formed last year to support Israeli policy positions within the legislature and has received support from Israel’s Consul General for the Southeast Region. The general consul’s office declined to comment on Todd’s Judea and Samaria bill.

Aside from the ideological underpinnings of the bill, Mohyuddin pointed out it’s highly unusual for the legislature to comment on international border issues.

The Muslim council is opposing the bill because of 'the precedent it sets,' Mohyuddin said.

'You’re now making decisions on international issues based on a fringe ideology. And if you allow this to go, where else does it go?'

But this isn’t the first legislative debate on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In 2024, Metro Nashville Council members Zulfat Suara and Jacob Kupin, who are Muslim and Jewish, respectively, introduced a resolution supporting a ceasefire on Israel’s war in Gaza. The resolution drew fierce outcry in public and behind the scenes, ultimately resulting in its defeat.

The American Muslim Advisory Council supported that resolution, which Mohyuddin said was more sensible than Todd’s new bill because it was addressing an issue that’s 'causing so much division in our communities.'

Similar bills have been introduced this year in Florida, Missouri and South Carolina.

Liam Adams covers religion for The Tennessean, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at ladams@tennessean.com or on social media @liamsadams. Vivian Jones covers state government and politics for The Tennessean. Reach her at vjones@tennessean.com.