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Bernie Sanders Turns Down Invitation To Address AIPAC Conference

America’s most influential pro-Israel lobby group, AIPAC is hosting its annual policy conference in Washington next week. All the presidential candidates were invited and all will be attending, except for one: Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Bernie Sanders, who also happens to be the only Jewish candidate ever to win a presidential primary. Mr Sanders said he would be unable to attend because of his campaign schedule. “I would very much have enjoyed speaking at the AIPAC conference,” Sanders said in a letter released to AIPAC’s President Robert Cohen on Friday. His decision not to attend happened to follow a petition campaign which was endorsed by Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters, although the Sanders campaign did not say whether it had responded to the petition Salon reports: Prominent journalist Max Blumenthal, who specializes in Israel-Palestine, created a petition calling on Sanders to reject AIPAC’s invitation to its conference. “As the main arm of the pro-Israel lobby in the United States, AIPAC has sworn to promote the racist, militaristic, and anti-democratic policies of the most right-wing government in Israel’s history,” Blumenthal wrote in a description accompanying the petition. “Its conference this year will feature Islamophobes, anti-immigrant activists, and religious extremists.” “With his promise [...]