The New York representative's post went up on Instagram on Christmas Eve, and depicted a child on top of exploded rubble, with wooden nativity scene icons seen around the damage.
"In the story of Christmas, Christ was born in modern-day Palestine under the threat of a government engaged in a massacre of innocents," AOC wrote.
She then compared the plight of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph with the modern Israel-Hamas war, writing, "Mary and Joseph, displaced by violence and forced to flee, became refugees in Egypt with a new born waiting to one day return home. Thousands of years later, right-wing forces are violently occupying Bethlehem as similar stories unfold for today's Palestinians, so much so that the Christian community in Bethlehem has canceled this year's Christmas Eve celebrations out of both safety and respect."
