"SECOND MOTHER"
"Rashida sees her granny as a second mother, she has always supported her. Rashida says she owes her success to her grandmother."
Tlaib did not outline what the conditions imposed on her visit were. Israeli media reported that she had agreed not to promote boycotts against Israel as part of her request to Israel's Foreign Ministry.
Tlaib, like Omar, has voiced support for the pro-Palestinian Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, which opposes the occupation and Israel's policies toward Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. BDS backers can be denied entry to Israel by law.
The pair are the first two Muslim women to be elected to Congress, and Detroit-born Tlaib is the first Palestinian-American congresswoman. Both are members of the Democratic party's progressive wing and sharp critics of Trump and Israel.
The Palestinians want to establish a state in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.
Israel has annexed East Jerusalem in a move not recognised internationally; maintains a blockade of Gaza, run by the Islamist Hamas movement; and controls most of the West Bank, where Palestinians have limited self-rule.
The prospects of resolving the conflict under the "two-state solution" that had guided peacemaking efforts for years have dimmed significantly since Trump took office, while Israeli settlements on land Palestinians seek for a state have expanded.
The Trump administration, which is particularly close to the Netanyahu government, has touted its own peace plan but details remain vague. It fuelled Palestinian anger by recognising disputed Jerusalem as Israel's capital in 2017.
Trump has for weeks been attacking Tlaib and Omar, along with lawmakers Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts - all women of colour known as the "Squad" - accusing them of hostility to Israel in a barrage condemned by critics as racist.
"Trump has told Rashida and Ilhan to go back to their home countries. What a contradiction, yesterday he asked them to leave and today he asks that they aren't let in," said Bassam Tlaib.
Still, the grandmother is hopeful: "My heart tells me that she will come."
