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At a pro-Palestinian event hosted by the anti-capitalist Native American advocacy group, the Red Nation, University of Minnesota liberal arts professor Melanie Yazzie came under fire for comments she made to “dismantle” and “decolonise” America.

Yazzie, a co-host of the Red Nation podcast “Red Power Hour,” made a series of provocative statements during the event, linking the US and Israeli occupations and advocating for the dismantling of what she referred to as the “violent settler project” of the United States.

During her speech, Yazzie said, “It’s our responsibility as people who are within the United States to go as hard as possible to decolonise this place because that will reverberate all across the world. Because the US is the greatest predator empire that has ever existed. So we want US out of everywhere.”

She further expressed a desire for the US to withdraw from various regions, including Palestine and North America, using the term “Turtle Island” to describe the latter.

Yazzie criticised liberalism as “trash”, associating it with imperialism and colonialism. She urged the audience to resist what she sees as the oppressive forces of colonialism and imperialism, rejecting liberalism as a valid form of resistance.

Yazzie also delivered a message to their “Palestinian relatives,” where she called the US a “violent settler project” and she and her comrades have the “moral authority” to do so “as the original people” of America.

“In addition to solidarity and the things that we might do, having the moral authority as the original people of these lands, to push back against the violent settler project that is the United States,” Yazzie said as quoted by the New York Post.

Claiming that “decolonisation” is “the only thing that’s going to save us as a species” and “the planet,” Yazzie concluded her remarks with a call to “dismantle the United States”, prompting applause from the audience.