The embroidered Palestinian dress (thobe in Arabic) was present for the first time during the swearing-in ceremony that took place on Washington DC’s Capitol Hill on Thursday January 3 2019.
Michigan Democrat Rashida Tlaib originally from Palestine was sworn into office while wearing a traditional garment stitched by her Palestinian-born mother.
Tlaib announced her intention to wear a traditional Palestinian gown at the Congress swearing-in to express her love for her origin heritage and identity.
“As a young girl I watched my mother hand stitch thobes while sitting on the floor with a lamp at her side […] Just thinking about it brings up so many memories of my mother and how proud she was of being Palestinian” she told a US fashion magazine.
In other press remarks she said that she hopes to lead a US delegation to the West Bank where her grandmother still lives after beginning her term.
On social media the Palestinian Congresswoman shared images of the dress she was wearing during the ceremony and asked others to #TweetYourThobe inspiring followers to share pictures of their dresses.
The hand-embroidered gowns are considered one way Palestinian women can show pride for their heritage. There are different traditional gowns in Palestine and each one typically represents the city the person wearing the clothing is from.
However Tlaib’s dress was seen by analysts as a message to US president Donald Trump’s racist policies against the Palestinians.
