In an interview last year with the New Yorker, Palestinian author and activist Yousef Bashir recounted his 2017 visit to Bernie Sanders’s congressional office with a group of Israeli students. “I told Bernie he was the most popular Jew in Gaza since Moses,” Bashir recalled.

And for good reason.

Alone among the major presidential candidates, Sanders has repeatedly spoken out about Israel’s violence against Palestinians. During the last Gaza War, in 2014, he called Israel’s use of force “disproportionate” and “indiscriminate.” He publicly condemned Israel’s killing of peaceful Palestinian protesters during last year’s Great March of Return. “Innocent people are being killed,” Sanders told the Intercept. “Those are terrible actions. Instead of applauding Israel for its actions, Israel should be condemned.” In an additional tweet, Sanders called the deaths “tragic” and unequivocally defended Palestinians’ freedom of assembly, saying: “It is the right of all people to protest for a better future without a violent response.”