When the Candidate for the American Presidency Lost the Way

It is common knowledge that candidates in American elections, be they congressional or presidential elections, do their utmost to win the votes of the Jewish community and to gain Jewish financial backing for their campaigns. To this end, they compete among themselves to show support for the Hebrew state and its policies, attempting to outdo one another in commitments and promises. In this context of shameless ingratiation to the Jewish community, one of the Republican candidates for the presidency — Newt Gingrich — recently treated us to three political discoveries at once, all of which I believe are flawed. In an interview on one of the Jewish television channels,* and again later in a debate, Gingrich informed us that: (1) the Palestinian state did not exist in the past, as Palestine had been part of the Ottoman Empire; (2) the Palestinian people are a mere invention; and (3) the Palestinians are nothing more or less than a group of terrorists!

Gingrich is known for his racist and bigoted stances against minorities and women, but he has outdone himself and truly crossed the line with these comments, riddled as they are with lies and historical errors.

Of course we know that Palestine was not a state during the time period he spoke of, and this is still the case due to Israel. But the same situation applies to more than 140 countries that were not independent at that time. The League of Nations was launched in 1920 with a membership of only 42 states; the United Nations, at the time of its inception in 1945, had 51 members, and now it has 196. Although Palestine did not have statehood during the time of the Ottoman caliphate, history confirms that the southern lands of Canaan have borne the name “Palestine” for more than 2,000 years. If we were to survey history from ancient to modern times, we would find the name of Palestine fully present in all treaties and contracts. The First Jewish Congress,** held in Basel in 1897, affirmed that the purpose of Zionism was the quest to establish a state for the Jews in “Palestine,” just as the unfortunate Balfour Declaration of 1917 announced the support of His Majesty’s government for the foundation of a homeland for the Jewish people in “Palestine.” The League of Nations decided in 1922 to place “Palestine” under the British Mandate. The same applies to UN Resolution 181, written in November 1947 and known as the partition plan, which sketched the future of governance in “Palestine.” And then finally, Israel, in its Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948, based itself on these prior resolutions. What’s strange is that Gingrich, who dealt with the study of history at the University of West Georgia at one time, has overlooked all of these facts in his shameful kowtowing to the Jewish community and to Israel.

Now we come to what the Republican candidate said regarding the “invention” of the Palestinian people. This is precisely what Golda Meir said over half a century ago when she announced, with bluster and bravado, that there was no such thing as Palestine or a Palestinian people. The firm historical reality is that the Palestinians descend from the progeny of the Canaanites and Philistines who have continuously inhabited this region since the dawn of history, before the Hebrews first set foot on their lands — also, naturally, before the Islamic conquest of Palestine. Hence this “invention” is only present to a small or sick mind.

We figured that terrorism had dropped from the political lexicon long ago with respect to the Palestinian people and their leadership. In 1988, American President Ronald Reagan agreed to enter into dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organization; and the Palestinians participated in the 1991 Madrid Peace Conference and in the negotiations that emerged from it. President George Bush the Father*** was the first American president to support the establishment of a Palestinian state beside the state of Israel in the year 2002. American presidents, Republicans and Democrats alike, have been welcoming Palestinian presidents — first the late president Yasser Arafat, and after him president Mahmoud Abbas — to the White House since the 1990s. In addition, the U.S. has sponsored negotiations between the two sides, Palestinians and Israelis, at Wye River, Camp David, Annapolis and elsewhere. As for President Clinton, his December 1998 visit to Palestinian Authority territory was the first by an American president. And he spoke before the Palestinian National Council in Gaza, praising the amendments made to the Palestinian National Charter in service of peace and coexistence. So, now, after all of that, will Gingrich revert to sticking the Palestinians with the accusation of terrorism?

I don’t want to imagine this Republican candidate occupying the White House come 2013, but who knows what will happen in the American arena over the next year? The reality is that our experiences with American presidents, whether Democrat or Republican, have not followed one single model; presidents have differed in their positions and in their degree of defiance in the face of Zionist pressure. Our experience with President Barack Obama has been a complete disappointment in light of all our hopes; the chart of Arab-American relations has shown a rapid decline following his historical speech at Cairo University on July 4, 2009.**** The American president could not stand up to the Israeli lobby, and he failed to encourage Netanyahu to halt settlement activity. It was America alone that stood against the February Security Council resolution condemning the settlement activity, using its right of veto. I say “alone” because the rest of the states of the Council, among them Britain and France, voted in favor of the resolution. Netanyahu refused all of Obama’s principles for a just settlement of the dispute. And then came the Israeli prime minister’s speech before the U.S. Congress last May, a blatant provocation of the president. The Obama administration also stood against the efforts of the Palestinian Authority to obtain Palestinian membership in the UN, employing all sorts of pressure and perhaps even extortion. And since the U.S. did not succeed in preventing Palestine from obtaining full membership in UNESCO, instead it decided to suspend its contribution to the organization’s budget, thus sacrificing its own interests to appease Israel!

While we are still discussing American presidents’ stances toward Israel, I must point to a stance opposite of Obama’s: this is the position adopted by the solid Republican President Ronald Reagan. It was said that Reagan was a friend to Israel, though this did not prevent him from condemning Israel when it attacked Iraqi nuclear reactors in 1981; Reagan supported a resolution of condemnation before the Security Council and asked Israel to pay reparations to Iraq. He also imposed a ban on supplying Israel with F-16 aircrafts. We must also remember that Reagan suspended a strategic cooperation agreement when Israel announced its occupation of the Golan in 1981. Also in the same year, he managed to overcome congressional opposition to supplying Saudi Arabia with airborne warning and control system (AWACS) aircraft, saying at that time that a foreign state does not have the power to dictate U.S. foreign policy. Above and beyond that, Reagan announced an important initiative in 1982 to settle the Arab-Israeli dispute, which was more favorable to the Arab demands set in the Camp David Accords in 1978.

The new Republican candidate stumbled before even taking the first steps of his march toward the White House — that is to say, if he could have actually defeated the sitting president. Whatever the case, we need to reevaluate matters and determine what can be done in this coming period. I don’t believe that we should submissively accept four more lame years of the same weak positions adopted by Obama in his first term as president, nor can we allow a Republican administration to obliterate all prior [accomplishments] and return us to point zero.

*Translator’s note: The interview in question was conducted by The Jewish Channel.

** Translator’s note: The commonly accepted term for this event is the First Zionist Congress.

*** Translator’s note: If the author is referring to the so-called “roadmap for peace” issued in 2002, then George Bush “the son,” not “the father,” was president.

**** Translator’s note: Obama’s speech was delivered on June 4, not July 4.