American Israel: What Difference?

Dr. Khaled M. Batarfi,
kbatarfi@al-madina.com.sa

James Rubin, senior adviser to Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry, was blunt when we asked him during the Democratic National Convention in Boston about the party’s stand on the Israeli-Palestinian issue. He insisted that America was committed to support Israel, no matter what.
The US would always be prepared to stand against world opinion — the International Court of Justice, the UN, its closest allies or anyone else, using its mighty veto to block any resolution against Israel, which is seen by much of the world as a rogue nation.
The Palestinians, he contends, are solely responsible for the breakdown of the peace process. Israel is simply acting in self-defense when it uses American arms and technology to kill civilians, bomb neighborhoods and assassinate political leaders.
The Israeli wall, considered illegal even by the Israeli Supreme Court, according to Rubin is a legitimate attempt to stop Palestinian suicide bombers whom he alleged are directed and tolerated by Arafat.
The elected Palestinian leader, he went on to say, must disappear in order for the peace process to restart.
The world votes against Israel, he coolly explained, because “Third World countries (even though those voting against Israeli atrocities, settlements and the “wall” include Europe and Japan) have an unbalanced and uninformed view of the situation.”
The supposedly civilized, educated gentleman even brushed UN-documented facts of Palestinian suffering as “exaggerated” and self-inflicted misery. Reflecting on what I had heard from the AIPAC-installed, Rubin and other Zionist Democrats and Republicans, I wondered why we would ever regard America as a sovereign, independent country.
And why would any Arab country respect UN authority if its resolutions only apply to us and never to Israel? And should the Palestinians accept America as a broker in any deal with Israel if US positions are no different from extremist Israeli policies and stands?
If I were Arafat, I would give up on both Israel and the United States of Israel, and listen to the Hamas and Hezbollah contention that there is only one way to deal with state terror: Terror. After all, Arafat is judged a terrorist either way.
I would tell the Palestinian leaders that this so-called peace deal is now too broken to be fixed, too weak to work and too rotten to be digested. The only way out is out — out of the deal, out of the offices and back to the street fight. Give Israel back the territory and let it, as occupier, be responsible for what goes wrong and pay for it.
At least then it wouldn’t have anyone to blame for its shortcomings but itself, and no punching bag to hit in reprisal. I say: Let’s all go back to square one — to the pre-US-guaranteed, US-betrayed Mideast Peace Accords world. That was a much, much more dignified square.