American presidential candidates display arrogance and hypocrisy toward the
Palestinians, MK Ahmed Tibi (UAL-Ta’al) wrote in an op-ed for the
Richmond
Times-Dispatch on Wednesday.
Tibi, who identifies as a Palestinian and is
a former political adviser to late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, accused
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Virginia) of holding all Palestinians
“responsible for the violence of a few.”
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“A man living in a glass home
ought not to throw such stones,” Tibi wrote. “Cantor ignored the fact that
Americans engaged in genocidal violence and enslavement when establishing the
United States of America… [and he] says not a word about Richmond neighborhoods
that still extol the virtues of Confederate leaders who fought to uphold
slavery.”
The Arab MK’s article in the Virginia newspaper came after
Cantor said Palestinians had a “culture of resentment and hatred” of Israel and
that they must prove they deserve a state, remarks that Tibi called “hysterical
vitriol.”
Tibi wrote that “the world begins to understand the cruelty of
Israel’s subjugation of the Palestinians” and that Israel used $3 billion each
year to “steal Palestinian land through military might.”
“Americans, I
believe, are better than this,” he wrote, adding that the US supported the Arab
Spring. He also said he had confidence that the US would support Palestinian
statehood.
According to Tibi, the US should strengthen nonviolent
Palestinian opposition to “Israeli domination,” which he said Cantor did not see
as problematic.
The Arab MK cited Republican presidential candidate Newt
Gingrich’s comments that the Palestinians were an “invented people,” retorting
that Americans were “every bit as invented, perhaps more, as they come from
every corner of the globe.”
In addition, he noted, Republican candidate
Michele Bachmann had said “Palestinian so-called refugees” should not be given
the right of return.
He expressed pessimism that Democrats would be
better for the Palestinians, however, explaining that the two parties were
competing to show who was more pro-Israel – a situation he called a “recipe for
disaster.”