An Open Letter To Barack Obama:
Phew, that was close....I ALMOST voted for you Barack!
As a displaced Palestinian and now an American citizen living in Montreal I was both shocked and amazed by your speech to the
AIPAC last week considering you are campaigning on the idea of ‘change’.
“...any agreement with the Palestinian people must preserve Israel's identity as a Jewish state.... Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel,
and it must remain undivided.”
Sounds like the ‘same old’ routine to me...
Let’s just hope the state of Virginia doesn’t declare itself “white only”, ‘transfer’ all of it’s non-whites and then declare Washington
D.C. as it’s undivided capital...because then you will have to fully support that decision too.
The overtly racist idea that a
Jewish nation could be created in Palestine, a mostly
Muslim region, was short sighted and naive to say the least. But to continue to support a racist state verbally and financially (was it another
3-billion last year?) has proven deadly for all concerned, including Americans. It’s time for a NEW approach to the situation in Palestine...yes
Barack...’change’.
Israel should declare itself a ‘secular’ society, embrace it’s ‘middle-Eastern-ness’ and allow all of it’s non-Jewish inhabitants back to
the homes and villages they were forced out of back in 1948 and 1967, as descibed in
UN Resolution
194. The final step to peace would be to create a bi-national government for the entire region of historical Palestine. Call it what you like
Palestine-Israel, Israel-Palestine or simply Palestein.
While Albert Einstein supported the idea of a Jewish National Home he distanced himself from Zionist jingoists and bigots like
Vladimir Jabotinsky and
Menachem
Begin writing in 1930 that, “oppressive nationalism must be conquered...I can see a future for Palestine only on the basis of peaceful
cooperation between the two peoples who are at home in the country...come together they must in spite of all.” Both before and after the war
Einstein continued to press this idea of a bi-national state in Palestine.
[Source]
Living in Quebec I am all too familiar with the idea of a ‘referendum’ as there are some
Quebecer's who want to separate from Canada and create a French nation here in
it’s place. Imagine, had there been a referendum of the people of Palestine on the creation of a Jewish state in their region 60+ years ago...Israel
never would have been created...but having a referendum would have been democratic...and who needs that, right?
Barack, if it’s about ‘change’, despite your slip up with the AIPAC, I still believe that you can be the one to make the Holy Land ‘whole’
again.