Jumblatt labels Bush, Sharon partners in crime

Jumblatt labels Bush, Sharon partners in crime

Mubarak: Arab world has 'Unprecedented hatred' for Americans

Politicians from both countries criticize the recent drastic shift in American policy in the Middle East

Compiled by Daily Star staff
Wednesday, April 21, 2004

US President George W. Bush is a criminal for turning US Middle East policy sharply toward Israel, Lebanon's Druze political leader Walid Jumblatt said on Tuesday.

"I think they've gone crazy there," the former militia chief and ex-Cabinet minister said of the White House. In comments published the same day, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a major US ally, said there is more hatred of Americans in the Arab world today than ever before because of the invasion of Iraq.

Known for his outspokenness, Jumblatt enraged Washington in October by calling a top US defense official a virus.

Bush's announcement last week, alongside a beaming Israeli prime minister, that Israel would keep some West Bank settlements did little to blunt Jumblatt's criticism.

"Bush is proud to be a friend of the criminal Ariel Sharon, so Bush is a criminal," he told Reuters at his Beirut home.

Born in 1949, Jumblatt wields tremendous influence in Lebanon and among the large Druze community, a secretive sect that emerged about 1,000 years ago as an offshoot of Islam.

He said Bush had gone beyond international rulings by accepting settlements on land Israel seized in 1967. Arabs had the right to respond with violence, Jumblatt said.

"Bush does not consider that Palestine even exists, so when he gives Palestine fully to the Jews, well, it's an open war between us - the Arabs - and the Israelis," he said.

Bush also rejected a return of Palestinian refugees to what is now Israel, leaving roughly 360,000 refugees in Lebanon with even less cause for hope.

Lebanon bars them from most jobs and owning land. Jumblatt called on his country to ease their miserable conditions.

"We have to give them the minimum of guarantees so they can work in Lebanon because I think between now and their going back to Palestine it may be another 50 years," he said.

Lebanon says it defends the right of Palestinian refugees to return to homes they fled at Israel's creation in 1948.

Jumblatt's tone on the US presence in Iraq appeared little softened since US Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz escaped an attack on his Baghdad hotel six months ago. Jumblatt said he hoped any further attacks would find their target.

"I hope that they will have more troubles in Iraq, the Americans," he said Tuesday. "The Arabs should open all their borders and send their fighters to fight the Americans in Iraq." He said Washington should tread carefully with its plans to impose sanctions on Syria, the main power broker in Lebanon.

"They have to take care, because we can fight back. If they want total chaos, the Americans, we are ready for total chaos." He said what he called US-Israeli terror would be met with Arab-Muslim terror. Where and how depended on Washington.

"It depends on what is left of reason in the White House," Jumblatt said.

Mubarak echoed such criticism, saying the dwindling image of the United States among his fellow Arabs has been exacerbated by what is seen as near-unflinching US support for Israel.

"At the start, some believed that the Americans were helping them," Mubarak said in comments published Tuesday by French daily Le Monde. "There wasn't any hatred toward the Americans."

"After what has happened in Iraq, there is an unprecedented hatred and the Americans know it," he added.

"There exists today a hatred never equalled in the region."

Mubarak, whose country is among the biggest beneficiaries of US foreign economic assistance, faulted US missteps in Iraq that have worsened the situation.

"In Iraq, they (the Americans) said: 'We are not going to allow the creation of an Islamic state.' Result: people are attached even more to the idea of religion," Mubarak said.

Many Arabs feel a sense of "injustice" in the way the United States has offered strong backing for Sharon.

"What's more - they see Sharon act as he wants, without the Americans saying anything," Mubarak said.

The Egyptian leader met with French President Jacques Chirac in Paris on Monday, on his way home from a trip to the United States to meet with Bush at his Texas ranch.