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Palestinians angered by Bush win
Many Palestinians have reacted angrily to news of US President George Bush's re-election.
Despite his declared vision for a viable Palestinian state thriving in peace beside Israel, most Palestinians believe Bush to be an enemy of Arabs and Muslims and a fanatic ally of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Despite his declared vision for a viable Palestinian state thriving in peace beside Israel, most Palestinians believe Bush to be an enemy of Arabs and Muslims and a fanatic ally of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
They argue that his support of Israel's policies in the occupied Palestinian territories - including extrajudicial assassinations and home demolitions - disqualifies him as an honest peace broker between the Palestinians and Israelis.
Bush's pledge to Sharon in early 2004 to support the annexation of large chunks of the West Bank effectively dried up any semblance of Palestinian optimism about his commitment to Palestinian statehood and a just and durable settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
"We are bracing ourselves for four more years of Israeli repression, murder and terror. I believe that Bush's embrace of Israeli expansionism will now be unmasked and brasher and blunter than ever before," Abd al-Sattar Qassim, political science professor at Najah National University in Nablus, told Aljazeera.net.
Qassim said Palestinians should not continue to entertain the illusion that one American administration would be better than another.
Hostile American policy
"Our problem is not with Bush or Kerry; it is with the established and inherently-hostile American policy which is based on supporting Israel, right or wrong. Hence, I believe that the Palestinian people, along with Arabs and Muslims in this part of the world, should stop looking to America for justice and peace.
"If we count on the US to restore our rights, then we will have to wait for eternity."
A known critic of PA Chairman Yasir Arafat, Qassim pointed out that "Sharon's influence on Bush is much bigger and more real than Bush's influence on Sharon... This is what many Americans don't realise".
"I think we have to make the Palestinian cause a personal preoccupation of as many Muslims as possible. In the final analysis, our goal should be to make America's relations with the Muslim world subject to US policies and behaviour toward the Palestinian people," he told Aljazeera.net.
More
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/815795CB-C49D-4C69-93A8-EB8FD47F4C32.htm
Bush's pledge to Sharon in early 2004 to support the annexation of large chunks of the West Bank effectively dried up any semblance of Palestinian optimism about his commitment to Palestinian statehood and a just and durable settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
"We are bracing ourselves for four more years of Israeli repression, murder and terror. I believe that Bush's embrace of Israeli expansionism will now be unmasked and brasher and blunter than ever before," Abd al-Sattar Qassim, political science professor at Najah National University in Nablus, told Aljazeera.net.
Qassim said Palestinians should not continue to entertain the illusion that one American administration would be better than another.
Hostile American policy
"Our problem is not with Bush or Kerry; it is with the established and inherently-hostile American policy which is based on supporting Israel, right or wrong. Hence, I believe that the Palestinian people, along with Arabs and Muslims in this part of the world, should stop looking to America for justice and peace.
"If we count on the US to restore our rights, then we will have to wait for eternity."
A known critic of PA Chairman Yasir Arafat, Qassim pointed out that "Sharon's influence on Bush is much bigger and more real than Bush's influence on Sharon... This is what many Americans don't realise".
"I think we have to make the Palestinian cause a personal preoccupation of as many Muslims as possible. In the final analysis, our goal should be to make America's relations with the Muslim world subject to US policies and behaviour toward the Palestinian people," he told Aljazeera.net.
More
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/815795CB-C49D-4C69-93A8-EB8FD47F4C32.htm
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i'd just love to see ya in a "fair fight" in gaza.