Recognizing that Palestinians are dying too, as Martin O’Malley did, shouldn’t be controversial
from Peter Beinart at Haaretz:
Talking to an Arab and Palestinian Audience Shouldn’t Lose You the Jewish Vote
Recognizing that Palestinians are dying too, as did Democrat hopeful Martin O’Malley, shouldn’t be controversial. But in the 2016 presidential campaign it’s risky merely to acknowledge the suffering of both sides.
The Arab American Institute invited every major presidential candidate to address its National Leadership Conference last Friday in Dearborn, Michigan. Only one showed up: Martin O’Malley, a long shot Democratic hopeful who once served as governor of Maryland.
Martin O'Malley slams anti-Islam hate in Dearborn, Michigan
Good for him. For more than a century, America’s wars have fueled bigotry against Americans supposedly linked to the enemy. During World War II, the victims were German-Americans. The city of Cincinnati even banned lunch counters from serving pretzels. During World War II, the victims were Japanese-Americans, more than one hundred thousand of whom were taken from their homes to desolate internment camps in the interior of the country.
Since September 11, the victims have been Arab and Muslim. And the bigotry is growing worse. According to the Arab American Institute, 43 percent of Arab Americans say they have experienced discrimination because of their ethnicity or country of origin, up from 30 percent in 2003...
In this environment, O’Malley deserves credit for saying that, “When I look in the eyes of immigrants,” — including Arab immigrants — “I see my grandparents,” who suffered discrimination because they hailed from Ireland. He deserves credit for condemning the recent attacks on American mosques, attacks that have gone largely unnoticed in this year’s campaign. And he deserves credit for urging that the United States admit 65,000 Syrian refugees, as requested by the United Nations.
O'Malley met with the Assad family of Garden City, featured in a Detroit Free Press story last month about Syrian refugees, and two refugees from Iraq who now live in Troy and Dearborn Heights.
But far from winning him praise, O’Malley’s appearance has become a political problem. That’s because, in his remarks, O’Malley bemoaned the fact that “We’ve lost 50 Palestinians in recent violence, many of them teenagers – their entire lives before them. We’ve lost 8 Israelis, including an American couple shot in front of their young children.” He also called on “Both sides…to take steps to end this violence and address the underlying cause of it.” And he’s declared himself “a strong supporter of the two-state solution, which would meet not only Israel’s critical security needs,” but “affirm the dignity of the Palestinian people to live as a free people in an independent state of their own.”
In response, my Atlantic colleague Jeffrey Goldberg tweeted that, “Martin O’Malley evidently not going after the Jewish vote.” But there’s little evidence that expressing empathy for Palestinians costs presidential candidates Jewish votes. In 2007, Barack Obama told an Iowa audience that “Nobody is suffering more than the Palestinian people.” In his book The Audacity of Hope, he talked about hearing Palestinians “talk of the indignities of checkpoints and reminisce about the land they’d lost.” Yet Obama beat Hillary Clinton among Jewish voters in Massachusetts, Connecticut and California. And he won 78 percent of the Jewish vote against McCain that fall.
For his part, Democratic strategist Hank Sheinkopf slammed O’Malley for “seeking support from any place he might find it,” as if there’s something disreputable about seeking Arab votes. And he accused the former governor of having “lost all touch with reality.”
But what’s striking about O’Malley’s comments is precisely his acknowledgement of reality. When Clinton issued a statement on the violence in Israel earlier this month, she only mentioned Jewish deaths. Recognizing that Palestinians are dying too, as O’Malley did, shouldn’t be controversial. But in the 2016 presidential campaign, it’s risky merely to acknowledge the suffering of both sides...
read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.683061
related:
Speaking in Mich., Martin O'Malley slams anti-Muslim hate...we can not let fear defeat compassion
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251718555
"Assalamu allaykum; marhaba; kif halkum?" Peace be upon you; hello; how are you? Presidential candidate Martin O'Malley greeted a crowd at the University of Michigan-Dearborn in Arabic, and went on to condemn xenophobia and Islamophobia, which he said are trickling into mainstream politics.
http://www.arabamericannews.com/news/news/id_11274/Presidential-candidate-OMalley-on-refugees:-We-can-lead-the-world-with-compassion.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
What a lovely thing to say!
AND he IS where the Party belongs today, for SURE!
as you know! I HOPE that others are learning it!
