[13 Jun 2004, Edwin Brown  N & O]

Nicholas Kristof's column ("Bush's pro-Israel tilt falls flat") in The N & O of May 26
warns that Bush's "embrace of Sharon hobbles us in Iraq even more than those
photos from Abu Ghraib." He warns of the extent to which all our efforts founder
on the Iraqis' perception that our occupation of their land follows the model of
Israel's take-over of the West Bank, Gaza, and Jerusalem.There after 37 years
Sharon's grip on all the Territories that might make a remnant Palestine viable
grows ever more  crushing. 

But when Kristof notes that while Bush and Kerry disagree on almost all else, they
vie with each other in giving away the Palestinians' patrimony for a mess of ballots,
he may have hit upon the issue on which the November election is made to hinge.
Having persuaded themselves of the mythic power of the American-Israeli PAC ,
Democratic campaign managers seem bent on lendng no offense to Zionists either
Jewish or Christian--as if their votes were winnable.

What succeeded in 1960 with Catholic John Kennedy at the helm was his appeal to
non-ideologue Americans of every religious and secular stripe. In these more
partisan times, the need to cultivate this great middle ground may go unheeded in
the U.S., while the moderate forces in both Israel and the OT are ground between
the upper and the nether millstones.  

Edwin Brown