President Obama is an excellent rhetorician—he displayed his oratorical gift once again during his speech on the state of the Middle East and North Africa last Thursday. However, I continue to be bothered by the seemingly arbitrary distinction President Obama drew between “good” Arab revolutions in Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and Syria, and the “bad” revolution in Palestine.
First, the President reasserted America’s support for democracy movements in the Middle East and North Africa. Going through a pretty thorough survey of countries in the region, Obama repeatedly praised protestors who used “the moral force of nonviolence” against their oppressive and undemocratic governments. The Presidents essentially affirmed the US’s policy towards democratic revolutions to be something like, “you start it, we’ll help you finish.”
Then, the President moved on to the issue of Palestine. As in the past, he condemned Israel’s continued settlements in the occupied territories. He also called for the 1967 borders to be used as a basis for territory swaps. (Some view this as a major turning point in US policy towards Israel/Palestine. I tend to see it as a more emotional issue: saying the word “1967” made “pro-peace” American lobby group J Street really happy and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu really mad, but functionally changed very little about the US’s actions.)
However (predictably), President Obama also noted that America’s “commitment to Israel’s security is unshakable,” and reaffirmed our position of nearly unconditional support for Israel.
Unfortunately, this doesn’t seem to jibe with his earlier message of support for democratic and populist overthrows of authoritarian and subjugating governments. It seems to me that Palestine has all the characteristics of a people in revolt against an oppressive and undemocratic leader—why does the President make Palestine an exception to his policy?
President Obama tried multiple times to justify the distinction between Palestine and other revolting groups. For one, he declared that “Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist”—but of course, Hamas’s deputy foreign minister stated explicitly on NPR last week that “we accept this state and ’67 borders.” (Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel, on the other hand, completely rejects any variation upon the 1967 borders and does not recognize Palestine as a state. Hm.)
The President also stressed repeatedly that he would support any people engaged in nonviolent protests, implying that, in contrast, all Palestinians are simply following Hamas down a “path of terror.” On the contrary, just four days before his speech, thousands of Palestinians marched on Israeli borders in nonviolent demonstrations on the anniversary of Israel’s formation on 1948. In fact, the Economist observes that “the tactics of mass non-violent protest that brought down the governments of Tunisia and Egypt, and are threatening to bring down those of Libya, Yemen and Syria, are now being used in the Palestinian cause.”
Furthermore, Israel again reacted to these nonviolent demonstrations like an oppressive occupying force, firing on protestors who were simply throwing rocks. (Obama declared in his speech that “the United States opposes the use of violence and repression against the people of the region”). The same article in the Economist notes that this has been the status quo for years, making small acts of terrorism unsurprising: after all, “it’s very hard to keep a non-violent movement non-violent when the government you’re demonstrating against subjects you to gunfire for a sustained period of time.”
Yes, the Palestinians threw rocks (without hitting any people, as far as we know)—but is that really so different from nonviolent protests in Yemen, where demonstrators threw rocks at local army posts? Why should President Obama approve of an action in Yemen yet disapprove of the same action in Palestine?
The only conclusion that I can draw is that the United States is vastly hypocritical and has no coherent policy in the Middle East. At the very least, it reveals that the Obama administration’s foreign policy is determined more by political concerns at home and strategic interests in the region than by a commitment to human rights or democracy.
President Obama cannot claim to support any nonviolent movement by people against an oppressive government and then fail to endorse Palestine’s bid for UN recognition. He must either specify that his policy makes an exception for Palestine (and then explain to a country full of freedom-loving Americans why it does so)… or he must support Palestinians just like other revolutionaries in the region.