Arab Americans should expand focus in presidential elections
By Ray Hanania – Once again, Arab American voters are in an election dilemma, stuck between a rock and a hard place as they contemplate whom to support in the presidential elections. Should they follow the lead of other American voters and support the candidates most likely to win the presidential nominations, Democrats Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton, or Republicans Mike Huckabee or John McCain? Or, should they follow their conscience, confused by candidates’ doubletalk on the Middle East, and vote for candidates who reflect their views but can’t win? In reality, it doesn’t matter. The Arab American vote is not a vote that will change national elections. But it can be a vote that changes Arab American politics and community dynamics.I am not saying Arab Americans shouldn’t vote or express their views. I am saying Arab Americans should use this presidential election as an opportunity to strengthen their own community voice.Why worry about the issues now being debated angrily in our community? Is Obama is or isn’t sympathetic to the Palestinian cause. Will Clinton really order the immediate removal of troops from Iraq, ending the American occupation there? Will McCain launch new wars against Syria and Iran?
When it comes to the Middle East, American politicians are slaves to powers that supercede principle or justice. Every presidential candidate will support Israel and pander to its needs.
They will say things to win pro-Israel votes, for example, that anger Arab Americans.
But that is a part of an election system in which Arab Americans continue to have weak voices, who remain unengaged as a community in the election industry, and who continue to be shut out of their local communities, denied jobs, appointments and even shunned at elections.
Candidates must cater to the demands of the voting constituencies who have mastered the election system.
Presidential candidates all support Israel, but not because the Israeli lobby, the powerful AIPAC, tells them how to vote. They do so because every candidate seeks to preserve support among their voting constituencies and they do not see an alternative in an equally powerful Arab American voter constituency.
The Arab American vote, despite tremendous work by the Arab American Institute (AAI) and the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), continues to remain relatively insignificant.
If candidates do not perceive that the American voters want Israel to end its occupation, the candidates will not force Israel to withdraw.
If candidates see that American voters don’t recognize that the violence in the Middle East is really the result of extremists on both sides, rather than the result of Arab or Muslim terrorist groups, then the candidates will only speak to the violence against Israel.
For Arab Americans, the choice is not about which candidate will support Palestine, for example, but rather will they step back from the emotional precipice of these single issues, and instead focus on the bigger picture in which they need to make their voices more resonant?
To make a difference, Arab Americans must empower themselves.
Rejecting a candidate on the basis of one issue is parochial, naïve and self-defeating.
Arab Americans, we are Americans, too. The Middle East is important to us but it is not the only issue. Like all Americans, we have concerns about growing unemployment, the nation’s failed and lobbyist controlled healthcare system, and the poor performance of our educational system.
We may find the positions of some candidates on the Middle East pushing us to anger, but the truth is we cannot throw the baby out with the bath water. We cannot allow emotion and anger to prevent us from engaging the election process with reason.
We should not support a presidential candidate who fails to recognize that healthcare in this country is abysmal and needs to be changed. Nearly 50 million Americans are uninsured and that includes many Arab Americans.
We should not support a candidate who fails to recognize that Americans are being driven into a debtors prison by a credit card industry that has Mafia-like powers to increase interest rates to outrageous levels as high as 30 percent on a whim.
Our educational system is failing to prepare our children to deal with today’s competitive world.
These issues are as important as our views on the Middle East. We are not a one-issue constituency, but when we define ourselves based only on one issue, we can be easily marginalized and ignored by the candidates.
The goal of a candidate is to win office, and they will do that based not on the back of principle and morality but rather by balancing constituency interests.
If the American electorate doesn’t see Israeli policy as an issue, then the candidates will not make it an issue. That means Arab Americans need to work harder to make it an issue not simply for the candidates but for the American public.
However, when the election is over, a president has the power to do almost anything. Voters must look beyond the headlines of the issues.
As best we can, we must look into the heart of the candidates, and select the candidate who embraces the principles we believe must apply to the Middle East. Which candidate is the most compassionate and reasoned when it comes to justice, fairness, principle and morality?
And then, we must step from outside the corner Arab Americans often find themselves painted, and instead vote on the basis of being “Americans.”
We must select a candidate that has the best chance of winning in the larger American election system.
We must weigh their words on the Middle East against the reality of their character.
All of the candidates most likely to win will pander to the power politics of lobbies, money and political organizations.
Until Arab Americans can establish a lobby so powerful we can impact American foreign policy, then we should focus on empowering ourselves. We must organize. We must strengthen our community press, shutting the door to the Middle East media which, for the most part, takes Arab Americans concerns for granted.
We have to show other Americans that we are American and that our concerns go far beyond single-issue controversies.
When the election is over, we must participate in selecting the one candidate most likely to find their courage and do the right thing once they are in office.
(Ray Hanania is an award winning columnist and author. Copyright Arab American Writers Group Syndicate, www.ArabWritersGroup.com.)
RAY HANANIA is a syndicated columnist. His columns appear in numerous publications including the Jerusalem Post, the Arab News, the Arab American News, the Southwest News Herald and more. Hanania is the publisher of the National Arab American Times Newspaper. Named Best Ethnic American Columnist for 2007 by the New America Media, and the 2009 Mehdi Courage in Journalism Awardee, Hanania hosts a morning Radio Show of Radio Chicagoland, in Chicago (Mon-Fri, 8-9:30 am) on WJJG 1530 AM Radio. He is an internationally acclaimed standup comedian, author of the humor book Ya Habibi, and pens the Comic Strip called Shades of Gray. View his complete Bio?
ANISA MEHDI is an Emmy Award-winning journalist specializing in religion, the arts, and people. For over 20 years she has reported, written, directed and produced television news and documentary programs for major American media outlets, including National Geographic, PBS, ABC News, and CBS. Her commentaries have been heard on NPR’s “All Things Considered.” Ms. Mehdi is founder and president of Whetstone Productions, a New Jersey-based production and consulting company. She is adjunct Professor of Communications at Seton Hall University. She writes a twice weekly for the Newark Star-Ledger Newspaper blog. View her complete Bio?
SAFFIYA SHILLO is a peace activist, communications specialist and community editor for the National Arab American Times Newspaper. Ms. Shillo serves as a Board Member of the Palestinian American Women's Society. Her activism is extensive, having served as the former President of the Palestinian American Congress-Chicago Chapter, as a National Board member of the American Task Force on Palestine, and as Director of the Arab American Institute's Chicago office. Active in Jewish/Israeli-Palestinian dialogue, Ms. Shillo gives presentations to national organizations on strategies and methods to achieve peace through dialogue. Ms. Shillo also served as Director of Ethnic Affairs for the State of Illinois' Office of Lieutenant Governor, and worked as a domestic violence/sexual assault counselor serving Chicago's Arab community. She can be reached at smshillo@yahoo.com
ALADDIN ELAASAR is an award winning Arab American journalist and author of several books including Silent Victims: The plight of Arabs and Muslims in Post 9/11 America. Elaasar is also a member of the National Arab American Journalists Association. Email him at omaraladin@aol.com. His latest book is The Last Pharoah: Mubarak and the Uncertain Future of Egypt in the MidEast.
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