Barack Obama's Anti-Israel Alliances [incl. Rashid Khalidi]

Barack Obama claims to be a supporter of Israel and a friend of the Jewish people. But many of the people who helped him in the course of his rise to political power, or whom he helped during his political ascent, are extremely anti-Israel, or even outright anti-Semitic. Let's examine the views and careers of just a few of Obama's anti-Israel and/or anti-Semitic benefactors and protégés:

Rashid Khalidi was the director of the PLO's press agency WAFA from 1976 to 1982, at a time when the PLO was conducting a massacre of 37 Israeli civilians in a bus on Israel's coastal road, the brutal murder of a four-year-old Israeli girl in Nahariya, and numerous other terrorist killings of Israeli civilians. The PLO was also waging a brutal war against the Lebanese Christian community during this period, and carried out numerous massacres of Lebanese Christians; the worst of these was the killing of about 500 people in the village of Damour. During this same period, Rashid's wife Mona Khalidi was an English translator for WAFA. Rashid Khalidi is now an advocate of a "one state solution" for all of "Palestine" - meaning the destruction of Israel and its replacement by an Arab state. Asaf Romirowsky and Jonathan Calt Harris, in an article in the Washington Times on July 9, 2004, summarized Rashid Khalidi's views about Israel this way: "[His] extremism comes out when he calls Israel an ‘apartheid system in creation' and a ‘racist state' that ‘brainwashed' Americans do not understand. Jerusalem, with its Jewish majority since the 1880s, he deems ‘an Arab city' whose control by Israeli ‘foreigners' is ‘unacceptable.' And so on." Khalidi also accuses Israel of "ethnic cleansing."

Allies of Palestinians see a friend in Barack Obama
They consider him receptive despite his clear support of Israel. By Peter Wallsten, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer April 10, 2008 CHICAGO — It was a celebration of Palestinian culture — a night of music, dancing and a dash of politics. Local Arab Americans were bidding farewell to Rashid Khalidi, an internationally known scholar, critic of Israel and advocate for Palestinian rights, who was leaving town for a job in New York. A special tribute came from Khalidi’s friend and frequent dinner companion, the young state Sen. Barack Obama. Speaking to the crowd, Obama reminisced about meals prepared by Khalidi’s wife, Mona, and conversations that had challenged his thinking. His many talks with the Khalidis, Obama said, had been “consistent reminders to me of my own blind spots and my own biases. . . . It’s for that reason that I’m hoping that, for many years to come, we continue that conversation — a conversation that is necessary not just around Mona and Rashid’s dinner table,” but around “this entire world.” Today, five years later, Obama is a U.S. senator from Illinois who expresses a firmly pro-Israel view of Middle East politics, pleasing many of the Jewish leaders and advocates for Israel whom he is courting in his presidential campaign. The dinner conversations he had envisioned with his Palestinian American friend have ended. He and Khalidi have seen each other only fleetingly in recent years.

And yet the warm embrace Obama gave to Khalidi, and words like those at the professor’s going-away party, have left some Palestinian American leaders believing that Obama is more receptive to their viewpoint than he is willing to say.

AAAN TRIVIA :

OCTOBER 2, 2000 : (CHICAGO, IL : IRAQI SPY "SIRHAN'S" aka DUMEISI'S NEWSPAPER AL MAHJAR CO-SPONSORS ANTI-ISRAEL DEMONSTRATION, ALONG WITH AAAN {see MONA KHALIDI} , AAI, IAP, ETC) The spy also runs this newspaper: "AL MAHJAR NEWSPAPER" Type of activity: Newspaper, media & marketing Address: 6000 W. 79th Street, , Burbank, Illinois- 60459 , USA
phone: (708)233-1303, fax: (708)233-1302
The purpose of our project is operative access to e-mail for interactive communication with organizations of Russia and the near foreign countries.

www.abunimah.org
October 2, 2000
ONE THOUSAND PROTESTORS MARCH ON ISRAELI CONSULTATE IN CHICAGO
CHICAGO-October 2--About one thousand Palestinians and supporters marched on the Israeli consulate in downtown Chicago this evening, to protest the ongoing massacre of Palestinians, which to date has claimed more than fifty lives, and injured more than 1,200, as Israeli troops continue to attack civilians with helicopters, rockets and live ammunition.
The number of people who attended the rally far exceeded organizers' expectations, as numerous buses and vans and private cars brought men, women and children of every age from different parts of Chicago and the suburbs.
Demonstrators gathered at Tribune Plaza, on Michigan Avenue, a main Chicago thoroughfare beginning at 4.30PM. Activists passed flyers to passersby, and demonstrators carried signs with slogans like "52 Years of Massacres is Enough," "How many children need to die?," and "Sharon=War Criminal."
As the crowd increased in size, chants went up in Arabic and English. Echoing the cries of their compatriots in Palestine, demonstrators chanted in Arabic, "With spirit, with blood we will sacrifice for you Palestine." English chants included, "Free Free Palestine!"
Led by young people carrying Palestinian flags, marchers headed south from Tribune Plaza across Michigan Avenue bridge, towards the Israeli consulate building. Original plans had called for a rally in front of the consulate, with speeches by community leaders. But because the demonstration was so large it was decided to keep the march going in a large loop in order to prevent people surging forward and being pushed against police barricades. Many protestors were emotional and grief-stricken. Chants came to a halt as protestors sat on the ground for a minute of silence in memory of Palestinian martyrs.
Twenty children from Chicago's Palestinian community, donned white T-shirts and lay on the road in front of the Israeli consulate. They were then sprayed with red paint to symbolize their solidarity with Palestinian children killed and injured by occupation forces.
An elderly Palestinian woman, who gave her name as Ferdaws, approached a group of non-Palestinian supporters with tears in her eyes, and said, "I want to thank you for coming to march with us today. We want to show the world that what they say about us is not true, we are not killers and terrorists." Ferdaws said that her father and sister had been killed in an Israeli attack on her village near Betunia, in the occupied West Bank in 1968.
This evening's demonstration received widespread coverage in local media, leading the Channel 2 (CBS) evening news, which reported that, "palestinians say they rallied today to better educate their neighbors and colleagues about the violence in their homeland." Fox TV (Channel 32), WGN TV (Channel 9) and several local radio stations also had reports. In addition, reporters from The Chicago Tribune and other newspapers were present.
Earlier in the day Ali Abunimah and the Israeli Consul-General Tzipora Rimon appeared on WBEZ Radio for a full hour fielding calls from listeners. (The Worldview program is archived at http://www.wbez.org)
The demonstration was co-sponsored by: Arab American Action Network, Al-Awda Chicago, Al-Mahjar, Arab American Institute, Arab American View Newspaper, Al-Quds TV, Committee for a Democratic Palestine, Friday Magazine, Friday Radio, Islamic Association for Palestine, Guild of Palestinian Writers and Journalists in North America, United Arab Networking, American Friends Service Committee, Eighth Day Center for Justice, Hammerhard Mediaworks, Southwest Youth Collaborative.
The protest in Chicago was one amongst many being held cities around the world as international condemnation of Israel's crimes grows.
Ali Abunimah
ali@abunimah.org
http://www.abunimah

54 posted on 07/09/2003 11:02 AM PDT by Hillary's Lovely Legs

*********************

JUNE 2002 : (ONE OF "SIRHAN'S" aka [AL MAHJAR PUBLISHER] DUMEISI'S 4 CONTACTS AT IRAQ'S UN MISSION IS EXPELLED ON SUSPICION OF SPYING) FBI agents said Dumeisi was in contact with four people at Iraq's United Nations mission who were actually intelligence officers. One of the four was expelled from the country by the State Department in June 2002 on suspicion of spying, the FBI said. ------- from http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/2321258/detail.html

*********************

JULY 9, 2003 Wednesday : (ILLINOIS : KHALED ABDEL-LATIF DUMEISI aka "SIRHAN" IS ARRESTED FOR SERVING AS AN UNREGISTERED AGENT OF IRAQ'S BAATHIST REGIME - HIS DOSSIER WAS FOUND BY THE INC IN IRAQ) A suburban Oak Lawn [suburban Chicago] man was arrested Wednesday on charges of serving as an unregistered agent of Saddam Hussein's government, including spying on opposition leaders for Iraqi intelligence, federal officials announced. Khaled Abdel-Latif Dumeisi, 60, was arrested based on a dossier found in Baghdad in April and turned over to the FBI.
U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald said in a statement that Dumeisi had furnished information to Iraqi intelligence without registering as a foreign agent. "Those who gather information in the United States about people living in America for the purpose of providing the information to hostile governments should understand that the FBI will pursue them vigorously," Fitzgerald said.
Federal law requires anyone acting as an agent of a foreign government who is not a member of that country's diplomatic service to register with the Justice Department as a foreign agent. Dumeisi never did so, federal officials said.
They said members of the Iraqi National Congress, an opposition group, discovered a dossier in a Baghdad safehouse run by Iraq's intelligence service in the days when Saddam's regime was crumbling.
---------- "Oak Lawn man accused of spying for Saddam," BY MIKE ROBINSON ASSOCIATED PRESS , Chicago Sun-Times , July 9, 2003

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.