The People Perceived As A Threat To Security
An Article by Randa A. Kayyali
Emergency Relief and Reconstruction Funds for Lebanon
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Pols undermine U.S. by pandering to Israel
Home News Tribune Online 06/5/07
BY HASSAN MAHMOUD
According to a recently published book, "Presidential Courage" by presidential historian Michael Beschloss,
Harry Truman was an anti-Semitic bigot who called New York City a "Kike town" and said, "Those goddamned Jews
are never satisfied. Jesus Christ couldn't please them when he was here on earth, so how could anyone expect
that I would have any luck?" While staying in Independence to interview Truman in 1961, the talk-show host
David Susskind asked him why he never invited him into his home. Truman replied, "You are a Jew, David,
and no Jew has ever been in the house."
By the approach of the presidential election of 1948, Truman's approval rating was very low.
At that time, the United Nations was debating the partition of Palestine between the indigenous
Palestinians and the immigrant Jews from Europe. The White House counsel, Clark Clifford, strongly
suggested that Truman recognize a Jewish State for which the Jewish donors would support his campaign.
As per the book, John Kennedy, allegedly, later insisted that recognition of Israel was rushed through
so fast because a Zionist bagman handed the president $2 million in cash in a suitcase. On the other side,
Secretary of State George Marshall, whom Truman described as the "great one of the age" and the "architect
of victory who won the war," told the president that if he followed Clifford's advice and if he were to vote
in the election he would vote against him. He and Assistant Secretary of State Loy Henderson and Under Secretary
Robert Lovett warned that the founding of a Jewish State in Palestine would be a strategic mmistake as it would
throw away many years of hard work with the Arabs, would jeopardize oil supplies, turn the whole Arab world into
our enemy and make Israel a burden on the United States.
With the hypocritical personality of a U.S. president as such, one wonders how national vital decisions were made.
Since 1948, many upheavals occurred in the Middle East resulting in many wars and destruction and loss of hundreds
of thousands of lives — including thousands of Americans — and periodic economic turmoil due to disruption of oil
supply, plus the birth of international terrorism. All of these catastrophes could have been alleviated or minimized
if we could have wisely managed the aftermath of the creation of Israel in the midst of a sea of Arab and Muslim nations
by evenhandedly forcing the adherence of the antagonists to the United Nations resolutions of 1947, which demarcated
the boundaries of two states — Palestine and Israel.
Unfortunately, our politicians never learned from the past. When President Bush is asked about the fallacy of the
allegations upon which the ruinous Iraq war was waged, his recent answer during his news conference of May 24 was
that a main reason for the war was Saddam's payment to the families of the killed Palestinians who attacked Israel.
When he speaks of the dispute with Iran, he always invokes the danger of Iran to Israel. Can't our politicians stop
holding our security and economic interest hostages to the whims of the extremist Israelis who are pursuing colonialist
policies in the Middle East and always demand from us to back their follies even by scarifying the lives of our soldiers and our economic welfare?
Amazingly, at the time when a number of our soldiers are kidnapped in Iraq, some New Jersey politicians thought that
the fate of our kidnapped soldiers is not worth as much as the fate of three Israeli soldiers captured by Hezbollah
and Hamas. Assemblyman Eric Monoz and state Sen. Thomas H. Kean Jr., both R-Union, Somerset, Essex, Morris, sponsored
resolutions that call on the United Nations to take action to help free the three Israeli soldiers. Munoz stated:
"I want Israeli citizens here and abroad and the government of Israel to know that the United States — and in particular
the State of New Jersey — stands united with them in their efforts to bring these young men home safely." One wishes that
these comforting words and strong resolutions are spoken and made on behalf of the missing Americans and their families.
Shame on those politicians. Their pandering to foreign interests blinded them to the interests of America.
"Be Counted" columnist Hassan Mahmoud is a resident of Westfield. "Be Counted" columnists are members of the public.
Their opinions do not represent those of the Home News Tribune.
A New Jersey few know: Paterson's thriving Arab community
The Star-Ledger, Sunday, April 08, 2007
BY MILTON VIORST
I enter Paterson over the Broadway hill past Eastside Park, where as a kid I biked on clear days, turning to gaze at the
Manhattan skyline a dozen miles away. The park is where I caught fireflies in a jar on hot summer nights and belly-flopped
on a sled on cold winter afternoons, where I sold sodas to picnickers on Sundays and once tried out, unsuccessfully,
for the high school baseball team. Just below the park, in the direction of downtown, is Derrom Avenue, whose elegant
mansions long advertised the wealth of Paterson's commercial aristocracy. Incongruously, amidst these mansions now
stands the Islamic Center, Paterson's principal mosque, symbol of the city's latest transformation.
Paterson, it is widely said, is home to America's second-largest Arab community. Dearborn, Mich., is first.
Paterson is also the hub of several hundred thousand Arabs living in northern New Jersey. Yet, growing up, how come I knew no Arabs?
The city, rather handsome and well-kept in those days, was shaped by solidly middle-class Irish, Italian and Jewish communities.
Since Alexander Hamilton persuaded George Washington to harness the power of the roaring falls of the Passaic River, its wealth
derived from industry, but in the 20th century it also served as a commercial hub for several hundred thousand residents of the North Jersey region.
My grandfather came from Poland in 1900 to work in Paterson's silk mills, the industrial core; my father, after a turn in the mills,
found retailing more compatible. The earliest Arab immigrants were Christian Syrians drawn from the textile workshops of Aleppo;
Mus lims, a second wave that began in the 1920s, preferred to set up small shops. By the 1940s, Arabs were an identifiable
community, but I never saw them. Paterson's ethnic groups were largely strangers to one another, gathered on their own turf
around their churches, later their synagogues, then their mosques. Though we lived in neighborhoods that were tightly
juxtaposed, only rarely did we cross the lines...
More
ADC-NJ wishes to thank all of our supporters for making our 9th Annual Banquet a great success.
The event, which took place at the Grand Ballroom of the Hasbrouck Heights Hilton, was attended by approximately 300 supporters and members.
This year's Achievement Award was presented to Ms. Sarah El-Shazly, of the Office of the New Jersey Attorney General and the
Recognition Award was presented to The Mental Health Association in Passaic County.
Among the many dignitaries present were: Ambassador Shereef EL-Kholy, Consul General of Egypt in New York;
Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein; representatives from the offices of Congressman Scott Garrett and Congressman
Bill Pascrell; Joe Orlando, CEO of Barnert Hospital; Andre Sayegh, Member, Paterson Board of Education and
Chief of Staff for State Sen. Girgenti; from the New Jersey Commission on Civil Rights: Chairman, Hon. John Campbell
and Commissioner, Hon. Dr. Joan Rivitz; and from the Rutgers University Center for Middle Eastern Studies were: Director
Dr. Hooshang Amirahmadi, Dr. Afshin Razani, Dr. Charles Haberl and staff member Paola Rizzuto.
Also present were representatives from the following organizations: The Arab American Family Support Center of NJ
(Tanweer), ADC-NY, ADC-Greater Philadelphia Area, American Muslim Union (AMU), Egyptian American Professional Society
(EAPS), Egyptian American Group, Islamic Center of Passaic County (ICPC), Islamic Center of Jersey City, NAAP,
New Jersey Muslim Lawyer's Association, Palestinian Heritage Foundation (PHF), and Wafa House.
We would like to thank our keynote speaker, Senator Lincoln Chafee, for offering the ADC-NJ audience an honest,
sensible and realistic approach to the Palestinian-Israeli Peace Process. We offer our sincerest thanks to all who
attended and helped to make this years Banquet a success.
Please let us know if you have any suggestions as to how we can make next year's Banquet even more successful.
Please email your comments and suggestions to adc@adcnj.us
Photos, media coverage of the event and the keynote speaker's ( Sen. Lincoln Chafee) speech among other speeches will be posted shortly.
