United States President George Bush’s election campaign received support from an unusual quarter last week when Hasan Rowhani, head of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council, said that four more years of George W would be good for Iran.
Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian leader, was asked about the Bush-John Kerry contest at a meeting with journalists a couple of weeks ago (before he was taken ill) and replied: ”It makes no difference.”
In London, the consensus among Arab ambassadors — though they don’t say so publicly — is that keeping Bush in the White House would be preferable to starting afresh with Kerry.
Such views are probably not what most people would expect to hear. Bush denounced Iran in his famous ”axis of evil” speech and has been making hostile noises about it ever since. He has cold-shouldered Arafat and more or less washed his hands of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
More generally, as far as the Arab world is concerned, he has spared no effort to make himself the most unpopular American president ever.
Disliking Bush is one thing, but working up enthusiasm for Kerry is another — and there’s little sign of that in the Middle East. What interests Arabs most is the US’s attitude towards the Palestinian people. Although the US under Kerry might be expected to re-engage in the peace process, Kerry’s emphatically declared support for Israel does not inspire Arabs with hopes of an even-handed approach.
Also pointing in Bush’s favour is the popular Arab view that second-term American presidents are better placed to take a firm line with Israel than first-term presidents.
The theory is that in their second term they no longer need to please the Israeli lobby in the US because they cannot seek re-election again. Although the examples of Jimmy Carter and George Bush Snr tend to disprove this theory, it’s widely believed nevertheless.
Bush gains, too, from the argument that says it’s best to stay with the devil you know. Arab politicians and diplomats are fond of the status quo (look how long most of them have had their jobs) and, after four years adjusting to life under Bush, they would rather not embark on a new learning curve with Kerry.
In any case, the influential Egyptian daily al-Ahram sees no substantial difference between Bush and Kerry, and has declared its support for Ralph Nader (of Lebanese descent), describing him as the only candidate who ”responds to Arab-American interests and positions on Palestine, Iraq, civil liberties and worldwide respect for international law”.
While agreeing that there may be little difference between Bush and Kerry on Israeli-Palestinian policy, Albert Aghazerian, a Palestinian-Armenian historian, detects a difference in their general attitude.
”It’s a difference regarding people who have taken it upon themselves to act as if they are the liberators of the world,” he said in an interview with the web magazine Bitter Lemons. ”For all his faults, I don’t think Kerry will ignore the lessons that we have learnt throughout history.
”The Bush people think they have a self-righteous justification to go and change the course of things. This messianic spirit, I think, is less in Kerry than it is in Bush … I believe that Bush has broken the basic rules of common sense … it has to do with this messianic approach.”
Bush’s messianic view, some argue, will bring more polarisation in the Middle East if he gets a second term, simultaneously benefiting the most impatient reformers and the Islamist militants: the reformers will be encouraged by continuing US pressure on Arab regimes, while al-Qaeda and its likes will look to Bush for further help with their recruiting.
There are various other sectional interests that could gain from keeping Bush in the White House. Bush’s relaxed environmental policies benefit the oil-producing countries (as do the current high oil prices). Bush is less likely than Kerry to trouble Arab governments with complaints about human rights, so long as they continue to fight terrorism, and there are many Lebanese who welcome American efforts to stop Syria interfering in Lebanon’s affairs.
As far as Iraq and the presidential election is concerned, the most Machiavellian view was set out recently in the Jordan Times. On the assumption that the war is unwinnable, the writer suggested that electing Kerry now will allow the neoconservatives to blame him for American failure in Iraq and to insist that everything would have worked out fine if only Bush had been given a bit longer:
”Many on the American right still believe that the Vietnam War could have been won if only the spineless traitors of the left had not weakened American ‘resolve’ — and they say this even though Richard Nixon, who was elected on a promise to end the Vietnam War and presided over the whole latter phase of it, was a Republican. What could they do with a lost war on a Democratic president’s watch?”
Far better, then, to keep Bush in power and make him reap the whirlwind. The Iraq quagmire may also explain why Hasan Rowhani and some other Iranian officials (though not, by any means, all of them) would like Bush to have a second term.
So long as the US is bogged down in Iraq, it cannot seriously contemplate toppling the regime in Iran — or, for that matter, in Syria. Prospects for the US remaining bogged down look rather better under Bush than under Kerry.
Some in the Iranian government also think Bush has begun to realise that his hostile policies towards Iran are unlikely to succeed and is therefore likely to adopt a more realistic approach if elected for a second term. If the dominant view of the Bush-Kerry contest in the Middle East is one of overwhelming cynicism, the picture among Arab-Americans — who do, after all, have a say in the outcome — is rather different.
Despite Bush’s effort to woo them with a message of greetings for Ramadan (”Americans who practise the Islamic faith enrich our society … Laura joins me in sending our best wishes”), they overwhelmingly support Kerry.
A recent poll of Arab-American voters in four of the states where they are most numerous — Michigan, Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania — showed 54% backing Kerry and only 28% backing Bush, with the rest undecided or supporting Nader.
Arab-Americans, though, have different priorities from Arabs in the Middle East. For them, the most important factor in deciding who to vote for is the American economy, followed by terrorism/national security, according to the poll. Iraq came fourth in their list of important issues, and Israeli-Palestinian issues only eighth.
The poll was conducted by Zogby International, a Washington-based firm whose boss, James Zogby, is himself an Arab-American and also a supporter of the Democrats.
In an article for al-Ahram Weekly he explained last week why he would be voting for Kerry.
”The last four years have had a devastating effect on our nation,” he wrote. ”They have tested our national unity and our sense of mission. The Bush administration has pursued domestic and foreign policies that have been both neglectful and reckless. Because of reckless tax cuts a record surplus was turned into record deficits.”
Turning to the benefits of electing Kerry and his running-mate John Edwards, he continued: ”Whatever differences I may have with them, I know that they will pursue diplomacy over unilateral military pre-emption. They can be better trusted to find a way out of Iraq than the arrogant crew that got us into that mess in the first place.
”They will protect our civil liberties … and they will make the pursuit of an Israeli-Palestinian peace a priority rather than a neglected afterthought.”
Optimistic words. But we shall have to wait a few more days to see if Kerry gets a chance to prove them wrong or right. — Guardian Unlimited Â