- Palestinian Authority President Yasir Arafat stunned
the world yesterday by demanding that the United States hold democratic
elections for a new Chief Executive before it attempts to continue in its
role as broker between Israel and Palestine.
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- "Mr. Bush is tainted by his association with Jim-Crow-style
selective disenfranchisement and executive strong-arm tactics in a southeastern
province controlled by his brother," said Mr. Arafat, who was elected
with 87% of the vote in 1996 elections in the West Bank and Gaza, declared
to be free and fair by international observers, including former U.S. president
Jimmy Carter. "Our count shows that he would have lost the election
if his associates hadn't deprived so many thousands of African-Americans,
an oppressed minority, of the right to vote. He is not the man to bring
peace to the Middle East."
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- Hugo Chavez, elected president of Venezuela with 62%
of the popular vote, concurred with Mr. Arafat. Chavez has long been a
victim of Bush's anti-democratic attitude, as the Bush administration funneled
hundreds of thousands of dollars through the "National Endowment for
Democracy" to anti-Chavez forces and reportedly gave the go-ahead
for an attempted military coup by those forces. "After it was over
and I was back in power," said Chavez, "his administration actually
told me 'legitimacy is not conferred by a majority vote.' Unless, of course,
it's a majority of the Supreme Court. I respect the local traditions, however
quaint, of the United States, but he hardly sets the best example for the
Middle East, does he? Why don't we get back to that idea of an international
conference to settle the question of Palestine?"
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- Bush was not without his supporters, however. Israeli
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, elected head of a country that legally discriminates
among its citizens on the basis of religious belief, forbids political
candidates from advocating an end to that discrimination, and disenfranchises
an entire people through military occupation, dismissed the call as "absurd."
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- Hamid Karzai, recently "elected" head of Afghanistan
by a grand council, or "loya jirga," in which a foreign body,
controlled by the United States, selected delegates; unelected warlords
who had ravaged the country were permitted to control the meeting and to
threaten delegates who refused to vote their way; and the U.S. special
envoy to Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, refused to allow at least two other
candidates to stand for election, added his support for Mr. Bush in his
hour of need. Said Karzai, "In Afghanistan, we have the loya jirga.
In the United States, you have your own process -- as we understand, it's
traditional over there for corporations to play a large part in electing
officials and writing legislation. We're very interested in looking into
that kind of system ourselves."
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- Vojislav Kostunica, chosen head of Yugoslavia in an election
where the United States spent an estimated $25 million to influence the
results, was also keen to rush to Bush's defense, indicating that he saw
no procedural problems with the 2000 elections.
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- And Mahathir Mohamad of Malaysia, long derided for his
claim that "Asian culture" is at odds with universal human rights,
added, "The elections are strictly an internal matter, and should
have no bearing on the status of the United States as a broker. The Palestinians'
high-handedness is a serious threat to national independence."
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- In a surprise move, British Prime Minister Tony Blair,
long an ally of the United States, supported Arafat's call, saying, "While
we're at it, let's take another look at our agreement on American independence.
George Washington was not only unelected, he did rather associate with
terrorists. Benedict Arnold would have been a much more suitable partner
for peace, n'est ce pas?"
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- Arafat, busy working on a plan to find a new Israeli
leader not tainted with the massacre of hundreds of innocents in Sabra
and Shatila to negotiate with, could not be reached for further comment.
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- Rahul Mahajan is the Green Party candidate for Governor
of Texas and author of "The New Crusade: America's War on Terrorism,"
(Monthly Review Press, April 2002). He serves on the National Board of
Peace Action and is a founding member of the Nowar Collective. He can be
reached at: rahul@tao.ca
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