Chairman's Message

Recently, a good friend of mine in the United States sent me an job vacancy he had spotted in an American publication advertising the post of President for the United Jewish Communities, a new national organisation formed by the amalgamation of the United Jewish Appeal (UJA), The Council of Jewish federations (CJF) and the United Israel Appeal (UIA), to provide leadership on international and national issues affecting Jewish Communities in the US and around the world.

What makes it so interesting and thought provoking is that this organisation raises around 1.2 billion dollars annually to support the Jewish Lobby in America and the state Israel.

The organisation represent 189 Jewish federations and 312 independent organised communities across the United States and Canada. Its aim is provide expertise in fund raising, support and co-ordinate community effort and build connections to Jews in other communities and countries.

You may wonder why I am writing on length at what is after all a job vacancy. I am doing so to emphasise how well organised and efficient the Jewish/Zionist lobby is in America and to contrast it with how ineffective and disorganised the Arab community in America has been in presenting the Arab cause to the American People.

Here is an organisation that requires the services of a professional manager with professional qualifications and at least Chief Executive Office credentials. We Arabs have a self-appointed spokes people such as James Zogby and Edward Said. But we have no highly organised grass roots organisations in America to raise funding for Arab issues or to project a better image of ourselves to western government and media.

Why is this so? After all there are around eight million Arab Americans compared to only five million Jewish Americans and Islam is the fastest growing religion in America. The truth is that while the Jewish community in America will support and vote for anyone who supports Israel and the Zionist cause, the Arab community do not even register to vote, we have no organisations to orchestrate block voting for candidates that support Arab interests and very often we are weakened by rivalry among competing factions who are more interested in gaining power for themselves than really furthering the Arab cause. While all American politicians, including the President fear the Jewish vote, no one fears the Arab vote for to date there has been none except where Arab Americans have run in a district or state that has a significant Arab population.

We must do better, for what happens in our region is greatly affected by what happens in Washington. After all, Washington is the capital of the only super power on Earth and within it the Jewish/Israeli lobby has the ability to twist and manipulate affairs to such an extent that they almost dictate US foreign policy on the Near East. This is evidenced by Clinton's choice of white house advisors, the two most senior are both Jewish, as is the National Security director and its state department spokesman. Perhaps more importantly the assistant to the Secretary of State for Near East affairs is Jewish, that is not all, both the State Department officials in charge of the peace process are Jewish political appointees who get grants for pro Israeli foundations. In fact every member of the US peace team is Jewish, there no Muslim or even Christian representation.

It is time we arabs took up the challenge of confronting and confounding the lack of political influence and the negative images of Arabs and Islam portrayed to the American people by the western media. We too need to establish a national organisation in America that fosters, encourages and develops grass root organisations throughout the country. Its aim would be to register Arab voters and put together an Arab/Muslim voting block on a national scale to support candidates who are judged better on the basis of their support of the Arab cause. The criteria of success would be not to look for perfection but for candidates but for candidates that are better than others on Islamic concerns. For if candidates for the American Senate and House of Representatives knew that a recommendation would be made in every Mosque in their State and across the country at election time, they will start to pay attention to the issues that concern us as Arabs. It would also make them pay attention to Arab political activists and Arab candidates.

Other objectives for a national organisation would be to counter the negative stereotypes of Arabs in the West by offering positive alternatives. Using articulate spokes people to intelligently identify and express our culture and values. We need to focus our message outisde our own community, we need to be outspoken on issues that concern us, we must use the language of the West and not rely, as we do too often, on Arabic radio, television, newspapers and magazines. We must target our messages to those who fail to see Arabs as good people with high moral standards and a deep sense of family values.

A national organisation must celebrate the achievements of those Arabs who have achieved success within the community and publicise the work of groups such as the Arab American Medical Association who are working hard to demonstrate that Arabs are just as successful and hardworking as their American counterparts and excel in many academic and professional disciplines such as medicine. There are literally thousands of Arab Americans who are leaders in society; people who have done great things and we must honour those people, as other ethnic group honours their successful people.

It has always been tempting for us to believe that there is a conspiracy in the West against Arabs but really it is ignorance on the West's part and our failure to overcome the ignorance by presenting ourselves and our values effectively allied to our lack of effective political clout with the governments of the West, especially America, that has led to the present marginalisation of the Arab cause.

Just think what we could have achieved if we had started organising in 1948 at the same time as the Israely lobby, which now has 150 employees and a 15 million dollar budget. Perhaps we too could have obtained for the Palestenian Cause the 84.8 billion in grants and loans that have cost the US tax payer 134.8 million dollars that the United States has given Israel over the years. Put another way, we could have obtained around 26,700 thousand dollars for every Palestenina currently residing in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza over the same period. We would have, I'm sure, seen major US policy formulations favouring Palestine and the Arab states rather than the blanket endorsement of Israel that exists today.

Arabs and Muslims around the world must demonstrate their unity to accomplish this vitally important transformation within the political system of the world's only remaining superpower. If we can do it then the entire human race will be the benificiary.

Khalaf Al Habtoor