Arabs, do you still have the delusion?

According to Abdel-Halim Kandil, political analyst and editor-in-chief of independent weekly Sout al-Umma, neo-conservative ideology “is not exclusive to the Republicans, but permeates both political parties” in the U.S.

“When it comes to Israel, there’s virtually no difference in Republican and Democratic party policies,” Kandil told IPS. “The Democratic administration of (former U.S. president Bill) Clinton, for example, consisted of even more Jewish Zionists — including the defence secretary (William Cohen), the secretary of state (Madeleine Albright) and the national security advisor (Samuel Berger) — than the current Republican Bush administration.

“These people occupy most of the top political and military positions throughout the American political system,” added Kandil. “Anyone who thinks Washington can serve as a fair mediator in the Israel-Palestine conflict — under Republicans or Democrats — is delusional.”

Kandil said the chief neo-conservative objectives are “securing Israel’s presence in the Middle East, the return of the Jews to Israel, and the eventual construction of the Jewish temple on the site where the al-Aqsa mosque now stands.”

According to Thabet, the neo-conservatives in Washington have exploited U.S. military might to neutralise regional opposition — mainly of the Islamic variety — to Israel.

“They have used U.S. military force to spread their version of ‘democracy’, which excludes all forms of political Islam — be it Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Hamas in Palestine or the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood,” said Thabet.

Some local observers suggest that the neo-conservatives in the current Bush administration, many of whom hold dual U.S.-Israel citizenship, are more beholden to Israel than to the U.S.

“These people have a greater attachment to Israel and world Zionism than they do to the U.S.,” Magdi Hussein, secretary-general of Egypt’s Labour Party, frozen by the government since 2000, told IPS. “But they have tried hard to convince the American public that U.S. and Israeli interests are one and the same.”

Text taken from Arabs Despair of U.S. Even More.