WASHINGTON, 23 April — Conservative Republican leaders are criticizing President Bush for leaning too hard on Israel and accusing him of tilting too much in favor of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and the Arabs.
Israel’s invasion into the Palestinian occupied territories has caused a split between members of the Republican Party, creating divisions among religious conservatives and putting some Bush supporters in the position of having to defend Secretary of State Colin Powell’s recent trip to the Middle East.
Conservatives and right-wing Israeli supporters have sharply criticized both the Powell trip and the president’s unheeded demand that Israeli forces withdraw from the Palestinian territories.
Undeterred, Bush repeated his demand that Israeli forces pull out quickly from Palestinian territories, in his weekly radio address on Sunday. “Israel must continue its withdrawals,” he said.
“The friction has been brewing for months, in mass e-mails, on conference calls and at weekly Capitol Hill gatherings of conservatives,” notes yesterday’s Washington Post, which adds that the dissension from the right only came into public view with the fight over the administration’s Middle East policy — specifically when Bush made demands on Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon which conservatives say were incompatible with the president’s own war on terrorism.
This severe criticism against Bush’s Mideast policy comes at a time when the president is “wildly popular” among average conservative voters and has steadily maintained very high approval ratings in nationwide polls. A new nationwide poll of voters, conducted last week by Public Opinion Strategies, a Republican polling firm, gave Bush a hefty 72 percent job approval rating on his “handling of the situation in the Middle East.”
All this is causing many Washington wonks to wonder why conservatives would risk attacking their own man.
Former Education Secretary William Bennett, popular radio commentator Rush Limbaugh, and even House Majority Whip Tom DeLay are among the many conservatives who have been critical of the president’s Mideast policy. They have called on Bush to be more supportive of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s efforts to crack down on suspected terrorist cells in the occupied territories in the West Bank.
The criticism has been so shrill, that moderate Republicans have been forced to publicly defend their own president against their conservative Republican colleagues. Go figure.
“The president is being as close to 100 percent supportive of the position of Israel in this conflict as it’s possible to be. And I think it’s the right thing to do,” said New Mexico Republican Chairman John Dendahl.
Al Cardenas, Florida party chairman, went a step further, saying the president must maintain some critical distance from the Israeli government’s actions in order for the United States to help achieve a lasting political settlement in the region.
“The president still views the role of the United States in the Middle East conflict as being a key mediator, which by definition requires tact, patience and understanding of both sides of the equation,” Cardenas said.
“To abandon that role and come down on one side would be the most significant shift in American foreign policy in 50 years — and it would not be appropriate.”
But, conservative Christian activists — many of whom call themselves “Christian Zionists” — make up an essential part of the Republican Party’s electoral coalition, and are ardent supporters of Israel.
“Most religious conservatives feel that the health of our relationship with Israel is critical to our nation,” said Virginia Republican party Chairman Gary Thomson at a recent Republican National Committee (RNC) meeting in Virginia.
“We are still predominantly a religious nation and Jesus was himself a Jew, and from a spiritual and Biblical context, that is very important,” Thomson said.
To his credit, Thomson displayed an understanding of the Mideast issue many of his colleagues have not: “There’s clearly the opportunity for people to second-guess the president and say Arafat can’t be trusted; Arafat is very important and if there is a way to move him to a solution, then we’d better do it. I don’t want American foreign policy to be dictated by any one country.”
