Loading ...The Backstory on Bernie Sanders and Israel-Palestine: Why Is He So Quiet About the Mideast Tragedy?
One of the most appealing qualities of Bernie Sanders’ campaign for the presidency is how consistent he is. While Hillary Clinton continually faces questions about her changing positions, Sanders is seen as the good kind of broken record; someone who says what progressives want to hear over and over again, for decades.
But there is one issue about which Sanders used to be much more outspoken, and has in recent years become very quiet: Palestine. Considering the elevated role of the Israel-Palestine issue in progressive circles, and Sanders’ continued success leading up to the primaries, it’s worth revisiting Sanders’ history on the topic and his early approach to foreign policy.
Burlington’s Foreign Policy
Sanders’ first big political office was as mayor of Burlington, Vermont in the early 1980s. Under the Sanders administration, Burlington was rejuvenated, becoming a much more equitable and progressive city. But not all of his policies were focused on the city.
“[H]ow many cities of 40,000 have a foreign policy? Well we did,” writes Sanders in his memoir Outsider In The House. “I saw no magic line separating local, state, national and international issues.”
It was this sort of thinking that convinced Sanders to bring linguist and foreign policy critic Noam Chomsky to speak in Burlington in 1985, mostly about U.S. policy in Latin America. Latin America was a hot topic in the city, and Sanders frequently wrote to federal leaders to condemn U.S. involvement there. The same year he invited Chomsky, he traveled to Nicaragua, witnessing the casualties of the U.S.-sponsored civil wars firsthand. “I will never forget…dozens and dozens of amputees in wheelchairs – young soldiers, many of them in their teens, who had lost their legs in a war foisted on them and financed by the U.S. government,” he wrote in his memoir.
Speaking Up For Palestinians, Once
Jesse Jackson’s progressive-charged 1988 campaign for the Democratic nomination, which Sanders endorsed, prompted Sanders’ first politically articulated views on Israel-Palestine. Political reporters pressed Sanders to explain his support for Jackson and to react to attacks on Jackson’s belief that the Palestinians have a right to an independent state. Jackson had been under heavy fire for this stance from the Democratic establishment, led by then-Senator Al Gore.
Sanders offered support for Jackson’s position, and went further when asked about Israeli treatment of Palestinians during the first intifada (uprising against the occupation). “The sight of Israeli soldiers breaking the arms and legs of Arabs is reprehensible. The idea of Israel closing down towns and sealing them off is unacceptable,” Sanders said.
“The United States of America is pouring billions of dollars into arms and into other types of aid in the Middle East. Has the United States of America used its clout, the tremendous clout that it has by providing all kinds of aid to the Middle East, to demand that these countries sit down and talk about a reasonable settlement which will guarantee Israel’s sovereignty, which must be guaranteed, but will begin to deal with the rights of Palestinian refugees,” said Sanders.
A reporter asked if Sanders was asking the United States to impose sanctions. He said he wasn’t, but did say that “you have the ability when you are the United States of America, which is supporting the armies of the Middle East, to demand that these people sit down and support a reasonable settlement.”
“Or else what?” asked another reporter.
“Or else you cut off arms,” suggested Sanders. “If the United States goes into the Middle East and demands a reasonable, a responsible, and a peaceful solution to the conflict that has gone there because of its clout because of the tremendous amounts of money that it is pouring into that region I think we can do it.”
Source: www.alternet.org