Azmi Bishara: We expect the worst in Palestine under Trump’s presidency and there must be an Arab pressure group

One of the bad signs that Bishara expects is that if Israel annexes the West Bank settlements, Trump may recognize this without any Arab officials who did nothing to confront this step after the annexation of Jerusalem in late 2017.

Based on this reality, the Arab thinker asked: Why do we rule out that Trump will start from his deal with Netanyahu (called the Deal of the Century) and go further or develop it, especially after the major blow we are receiving now from the Israelis in the West Bank and the ongoing genocide in Gaza?

Another question raised by Bishara is that after the Gaza massacre, the Lebanon war, and what it is committing in the West Bank now, is it possible to ignore everything Israel has done and normalize relations with it without any consideration for the rights of the Palestinian people?

What does Trump want from the Arabs?

Bishara believed that the rulers whom Trump will address to conclude normalization with Israel must respond to him, as they are the ones who did not play their role during the war on Gaza, and “at least we expect them to do something when Trump addresses them to normalize.”

In this context, Trump will ask Arab rulers, and Gulf rulers in particular, in Bishara’s opinion, for four main issues: buy more weapons, reduce the price of oil, arm themselves, and normalize relations with Israel without fulfilling the rights of the Palestinian people.

In light of this scenario, there must be an Arab pressure group that puts its national interests on the table first, and those interests must include the Palestinian issue instead of isolating it, according to the director of the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies.

Bishara advised that Arab officials should be prepared for the pressure coming upon them, suggesting that Egypt and Jordan would be the most affected if Trump and Israel escalated their steps to displace the Palestinians.

Gaza war

In response to a question about the possibility that Trump would actually rush to end the war on Gaza, Bishara replied that the end of that war is approaching, but not thanks to Trump, but because there is nothing left of Gaza.

He went on to explain that the failure to stop the war so far is due to the fact that the political alternative is not ready according to the Israeli vision, which is a Gazan administration separate from the interests of the Gazans and the Palestinian cause under Arab supervision and above that Israeli supervision. A similar thing is happening in Lebanon according to his reading, as the Israelis are continuing the war because their conditions were not accepted by the resistance.

In the interview on Al Arabiya TV, the Arab thinker stopped at a group of paradoxes, such as Trump’s appointment of Mike Huckabee as US ambassador to Israel, coinciding with the appointments of senior ministers and officials in his administration, “as if the ambassador to Israel is like a foreign minister,” according to Bishara, who interpreted this coincidence as a message from Trump to his friends from the Zionist lobby in America, his allies and supporters, to please them.

Foreign Policy Decision

Away from the expected repercussions of Trump’s return on the Arab region and the Palestinian cause, Bishara reminded that the American president has all the powers in this country’s foreign policy, and pointed out that the margin of maneuver in Trump’s case is wider because he is surrounded by loyalists, and because there is a general impression and mood that the man has overcome all the difficulties in reaching the presidency, thus there is a feeling that he has a great mandate, even though he does not have popularity that crosses the camps, as was the case with Barack Obama and George W. Bush, for example.

But the difference, according to Bishara's analysis, is that this time the mobilization was greater among this white right-wing majority (of Trump voters), while the Democratic camp was suffering from a low voter turnout and from lethargy and fatigue from the Biden administration.

Bashara noted that Trump's most effective ads were on issues that may not concern the majority of Americans, contrary to what some Democrats think, such as transgender issues.

What if the Democrats nominated a white person? Bashara answers that American elections have often been held between white men in the past, and one of them wins, so there is no guarantee that if the Democratic candidate had been white, the result would have changed. He confirms, based on numbers and polls, that many of those who did not vote for Harris did so because she is a woman and black, and the majority of blacks voted for Harris while the majority of whites voted for Trump.

Back to Old America

As for Donald Trump’s electoral base, it has always existed and is large in number. It still believes in white American Protestant values based on what it sees as the values of the American family, fear of immigrants and gender phenomena, and convictions such as that poverty is a kind of laziness and that the state is forbidden to take the money of the rich (taxes) to help the poor. All Trump has done is speak on behalf of this trend without shame, and this is one of the reasons for his strength, according to the Arab thinker’s assessment.

Based on this, Bashara concluded that many conservatives support Trump because they are Salafis who want to return America to that stage, which is embodied in Trump’s slogan “Make America Great Again.”

But the director of the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies points out that Trump is not one of these people, but rather an opportunist surrounded by a group of newly rich parasites who, like him, came from the real estate development sectors and the unproductive bourgeoisie, and who have met on the basis of interests with this group of conservatives. He explained that this isolationist reaction in American society has not affected the major cities, but rather the countryside, suburbs, and small towns.

Meanwhile, Bashara believed that if Trump did not use his second term to make real structural changes, taking advantage of the presence of his supporters in the Supreme Court and the Republican majority in both houses of Congress, it would be a difficult period and pass, but this period is dangerous because Trump and his men will use it to make radical changes in culture, education and taxes.

Because all institutions have been closed to the forces that will oppose the elected president, and his opponents will have no choice but the street and the public space, which, according to Bashara’s estimation, will lead to the outbreak of a real conflict that will perhaps begin after the first year of Trump’s rule.

Marginal role of Arabs and Muslims

In his analysis of the role played by Arabs and Muslims in America in Trump’s victory, Bishara agreed with those who said that Biden’s foreign policy influenced thousands to be less enthusiastic about voting for Harris, but he asserted that the Arab vote in the elections was not influential, and summed up the matter with the phrase: The difference between Harris and Trump was not made by Michigan (which is considered the home of Arab and Muslim Americans in America).

Bashara summed up the crisis of Arabs and Muslims in America by saying that they were unable to reserve their own influence on the elections, because they were not organized on the basis of their issues, and because they did not agree on their issues as Arabs and Muslims.

While Bishara stressed that the Democratic Party’s positions were extremely bad regarding Gaza and the issues of our region for Arabs and Muslims, strategically and in the long term, minorities are active in the Democratic Party in order to be influential, and the bet of Arabs and Muslims today should perhaps be on that party whose majority of youth do not support Israel and oppose the occupation, according to Azmi Bishara, who expressed his belief that Arabs and Muslims who believe that Trump will protect family values are delusional, because Trump does nothing but address people’s fears, and he personally is most likely not keen on any values.

(New Arab)