On his second visit to Syria, in the summer of 2001, Bishara was again accorded a state welcome, and even held a two-hour meeting with the new president, Bashar Assad. Bishara later reported that he and the Syrian leader were of one mind concerning the conditions necessary for agreement between the two countries. “He cannot give up one inch of the Golan Heights,” Bishara said, adding that “such a concession would be madness from the point of view of his moral and substantive legitimacy in Syrian society.”³⁶

Bishara, moreover, feels no need to justify the apparent contradiction between his adamant calls for liberal reforms in Israel and his open sympathy for the Syrian regime. During his first visit to Syria, his only criticism of that government’s brutal practices was that “They are certainly not my cup of tea.”³⁷ After meeting with Bashar Assad during his second visit, he explained that the new president of Syria was not “a liberal democrat in the Western mold…. Bashar does not believe that liberal democracy is an option for Syria at the present time…. [Democratization in the West] is a process that took several hundred years.”³⁸ It is worth noting the contrast between Bishara’s lukewarm criticism of Syria and the concrete call for democratic reform that was published in 2001 by a number of Syrian intellectuals. In an interview on the Lebanese television channel LBC, Bishara mocked their efforts—triggering a sharp response from the reform-minded Syrians. One of them, Subhi Hadidi, described Bishara as “the Syrian information minister” and assailed him for supporting the oppression of Syrians while he benefits from the open society in Israel. “How, in the name of Allah, can he be patronizing to his Syrian brothers who are demanding the rights that he enjoys in Palestine, courtesy of his Zionist enemy?”³⁹

Nor is Assad the only despot to enjoy the public admiration of Arab MKs. During and after the Gulf War, several of them showed sympathy for Saddam Hussein’s objectives, if not always full support for his actions. In an interview he gave to the Hadash party newspaper, Al Itihad, on the day after Iraqi Scud missiles hit Israeli cities in January 1991, Hashem Mahameed declared that by invading Kuwait, Hussein had restored the glory of the Muslim tradition to the Arab nation.⁴⁰ Prior to the start of the Gulf War, Ahmed Tibi offered an explanation for this pro-Iraqi mood:

There is more sympathy among Israeli Arabs for Iraq than for other Gulf states. Saddam is seen as a courageous man who can stand up to the United States, which in our eyes was always the most consistently anti-Arab power and has granted approval and provided political, military, and economic backing for [Israel’s] occupation of the territories. Second, there is no love lost between Arabs in Israel and the corrupt oil princes. Third, even we, the Arabs of this country, would like to see a strong military force… with bargaining power against the U.S.-Israel axis.

Tibi went on to say that “in no way does this mean we would call on Saddam to launch missiles with chemical warheads at Tel Aviv.” But this reservation, he explained, was not due to any fear that Arabs might be hurt alongside Jews, but because no “serious person” in the Arab world considers the destruction of Israel to be a practical option: “There are also Arabs who do not want to destroy Israel, not because it is illegal or inhuman, but because it is unrealistic.”⁴¹

Occasionally, the solidarity with Israel’s enemies shown by Arab members of Knesset goes so far as to include encouragement for continuing the armed struggle against the Jewish state. In a response to Hezbollah attacks after the IDF pullout from Lebanon in late May 2000, Israel bombed a Syrian radar installation, killing three Syrian soldiers. United Arab List leader Abdulmalik Dehamshe lost no time in sending a telegram offering condolences to the Syrian president on the “martyrdom” of three “sons of Syria… during a criminal attack by Israel’s fascist government… that is bent on war and refuses to take the road to peace.” The attack, he wrote, “shows the need for Arabs to close ranks and put an end to Israel’s extreme actions.” He even referred to the place from which the telegram was sent as “Nazareth, Palestine 1948” and signed it “in the name of our people, ‘the inside Arabs’ of 1948.” Dehamshe also sent a telegram to the king of Jordan asking him to cancel the proposed visit of the Jordanian foreign minister to Israel as a means of protesting the attack on Syria.⁴²

Again, it is important to emphasize that the solidarity shown by Arab MKs for groups and regimes engaged in armed struggle against Israel is not limited to a rejection of the 1967 “occupation” or of Israel’s presence in Lebanon. Hezbollah maintains its commitment to its struggle against Israel even though Israel withdrew from Lebanon; the leaders of most Palestinian terror organizations, Islamic as well as secular—including Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine—openly advocate armed opposition to Israel regardless of any concessions the Jewish state might make regarding the West Bank or Gaza; likewise, at no time has Saddam Hussein distinguished between the “Zionist occupation” of 1948 and that of 1967. Arab MKs’ identification with the PLO dates back to well before that organization officially recognized Israel in 1993, to a time when the PLO’s stated aim was the destruction of Israel, and it has not wavered even since the Palestinians launched the current war in September 2000 and rejected Israel’s offers at Camp David and Taba to satisfy almost all of their territorial demands. Moreover, the fact that Arab MKs regularly support individuals and organizations whose ideology is far removed from their own strengthens the conclusion that at the root of this solidarity stands no common ideological or political vision other than their commitment to undermine the foundations of the Jewish state. To this end, even Christians, Marxists, and Islamic radicals are prepared to work hand-in-hand; even self-proclaimed liberals and humanists are willing to ally themselves with tyranny.

 

The support Arab members of Knesset have shown for the struggle against Israel has often included expressions of understanding for, or even identification with, violent acts committed against Israel, including those that are unmistakably terrorist in nature. Arab MKs have repeatedly encouraged Palestinian violence against Israel through veiled statements of support or even explicit calls to carry out terrorist acts. In a speech delivered in Gaza during a visit of Israeli Arab representatives in 1992, Hashem Mahameed called upon the Palestinian people “to use all means in the fight against oppression and occupation—stones are not enough, Intifada is not enough.”⁴³ A month after the Palestinians launched the current campaign of violence in September 2000, Hadash leader Muhammad Barakeh told students at Bir Zeit University that “we welcome and applaud this Intifada and believe it is the right response at the right time.…”⁴⁴

Abdulmalik Dehamshe has been particularly consistent in his glorification of violent struggle against Israel. During a 1997 visit to Syria, he announced that “the Arab nation will win by the sword on its way to the honor that it longs for and to victory, and we will return to our homeland with our head held high. The victory will come thanks to the Arab nation’s jihad.”⁴⁵ In July 2000, when he visited the Al Aksa mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem at the invitation of the PA-appointed Mufti of Jerusalem, Dehamshe declared that he was ready to be “leading the martyrs in the defense of Al Aksa.”⁴⁶ Two weeks before the outbreak of rioting by Arab citizens of Israel in October 2000, he attended a meeting of the Supreme Monitoring Committee of the Israeli Arab leadership and openly advocated violence against police officers carrying out their duties: “We will break the arms and legs of any policeman who destroys an Arab house. The Arab public is going through a difficult period. We are on the verge of a new, massive, and popular Intifada of Israeli Arabs.”⁴⁷

In an interview he gave after the Palestinian Authority’s violent campaign began in September 2000, Dehamshe described the new reality created by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s visit to the Temple Mount, which Palestinians cite as the trigger for the current violence. “This is a war that every Muslim will take part in. There is no Green Line at Al Aksa; it will be continued throughout the entire State of Israel.”⁴⁸ About a year later, he again spoke of his willingness to be a martyr: “I am prepared to be a martyr in the defense of the Al Aksa mosque and the sanctuaries of Islam against anyone who tries to harm them.”⁴⁹ Next to the Sarafand mosque near Caesarea, which according to Palestinians was destroyed by Jews, he promised that the structure would be rebuilt “even if blood is spilled.” Similarly, he is quoted as contending that the only way to deal with the expropriation of land from Arabs is through sacrifice and bloodshed: “Only martyrs will stop this process. The time has come to fight with all our might, and if this means blood will be spilled, so be it…. Only through combat can we stop the expropriations.”⁵⁰