Retiring President Biden hit the retailers on Black Friday and shocked onlookers by selecting up a duplicate of a guide describing the institution of Israel as “colonialism” that’s been met with Palestinian “resistance” — an acquisition its writer bemoaned was “4 years too late.”
Biden, 82, left Nantucket Bookworks holding in full view of the press a duplicate of “The Hundred Years’ Conflict on Palestine: A Historical past of Settler Colonial Conquest and Resistance, 1917-2017” by Columbia College professor emeritus Rashid Khalidi.
The guide argues that “the trendy historical past of Palestine can greatest be understood in these phrases: as a colonial warfare waged in opposition to the indigenous inhabitants, by a wide range of events, to power them to relinquish their homeland to a different individuals in opposition to their will.”
Khalidi, a Palestinian American, refers to President-elect Donald Trump’s first administration as a “mouthpiece” for Israel and accuses Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of main “probably the most excessive authorities” in his nation’s historical past.
The Arab Research educational slams what he describes as slanted press protection in favor of Israel.
“I don’t communicate to the Submit (or the Occasions for that matter), so this isn’t for publication, however my response is that that is 4 years too late,” Khalidi advised The Submit, which didn’t supply or conform to any phrases conditioning that response as off the report or on background.
It was not instantly clear if Biden bought the guide or if it was given to him whereas within the store — after he and first son Hunter Biden, 54, dined with first daughter Ashley Biden and different members of the family on the close by Brotherhood of Thieves restaurant forward of the island’s annual Christmas tree-lighting ceremony.
Biden has repeatedly referred to himself as a Zionist, that means a supporter of the Jewish motion that spurred immigration to the Holy Land, resulting in the institution of the state of Israel in 1948.
“You don’t should be a Jew to be a Zionist. I’m a Zionist,” Biden advised visiting Israeli President Isaac Herzog on Nov. 12 within the Oval Workplace.
The retiring commander in chief visited Israel in a present of help shortly after Hamas terrorists murdered about 1,200 individuals on Oct. 7, 2023, and needed to cut back his public appearances afterward, as livid activists persistently heckled him as “Genocide Joe” for backing Israel’s invasion of the Gaza Strip.
1000’s of pro-Palestinian protesters descended on the White Home final November chanting “F–okay Joe Biden” and “Genocide Joe has gotta go” — with some even portray the moniker on the White Home gates alongside crimson handprints.
Biden has more and more criticized Netanyahu previously 12 months over civilian casualties in Gaza and reportedly has used expletives to explain him behind closed doorways.
The Zionist motion started within the nineteenth Century with European emigres buying land within the historic Jewish homeland, then held by the Ottoman Empire, and continued below the British mandate following World Conflict I.
Khalidi’s guide knocks Trump for enacting a variety of insurance policies reminiscent of shifting the US embassy to Jerusalem and recognizing Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights from Syria. The work was printed in early 2020 earlier than Trump brokered diplomatic relationships between Israel and 5 Muslim nations.
“Trump’s individuals deserted even the shabby previous pretense at impartiality. With this plan, the US ceased to be ‘Israel’s lawyer,’ turning into as a substitute the mouthpiece of probably the most excessive authorities in Israel’s historical past,” wrote Khalidi.
The guide prescribes “a path based mostly on equality and justice” that ends “the oppression of 1 individuals by one other.” It cites discriminatory Israeli insurance policies in opposition to Palestinians, whom Khalidi notes are of each Muslim and Christian backgrounds.
“Settler-colonial confrontations with indigenous peoples have solely led to one among 3 ways: with the elimination of full subjugation of the native inhabitants, as in North America; with the defeat and expulsion of the colonizer, as in Algeria, which is extraordinarily uncommon; or with the abandonment of colonial supremacy, within the context of compromise and reconciliation, as in South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Eire,” he writes.
“If the elimination of the native inhabitants just isn’t a possible consequence in Palestine, then what of dismantling the supremacy of the colonizer with a view to make potential a real reconciliation? The benefit that Israel has loved in persevering with its undertaking rests on the truth that the principally colonial nature of the encounter in Palestine has not been seen to most People and lots of Europeans.”
Khalidi writes that the “well-liked resistance” amongst Palestinians “might be anticipated to proceed to mount.”
The writer praises the First Intifada by Palestinians in opposition to Israel, which left greater than 2,000 useless after practically six years of riots and rock-throwing between 1987 and 1993.
“The First Intifada was an excellent instance of well-liked resistance in opposition to oppression and might be thought-about as being the primary unmitigated victory for the Palestinians within the lengthy colonial warfare that started in 1917,” the guide says.
He has much less constructive phrases for the following Second Intifada that’s higher identified for suicide bombings concentrating on Israeli civilians, which resulted in a infamous safety fence segregating Palestinian enclaves, writing that “the Second Intifada constituted a significant setback for the Palestinian nationwide motion.”
The Nantucket outing got here simply three days after Biden introduced a US-brokered cease-fire between Hezbollah and Israel, as his administration continues to hunt the discharge of each American and Israeli hostages held by Hamas with a view to finish the warfare in Gaza.
White Home spokespeople didn’t instantly reply to The Submit’s request for remark.
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