[MID-EAST
REALITIES © -
MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 10/20/2003]:
There he was at it
again this weekend playing footsie with his good friend Joe Lieberman,
the Senator from Connecticut and the representative of and apologist
for Ariel Sharon and Israel. It was once again
non other than James Zogby, the Arab-American political hustler, at his
best (tongue in cheek of course!). And even after all the
many millions he has pocketed and spent on self-promotion, Zogby could
only manage to get a few hundred naive and confused Arab-Americans to
join him for his latest little conference in Detroit -- the one his
good friend Joe Lieberman exploited for his own gain rounding up the TV
cameras to show him addressing his Arab-Americans "cousins" and
"telling it like it is". Zogby is more pariah among
in-the-know activist Arab-Americans than anything else; but even so
official Washington and the corporate-media often trot him out when
they want a safe and practiced 'Arab-American' talking
head. The following two MER Flashback
articles help put Zogby, as well as the overall state of Arab-American
affairs in Washington, in clearer perspective. And from nine
years ago this two-page spoof DOGBY 'Illusions' Newsletter that Arab
American students published and mailed out hoping to expose Zogby for
what he really was then...and is even more now.
FlashBack
- "Washington Scene" April 2001:
THE TRAGIC STATE OF ARAB AMERICAN AFFAIRS
ADC Bumbles and Stumbles Leading to
Nowhere
Arab Americans Terribly Weak and Co-opted
[MID-EAST REALITIES -
MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 4/20/2001]:
Three things this week underscored the pathetically tragic state of
affairs for the Arab American community which remains, well,
politically retarded and as a result miserably weak...not to mention oh
so co-opted and manipulated.
After weeks of
"organizing" and, as usual, badly led to nowhere by the American-Arab
Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) and its third-rate group of
long-time staffers in Washington, a rather bedraggled group of about 50
managed to turn out at the "demonstration" at the Israeli Embassy
yesterday. The ADC has hardly any real grass-roots, no allies worth
discusing, and over the years has squandered even the little
credibility it once had, especially here in Washington where the
realities of the ADC scene are much better understood then in other
places around the country.
The ADC crowd is also
responsible for another little fiasco this week, pushing their
credibility with many into the minus category. After a variety of local
Arab and Muslim groups around the country invited the iconoclastic
Israeli writer Israeli Shamir to speak to them, ADC, in its usual
underhanded way, launched a campaign actually trying to discredit
Shamir as a racist and "anti-semite", urging groups to cancel his
scheduled talks. Apparently feeling threatened as usual
that someone
not under their thumb was speaking up and getting more attention then
themselves, the ADC's Hussein Ibish and an associated Chicago
super-charged activist with few credentials but much malicious
misinformation, Ali Abunemah, started sending their rantings to the
couple of incestuous Palestinian email groups they constantly try to
manipulate (those groups are themselves another sadly pathetic tale of
woe, but for another day).
So while the Israeli
army
was busy invading the Arafat-Authority areas of Gaza, still further
trying to torture the Palestinians into submission, the ADC crowd was
busy trying to defame one of the few Israeli writers loudly and
publicly calling for total equality among Jews and Palestinians; and
then wondering in a seemingly oblivious daze why their credibility is
so marginal that even with staff, friends, and onlookers, they could
only manage to get 50 people to come to their demonstration at the
Israeli Embassy at such a critical time in history. What a tragic state
of affairs.
Oh yes, and then there
is
Jim Zogby -- probably the most despised Arab American (if we are
talking about other Arab Americans that is) but also the one whom the
Saudis promote the most and who grabs for the limelight the most.
Zogby's model it seems is former mentor Jesse Jackson -- but at least
in Jesse's case he has some actual following among fellow Blacks.
Zogby went on CNN's
"Crossfire" program this week -- defender of the Palestinians he
pretends to be. In reality he is a kind of political whore funded
and
promoted by the Arab regimes to protect their own interests, front for
the "peace process", slither platitudes in his articulate way, and
considerably enrich himself as he goes (the "Builders For Peace"
Scandal another sadly pathetic story, but also for another day).
The ridiculous but
watched "Crossfire" program which promotes itself as representing all
spectrums of opinion is actually a political masquerade program
whenever the subject is the Middle East. "On the left" they had a host
that day, Robert Shrum, former Clinton/Gore "strategist", who sounded
like Ariel Sharon's campaign manager. "On the right" was the old Robert
Novak, who kept telling everyone he was a great supporter of Israel
like the Zionist leaders Yitzhak Rabin, Ehud Barak, and David
Ben-Gurion! And as guests they had the despised Zogby who
actually
represents the most right-wing and repressive regimes in the region and
who also was promoting the Clinton/Israeli "peace plan" up against the
fast-talking Sharon-appologist who is now Israeli Consul-General in New
York. Yes, we did say "pathetic"...but actually that word is no longer
sufficient in today's circumstances.
But
then, it's the same
old story really. Since the Arab American "leadership" is afraid to
protest Zogby's grotesque grandstanding (not to mention whom he
represents and how) and allows him to carry on as he does, since the
Arab American organizations can't compete in a serious and professional
way anyway and are so badly co-opted and marginalized from within (as
well as from without), this putrid rotten stinking state of affairs
persists in today's ignominious Washington.
FlashBack
- "Washington Scene" January 2003:
Zogby Miserably Exploits All
Once Again
Near Total Collapse of
Arab American Organizations in US
[MID-EAST REALITIES -
www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 1/08/2003]: For years now Jim Zogby has been
politically scaming everyone he can in Washington and the Middle East.
Zogby has become known as something of a political parasite constantly
feeding off the Palestinian conflict from all sides; always to his own
personal benefit and actually causing far more harm than help for the
Palestinians. Just a few years ago in the Clinton "Peace Process" years
it was the "Builders For Peace" project -- resulting in millions to
Zogby and friends but in the end not one single completed project to
benefit the Palestinians! Now in the Bush years Zogby has come up with
some new sordid tricks.
Heavily promoted by
the
Saudis Zogby is actually quite widely despised, even hated, by many
Arab Americans -- especially the most active and knowledgeable
grass-roots.
Zogby's latest scam is
taking place soon this month in Washington. Using a guillible
simple-minded post-student Palestinian from Ramallah as his front man
Zogby is once again miserably exploiting the vacuum caused by the
near-total collapse of Arab American organizations in Washington.
This latest political
scam -- complete with another help-them-out photo visit to the White
House -- is being called the "1st Annual National Arab-American
Professional Conference". Anyone with any dignity and smarts will stay
away...far away; but there are always those eager to cash in for
themselves, as well as those who just don't know whom they are dealing
with and how tragic the whole predicament in Washington has become.
Indeed a variety of corrupt and slippery Arab American business-types
are now expected to attend as usual. But because Zogby and chums can't
manage to get enough bodies to come -- even with the financial
subsidies they've arranged and advertised far and wide -- it's being
combined with what is called by Zogby side-kick Hanna Hanania the "5th
Annual Arab-American Conference. While the Palestinians back home are
being shot, starved, and bombed, the Zogby/Hanania crowd is going to
wined, dined and screwed -- complete with live band, DJ, and a couple
each of nearly-free breakfasts, lunches, dinners plus a "grand party"
and banquet hoopla!
What a despicable (yes,
we come back to that word) travesty it all is, with Jim Zogby
personally (along with one of his key patrons, Saudi Ambassador
'Prince' Bandar) surely the most despicable character in the charade.
It's a fitting time to recall this spoof newsletter that was
distributed by Arab American students a few years ago hoping to expose
and embarrass Mr. Jim...but sadly to little avail.
