Republican US presidential candidate Congressman Ron Paul will have to answer to pro-Israel supporters following a blog post by a former senior aide stating Paul wishes Israel “did not exist”.
Posting on the “Right Wing News” blog, former campaign coordinator and national organizer for Paul Eric Dondero wrote that he “never heard a racist word expressed towards Blacks or Jews come out of [Paul’s] mouth,” and never heard him say anything “that could be called ‘anti-Semite’”.
However, Dondero stated that he is certain Paul wishes Israel would disappear.
“[Paul] is most certainly Anti-Israel, and Anti-Israeli in general,” Dondero wrote. “He wishes the Israeli state did not exist at all…. his view is that Israel is more trouble than it is worth…. he sides with the Palestinians, and supports their calls for the abolishment of the Jewish state and the return of Israel, all of it, to the Arabs.”
Dondero related a story about a meeting between Paul and the Houston Jewish Young Republicans in which Paul chastised the group for supporting Israel. “He berated them, and even shouted at one point, over their un-flinching support for Israel. So much so that the 6 of them walked out of the office,” Dondero said. “I was left chasing them down the hallway apologizing for my boss.”
Paul’s feelings about Israel are not related to his feelings about American Jews, according to Dondero. “Again, American Jews, Ron Paul has no problem with,” Dondero said. “In fact, there were a few Jews in our congressional district, and Ron befriended them with the specific intent of winning their support for our campaign.”
Paul’s spokesman, Jesse Benton, responded to the blog post by telling CBS Political Hotsheet that Dondero is a “disgruntled former staffer who was fired for performance issues,” who has “zero credibility”.