But lest we overlook the nicer things, in numerous places in his 2010 book America’s Misadventures in the Middle East, Freeman does support the existence of the State of Israel. (For example, on p. 121, he writes, “A just and durable peace in the Holy Land that secures the State of Israel should be an end in itself for the United States.”)
In his remarks before the New America Foundation on January 26, 2011, Freeman argued that the “United States essentially has disqualified itself as a mediator” of the Israel-Palestine peace process. He argued that the US cannot “play the role of mediator because of the political hammerlock that the right wing in Israel through its supporters [in the US] exercises in our politics.” Freeman argued that U.S. vetoes of United Nations Resolutions condemning Israeli settlements in occupied territory undermine the role of international law.
In remarks to the Palestine Center on May 4, 2011, Freeman stated that “the cruelties of Israelis to their Arab captives and neighbors, especially in the ongoing siege of Gaza and repeated attacks on the people of Lebanon, have cost the Jewish state much of the global sympathy that the Holocaust previously conferred on it. The racist tyranny of Jewish settlers over West Bank Arabs and the progressive emergence of a version of apartheid in Israel itself are deeply troubling to a growing number of people abroad…. Ironically, Israel – conceived as a refuge and guarantee against European anti-Semitism – has become the sole conceivable stimulus to its revival and globalization (Meaning, look at those Jews causing all this anti-Semitism – JP) …. Israel is vigorously engaged in the collective punishment and systematic ethnic cleansing of its captive Arab populations. It rails against terrorism while carrying out policies explicitly described as intended to terrorize the peoples of the territories it is attacking or into which it is illegally expanding.”
The Jewish Press staff contributed to this report.