Emissary Of Night | ليلى: I suspect this compulsion to reduce the issue down to Muslims is part of this perception of the conflict as religious but it is not that religious at all. Palestinian nationalism is a largely secular project historically and, notably, so was Zionism up until recently.

People in the political press and on here/Twitter still don't really get that Palestine is not a "Muslim American" electoral issue but an Arab American issue. The most influential and wealthy Arabs in the Western diaspore are Christians who care just as much about Palestine as their Muslim sisters.

I suspect this compulsion to reduce the issue down to Muslims is part of this perception of the conflict as religious but it is not that religious at all. Palestinian nationalism is a largely secular project historically and, notably, so was Zionism up until recently.

An interesting dynamic in the relationship between partitionism in India & Palestine is that Jinnah and the Muslim League opposed partition in Pal out of pan-Islamic solidarity, but Palestinian leaders wanted nothing to do with him, (correctly) fearing his partitionism would set a precedent for them

Do people forget that George Habash, founder of the PFLP, a hard left group, was a Christian (Greek orthodox)?

Unfortunately I doubt most Americans have ever heard of Habash or the PFLP lol

Most younger Americans never heard of the Palestinian Liberation Organization. Most Americans don't even remember that the PLO had Catholics among its number, nor do they remember that Palestine's government had Catholics serving it. Americans lack knowledge on the diverse past of Palestine.

I still remember a Catholic that was serving as a representative for the PLO in the USA that was branded as a terrorist for trying to seek donations for the PLO from American citizens... and it was one of the things that Zoomers would not have a recollection of since it was before their time.

This probably gives away my age, but I saw him give a talk in the late 90s in which he took a 2X4 to Arafat. By then, he was clearly ill.

I think a lot of people get tripped up on this because Zionism *is* a Jewish thing and because they have a Western (i.e., Christian) worldview, they figure it *must* be religious, ergo it must be a religious conflict.

Most of the Arabic people I knew personally were Christian. Most of the Muslim people I knew were white. All the Sufis I knew were Jewish. (Past tense as I’ve only seen one of these people since the late 80s)

The big sea change, imho, is post 9/11. Muslim-Americans used to be a decent center-right bloc of the GOP, and even in ‘04 the “Arab Americans For Bush” contingent was around and donating.

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