A Congressman's New Realism and a Senate's Old Cliches

By Pat McDonnell Twair

More than 140 Arab Americans who traveled to the Anaheim Hilton Hotel March 3 to hear Republican Representative Christopher Cox, who represents the Newport Beach congressional district, were gratified to hear a politician who seems genuinely interested in a just solution to the Palestinian-Israeli dispute.

Although Cox does not serve on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, he demonstrated to the Arab-American Republican Club of Orange County that he follows Middle East events closely.

"Many believe the problems in the Middle East are profoundly intractable and so complex that there can be no solution," he said. Then, citing recent events in Eastern Europe and Nicaragua, Cox commented, "If these things could happen, it seems the unsolvable problems in the Middle East could be solved if we have a foreign policy based on even-handedness and human rights."

It seems the California state legislature is out of step with Washington.

Answering questions from the audience, Cox said he favors the United States giving refugee status to more Soviet Jews, and Soviet Christians, as well as to Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong.

Several questions dealt with the annual approval by Congress of a $3 billion aid package to Israel. "I don't believe in a constant increase in foreign aid," Cox said. "What Eastern Europe needs, for instance, is foreign enterprise and private investment." At present, he said, Congress looks at the former year's budget with the attitude of whether or not to increase it. "An actual cut would send a shock wave to all recipients and enable Congress to have more leverage."

When asked why Congress doesn't initiate a movement to get Israel to the peace table now that the PLO's Yasser Arafat has complied with every demand of the US government, Cox said: "The key to the problem is if Secretary Baker can overcome the Jews' fearful image of Arafat."

This is not the first time the Orange County Republican Arab-Americans have hosted a congressman. "We're taking part in the political process by bringing our issues into mainstream politics, and we're looking forward to reaching out to more congressmen in our area," dinner chairman George Hanna explained.

California Resolution Favors Israeli Peace Plan

On June 26, the California Senate initiated a resolution praising Shamir's peace plan. It went through the Senate Rules Committee within three days, even as Arab American groups were writing letters of protest to Sacramento. The resolution lay dormant until Feb. 15, when Arab Americans were notified by phone that it would be heard Feb. 20 by the Assembly Rules Committee.

Victor Ajlouny, a founding member of the Silicon Valley Congress of Arab-Americans, says he was notified by the office of Tom Bane, chairman of the California Legislature Rules Committee, that those supporting and opposing the resolution would each have 20 minutes to testify. The resolution had been renamed "Relative to the Israeli Plan for Free and Democratic Elections," and much of the original wording had been deleted or changed.

On Feb. 20, Ajlouny and Hamdy Saleh, counsel for the Egyptian Consulate in San Francisco, testified, along with representatives of the American Israel Political Affairs Committee and the Jewish Community Relations Committee of Los Angeles.

Of eight changes recommended by Ajlouny and Saleh, six were adopted. These included deleting references to Israel as the "sole democracy in the Middle East" and "the democratic state of" Israel. "We were trying to develop a resolution that talked about the first step for a just and lasting peace," Ajlouny explained.

Nonetheless, it seems the California state legislature is out of step with Washington. While Secretary of State Baker was inviting Yitzhak Shamir to send his foreign minister to discuss his own election proposal with the foreign minister of Egypt and Baker, Sacramento was still pasting together AIPAC's words in praise of Shamir in Resolution 40, which still must be passed by both state houses.

Pat McDonnell Twair is a free-lance writer based in California.