Israelis strongly support Bush win

JERUSALEM — Opinion polls show that Israelis are solid in their support of President Bush on Nov. 2, considering him the best ally that the Jewish state has had in the White House.

But Palestinians, who once had high hopes from a Bush administration, now bitterly oppose the president.

Locked in a bloody conflict dragging into its fifth year, Israelis and Palestinians both have a stake in who governs the United States and holds sway in Middle East diplomacy.

Yet rarely have they been more sharply divided over an American presidential race.

“In this land of irreconcilable differences between Arabs and Jews, you can add one more thing they can’t agree on,” a U.S. diplomat said.

Opinion polls show that Israelis stand alone internationally in their solid support of Mr. Bush.

“Israel loves the president because he holds the umbrella that protects it from its enemies,” wrote Shmuel Rosner, a columnist for the Ha’aretz newspaper.

Rachel Saperstein, a 63-year-old Israeli grandmother who lives in the Gaza Strip, regards Mr. Bush as a hero.

“Who else could keep a terrorist like [Yasser] Arafat in isolation and throw Saddam Hussein in jail?” she said. “Bush wants Israel to be safe from Muslim terror.”

Though astonished at Mr. Bush’s endorsement of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to evacuate Gaza Strip settlements next year, Mrs. Saperstein fears a Kerry administration would push for a transfer of even more of the occupied land that she sees as Israel’s by biblical birthright.

Leaving little doubt that support for Mr. Bush reaches to the top, Mr. Sharon even managed to forget the name of Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee.

Palestinians are not so much enamored of Mr. Kerry as embittered by what they see as Mr. Bush’s pro-Israel bias.

They are furious with the president for agreeing that Israel should be allowed to retain large swaths of the West Bank and bar the return of Palestinian refugees under any future peace deal.

“I want to see [Mr. Bush] bow his head in defeat and lower his arrogant tone,” said Gomaa, 40, as he attended customers in his electronics shop in Gaza City.

Palestinian hostility has been fed by Mr. Bush’s perceived green light for Israel’s military crackdown in the Palestinian territories, his diplomatic isolation of their leader, Mr. Arafat, and the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

Despite that, Palestinians only cautiously prefer Mr. Kerry. They hope he will take a more evenhanded approach but see him as unlikely to seriously rethink America’s Middle East policy.

Mr. Kerry has taken pains to reassure American Jewish voters that he would be as pro-Israel as Mr. Bush, even sending his brother, a convert to Judaism, as an emissary to ease any Israeli concerns.

Israeli preferences for Mr. Bush do not transfer to American Jewish voters, normally a solid Democratic bloc.

An American Jewish Committee poll shows that Jews prefer Mr. Kerry to Mr. Bush, 69 percent to 24 percent. It is a five-percentage-point increase for Mr. Bush from 2000, when he received 19 percent of the Jewish vote.

A Zogby International poll shows 68 percent of Muslims back Mr. Kerry, while 7 percent support the president. In 2000, Mr. Bush led Al Gore among Muslims by 11 percent.

Like Mr. Bush, Mr. Kerry has made scant mention of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in speeches and debates except to vow that he will safeguard Israel’s security.

“They are competing to win the affection of the Zionist entity,” said Sami Abu Zuhri, a spokesman for Hamas, an Islamist militant group sworn to Israel’s destruction. For the Palestinians, he says, “either of them is a losing choice.”