Iraq said Friday US president-elect George W. Bush would try to dupe the Arab world over the Middle East peace process and that the only way forward for the Palestinians was holy war.
The Ath-Thawra daily, mouthpiece for President Saddam Hussein's ruling Baath party, said Bush would copy his predecessors in letting US foreign policy be controlled by "the hegemony of the Zionists."
"Bush's father already deceived everybody once, Bill Clinton deceived everyone twice in the course of two terms in office and now Bush will deceive again," it said in Iraq's first official reaction to the US election results.
As president in 1991, George Bush, father of the president-elect, led the multinational Gulf War effort to drive Iraqi troops out of Kuwait, and he remains a detested figure in Baghdad.
"Does Bush junior have something that his father or his successor didn't have?" Ath-Thawra said, calling on the Palestinians to launch a "jihad," or holy war, to win their liberation from Israeli control.
"In order to liberate Palestine, jihad is the only proper, sensible, realistic and practical strategy," the daily said, also taking a swipe at those favoring a negotiated peace with the state of Israel.
"Those who believe that probably have the false hope that the new American president is going to deliver a magic solution," the paper said.
"The problem with such people is that they refuse to recognize that (the choice of peace) no longer exists," it said.
"All that is left for those people to do is to go chase after some new mirage, agree to more shameful concessions, and act like card-playing losers who keep on playing and playing until they've sold the shirts off their own backs" -- BAGHDAD (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
