On Thursday, June 20, Governor Rick Snyder cut short a trade mission to Israel that was supposed to last nine days. The governor arrived to Israel on June 15, but headed back early to Lansing to take care of legislative business.

The visit, which marks the governor’s first official trip to the Middle East, comes at a time when notable intellectual figures and academic institutions are boycotting the Zionist state for its racist policies and occupation of Palestinian land in the West Bank.

This visit ought to be objected to on principled and political grounds.

Israel has a long history of well-documented human right abuses, which range from military occupation and home demolitions, to indefinite detention and indiscriminate targeting of civilians.

These abuses are mostly committed against Arabs. It is most unfortunate that the governor of the state that that is home to the largest concentration of Arab Americans, outside of the Middle East, decided to visit a country with numerous documented abuses against this same group of people.

This visit is very offensive and remains unclear as to why it is necessary to Michigan’s economy, especially when considering that the State has a number of trade partners in the Middle East, other than Israel. For example, Saudi Arabia ranks fifth in countries that import Michigan’s products.

In 2012, Michigan exported $117 million in goods to Israel.  This is only a fraction of the $1.7 billion in Michigan-made exports to Saudi Arabia.

By visiting Israel, Snyder has, not only disregarded the feelings of our community, but he has also disregarded potential investors from oil-rich Arab Gulf countries.

During his visit, Snyder celebrated, in his official capacity, the 90th birthday of Israeli President Shimon Peres.

“It is a tremendous honor to take part in this event and witness so many pay tribute to President Shimon Peres on his 90th birthday,” Snyder said.

In 1996, Peres, as the Prime Minister of Israel, commanded “Operation Grapes of Wrath,” during which hundreds of Lebanese civilians were murdered by the Israeli war machine.

Thousands of Arab Michiganders remain haunted by the pictures of the dismembered bodies of children in Qana.  This travesty was carried out by the Israeli government when it was headed by Peres. On April 18, 1996, the Israeli air force bombed a clearly marked United Nations compound that sheltered defenseless Lebanese refugees, most likely with Israel’s knowledge.

Amnesty International’s investigation of the Qana Massacre revealed that the Israeli army “intentionally attacked the U.N. compound, although the motives for doing so remain unclear.” A U.N. investigation concluded that the shelling, which killed 106 Lebanese civilians, was “unlikely…a technical or procedural error.” And Human Rights Watch described the massacre as a “violation of a key principle of international humanitarian law.”

I wonder if Snyder knows that two of the 36 children murdered by Peres and his government in Qana were Michigan citizens. Hadi and Abdulmohsen Bitar, of Dearborn, both under 10 years of age, were visiting their grandmother in south Lebanon, before the Israeli offensive started. They took refuge in the U.N. building, which, sadly, could not protect them from the Israeli bombs.

Peres, who is known among members of the Arab American community as the “Butcher of Qana,” is a war criminal, whose crimes targeted the relatives and families of some of Snyder’s constituents. It is unacceptable that our governor celebrated his birthday.

Israeli abuses are not exclusively directed against Arabs, though.

While the governor has previously spoken to children at an education program that provides intervention and treatment services to Ethiopian-Israeli children, which was, in part, established by the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, he ought to know that Israel does not want Ethiopian children in the first place. 

Israeli newspaper Haaretz revealed earlier this year that Israeli medics have forced Ethiopian women to take Depo-Provera birth control vaccination, without explaining the effects of the drug, which can prevent women from becoming pregnant for up to two years.

Ethiopian women said that taking the drug was a requirement to immigration to Israel. The Israeli government vowed to investigate the matter and denied responsibility for forcing the drug on women, without denying the practice itself.

Snyder did not even make the few constructive points he could have made in Israel.

He did not mention Michigan’s Arab American community in his visit. While, he could have hinted at how the coexistence of Jews and Arabs in Michigan can be a model for lasting peace in Palestine in Israel, he did not.  It appears that he has chosen to dissociate himself from Arabs in a country that does little to hide its racism against them.

No one expects Snyder to campaign against the Israeli occupation. As a governor, foreign policy is not his business, or jurisdiction. However, when he decides to make a visit to Israel, he is inadvertently choosing sides in this age-old conflict in the Middle East–something he should not be doing, especially when considering that thousands of his constituents are not happy with the side he is picking.

The sitting governor has not been a friend to our community. Perhaps, he will see our discontent with him at the ballot box, if he runs for reelection in 2014.