Des Moines, Iowa – Nationwide media, political pundits and United States presidential hopefuls all converged on the state capital of Des Moines this week, because it performed host to the ultimate Republican debate earlier than the Iowa caucuses.
However simply miles down the highway from the place Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis traded barbs on Wednesday night time, native businessman Mohamed Ali was unfazed.
“Honestly, we don’t care about them,” Ali instructed Al Jazeera, blowing smoke from his hookah pipe in a packed cafe exterior Des Moines. “With all the debates, they all fight and compete over who supports Israel more.”
Whereas detached in direction of the race for the Republican nomination, the 46-year-old Palestinian American father of three mentioned one factor was sure: He wouldn’t again Democratic President Joe Biden for a second time period in November.
Israel’s warfare in Gaza had been a turning level for Ali, who beforehand supported Biden in 2020.
Wearing a white button-up shirt with a light-weight blue blazer over it, he alternated between anger and stoicism — voicing rage over Biden’s assist of Israel and apathy in direction of the 2024 elections.
“The Arab and the Muslim community, they are not voting for Biden. I did not talk to a single person who said he’s going to vote for Biden,” Ali instructed Al Jazeera, as Arabic pop music blared within the background of the cafe.
He added that even the prospect of Donald Trump’s return to the White Home was not sufficient to spur Arab Individuals to vote Democrat within the presidential race.
Ali was born in Lebanon to Palestinian refugee mother and father. He studied in Tunisia earlier than shifting to New York and ending up in Iowa — the agricultural, sparsely populated state the place the primary Republican main contest will happen on Monday.
However Ali, like many Arab and Muslim Individuals, has discovered himself disillusioned with mainstream US politics because the warfare in Gaza unfolds. Biden has articulated “unwavering” assist for Israel, and his rivals within the Republican subject have all tried to outdo one another with their advocacy for the US ally.
All of the whereas, worldwide outcry has mounted over the rising demise toll in Gaza, the place an Israeli navy marketing campaign has killed over 23,700 Palestinians. Israel itself confronted genocide accusations this week earlier than the Worldwide Court docket of Justice.
So in Iowa, because the election approaches, many Arab Individuals really feel caught between Biden and a tough place.
For now, many are spending their power on native activism for Gaza. Ali himself has organised a number of Palestine solidarity protests, drawing a whole lot of individuals in Des Moines.
‘Litmus test’
Though overwhelmingly white, Iowa is dwelling to sizable Arab and Muslim communities: One grassroots venture estimated Iowa’s Arab American inhabitants to incorporate upwards of 17,700 folks, in a state of three.2 million.
One of many nation’s oldest mosques is within the jap Iowa metropolis of Cedar Rapids, an space that elected its first Arab American state legislator in 2022.
South of Cedar Rapids, within the faculty city of Iowa Metropolis, there’s additionally a rising Sudanese American neighborhood. In Des Moines, in the meantime, there are clusters of Arab and Muslim Individuals from the Center East, South Asia and Bosnia.
Whereas US Arabs and Muslims are not any monolith, greater than a dozen activists interviewed by Al Jazeera echoed the identical sentiment: They really feel alienated by Republicans, however they won’t vote for Biden.
Ending the warfare in Gaza is now the central subject for a lot of of Iowa’s politically energetic Arab Individuals. They’ve organised protests, met with representatives and pushed ceasefire resolutions on the native degree to make their voices heard.
“I find it very difficult to stomach anybody who can’t call for a ceasefire at this point, no matter what party they’re in,” mentioned Maria Reveiz, a Lebanese American yoga teacher who owns a jazz membership in Des Moines.
“I’ve left the Democratic Party. I have no affiliation. Palestine from here on out is my litmus test for anybody to get my support ever again.”
That sense of disenfranchisement amongst Arab and Muslim Individuals in Iowa has been amplified by an absence of outreach from campaigns throughout this 12 months’s presidential race.
Whereas Democrats made headlines in 2020 for organising caucuses in Iowa mosques, Republican candidates haven’t reached out particularly to Arab and Muslim Individuals, including to these communities’ lack of concern with Monday’s race.
Reveiz, a curly-haired mom of three, campaigned for Bernie Sanders in the course of the 2020 Democratic caucuses, however she has since lined a sticker of a mittened Sanders on her laptop computer with a Palestinian flag.
Sanders has not known as for a everlasting ceasefire in Gaza.
When she spoke to Al Jazeera, Reveiz’s home seemed like a shrine for Palestine: a keffiyeh above the fireside, a portray by a Palestinian artist on the wall, a shawl with the colors of the Palestinian flag on a shelf. Reveiz herself wore a pendant that mentioned “Palestine” in Arabic round her neck.
Even a Buddha statue within the nook of her lounge was draped with a Palestinian flag.
Reveiz had visited Gaza a number of instances up to now years with an help group to steer yoga courses designed to assist deal with trauma. Israeli shelling has since killed one in all her pals within the Palestinian territory.
“Ahmad Ismail,” Reveiz mentioned, whispering his identify however stopping wanting crying. “Wonderful human.”
With Israel limiting entry to meals, drugs and water in Gaza, Ismail had been on his roof accumulating rainwater when he was hit by shelling in Deir el-Balah.
Reveiz mentioned she has now contacted the workplaces of her representatives in Congress so typically that staffers recognise her. She has additionally written to the White Home demanding a ceasefire. However she has not heard any constructive responses to her requests. “It’s futile,” Reveiz instructed Al Jazeera.
Iowa Metropolis decision
About two hours east of Des Moines, ceasefire activists in Iowa Metropolis turned their consideration to their metropolis council to advance their trigger.
On January 2, the Iowa Metropolis metropolis council adopted a decision calling for a ceasefire in a 4-3 vote. Though municipalities have little energy over overseas coverage, Deema Totah, a Palestinian American professor on the College of Iowa, mentioned the measure was vital.
“We need some sort of mechanism for democracy, for our voices to be heard. And in this large country, this mechanism is through local government,” Totah instructed Al Jazeera.
“Native authorities has the power to amplify these voices, has the power to be on the proper aspect of historical past, has the power to placed on the file that there have been residents towards this — that this wasn’t the view of the USA to fund the navy marketing campaign that Israel is participating in.
“We want future history books to say that this was a unilateral decision by a government whose people did not agree with them.”
Tarweeh Osman, a Sudanese American neighborhood organiser who advocated for the decision, mentioned she felt recognised after the measure handed.
Nonetheless, she mentioned, as an Arab American, she feels “unheard” and “alienated” by each Biden and the Republican presidential candidates vying for victory in Iowa.
She famous that politicians’ staunch assist for Israel is translating into efforts to crack down on pro-Palestinian advocacy within the US. By means of instance, she pointed to DeSantis, one of many Republican hopefuls competing on this 12 months’s Iowa caucuses: As governor of Florida, he ordered a ban on a Palestinian rights scholar group at state universities.
“It’s terrifying that we’re seeing legitimate political dissent that’s protected by the First Amendment being systematically delegitimised by our political representatives to appease pro-Israel interest groups,” Osman instructed Al Jazeera.
However she added that one other 4 years of Biden may additionally show detrimental for Palestinian rights supporters, given the president’s unconditional backing of Israel.
For her half, Totah mentioned she feels “erased and discarded” by rhetoric that dehumanises Palestinians from each main events.
In October, Biden questioned the warfare’s Palestinian demise toll, dismissing the killing of civilians because the “price of waging a war”.
“I have voted Democrat in the past. But this year, I cannot vote for Biden. And I’m looking at third-party candidates right now,” Totah instructed Al Jazeera.
Ceasefire calls
Sami Scheetz, a Democrat who represents neighbouring Cedar Rapids within the Iowa State Legislature, spoke in favour of the Iowa Metropolis ceasefire decision when it was being debated earlier this month.
Scheetz mentioned his election because the state Home’s first Arab American member in 2022 displays the “strength and diversity” of the neighborhood.
Whereas he has not confronted direct discrimination, Scheetz added that advocating for the rights of Arabs and Palestinians “during the war in Gaza has come at a political cost”.
Throughout the nation, politicians important of Israeli insurance policies have confronted pushback by pro-Israel teams. For instance, the pro-Israel foyer group AIPAC is making ready to spend greater than $100m within the subsequent election to defeat progressives calling for a ceasefire in Congress, in response to a number of US media reviews.
However Scheetz mentioned his advocacy was fuelled by the “alarming reality” on the bottom in Gaza.
“It’s essential to stand against injustice and prioritise human rights, even when faced with these consequences,” Scheetz instructed Al Jazeera.
“This catastrophic devastation unequivocally demands an immediate reassessment of the current strategy, as the relentless military campaign is not only devoid of justice but also stands as a formidable obstacle to any prospect of lasting peace in the region.”
Scheetz’s Republican colleagues within the Iowa State Home are making ready a decision that fails to say Palestinians and as an alternative backs Israel’s “right to act decisively and unilaterally in self-defense” by means of its navy actions in Gaza.
However the state’s Democratic Social gathering has additionally strained relations with Palestinian rights advocates.
Final 12 months, Iowa Democratic Social gathering Chair Rita Hart condemned a Democratic scholar group for issuing an announcement that learn partially, “Could each Palestinian reside lengthy and free, from the river to the ocean“.
Newman Abuissa, the Arab American Caucus chair for the Iowa Democratic Social gathering, has pushed again towards Hart and known as on her to apologise.
Abuissa instructed Al Jazeera that Arab Individuals are attempting to make themselves heard throughout the occasion, stressing that there’s a hole between the Democratic management and nearly all of voters who again a ceasefire in Gaza.
Requested about Arab Individuals’ curiosity within the Republican caucuses, he mentioned, “We have been busy working on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for the last three months.”
A landmark mosque
North of Iowa Metropolis, Cedar Rapids has a web site steeped in symbolism for Muslim Individuals: one of many nation’s oldest mosques.
The Mom Mosque of America was inbuilt 1934 by Lebanese and Syrian immigrants. Located in a residential neighbourhood, its white constructing would mix with the snow-blanketed lawns that encompass it, if not for its brilliant inexperienced dome and awning.
When Al Jazeera visited the mosque this week, Ahmed Abdoney — a US Air Power veteran — was there taking a look at pictures of his household attending early congregations.
One picture options Abdoney when he was about 10 years previous. He mentioned his maternal grandfather was one of many founders of the mosque.
His father, in the meantime, arrived at New York’s Ellis Island within the Thirties and moved westward, working as a travelling service provider till he settled in Ohio, then moved to Iowa.
Abdoney mentioned the Arab neighborhood in Cedar Rapids grew over time, however folks there are non-public, not as seen as Arab communities in different components of the nation.
“They have been very successful in small businesses, having jobs,” Abdoney mentioned. “They help each other out. They’re always there for each other.”
Imam Taha Tawil mentioned the mosque exhibits the lengthy historical past of Islam within the US, including there are plans to develop the constructing to incorporate a guests’ centre.
Tawil harassed that the mosque is an apolitical house. Nonetheless, in 2016, he made nationwide headlines when he invited Trump to go to the mosque after the then-candidate proposed banning Muslims from getting into the US.
The imam mentioned the invitation nonetheless stands, however he doesn’t suppose the previous president will take him up on it, on condition that he didn’t reply to the unique one eight years in the past.
“The American way is to sit down and argue and try to convince me to vote for you — not attack us then ask us to vote for you,” Tawil instructed Al Jazeera.
Trump ignited additional controversy throughout his time period as president by shifting the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a transfer that was seen as rejecting Palestinians’ internationally recognised claims to the holy metropolis.
However regardless of Arab and Muslim Individuals’ tense historical past with Trump, some locally are usually not completely ruling out backing the previous president, who seems set to win Iowa and run away with the Republican nomination.
“If, by some miracle, Trump comes up with something that really shows he changed his views on Palestine, and we think he has some positive ideas, then he could be a choice for us,” mentioned Ali, the Palestinian American businessman.