"As President, my promise to the people of Israel is this: I will never force Israel to make concessions," Kerry

WASHINGTON, May 4 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Unconditional support of Israel has become the common feature of the U.S. presidential election campaign with Democratic hopeful John Kerry describing Israel’s security as "paramount" and pledging never to push Israel into peace agreements against its interest.

"As President, my promise to the people of Israel is this: I will never force Israel to make concessions that cost or compromise any of Israel's security," Kerry told leaders of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) Monday, May 3, reported the New Hampshire Sunday Times on its website.

"The security of Israel is paramount. ... We will also never expect Israel to negotiate peace without a credible (Palestinian) partner. And it is up to the United States in my judgment to do a better job of helping the Arab world to help that partner to evolve and to develop."

Kerry further told the prominent Jewish group that he criticized Bush for too often "disengaging" from the effort to forge a Palestinian-Israeli settlement.

While repeating some of his standard criticism of Bush's foreign policy, he said the emphatic U.S. support for Israel - which has won Bush support from what is historically one of the Democratic Party's most reliable voting blocs - would be no less steadfast in a Kerry administration.

Bush and Kerry had embraced Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's controversial plan to unilaterally withdraw troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip at the same time they endorsed dramatic concessions to Israel about the terms of an eventual settlement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

Kerry also made a quick nod to the news of the moment, the vote in a Likud Party referendum Sunday to reject Sharon's plan.

The snubbing of Sharon by his party was a setback for Bush, and leaves the path to a settlement more uncertain than ever.

"Obviously, yesterday's vote raises questions about where things are going," Kerry said.

"Israel has long wanted to be out of Gaza. ... And whatever the future of this particular plan, if elected President I will guarantee you that I will work continuously, never disengaging as this administration did for so long, in a way that will advance that cause."

Kerry devoted much of his talk to personal reminiscence.

In animated tones, he spoke of his first visit to Israel, which he said was under the auspices of the ADL.

Kerry said he went to the (occupied Syrian) Golan Heights, visited the Sea of Galilee, and "actually stood on the Mount of the Beatitudes and read the Sermon on the Mount to those gathered with me."

The highlight, though, came when Kerry, a licensed pilot, persuaded the Israeli Air Force to let him see the country from above, by taking the controls of a training jet.

"So I went up to about 12,000 feet and proceeded to go in and do a loop," Kerry recounted, to appreciative laughter from the audience.

"And I want you to know, ladies and gentlemen, that to be able to come out upside down and look down and catch the horizon in back of me, and see all the way down into the Sinai, to the old base that had been given up, all the way across into Jordan, all the way out into the Gulf of Aqaba, and to see Israel beneath me ... and to see it all upside down was the perfect way to see the Middle East and Israel."

On his campaign website, Kerry makes it clear that his support for Israel is unwavering.

"John Kerry believes that history and our own best interests demand that the United States maintain a steady policy of friendship and support for Israel. 

"As the only true democracy in the Middle East, Israel is our most important ally, and a critical partner in the quest for peace and security in this troubled region. America’s longstanding commitment to Israel’s independence and survival must never waver."

Bush has already out-raced Kerry in wooing the influential Jewish votes by breaking away with decades-old U.S. policies.

With Sharon at his side in a press conference here, Bush told reporters that Palestinian refugees could not return to land lost in 1948 and that Israel could retain occupation of lands in the West Bank, in what is dubbed as a "Bushfour Promise".

The U.N. and the European Union immediately rebuked the American policy shift, which completely ignored dozens of U.N. resolutions in that regard.

Ever since its creation in 1948, Israel has ignored 65 U.N. resolutions aimed at giving back the Palestinians rights and lands in endless attempts to reach peace in the Middle East.