OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
President Joe Biden was seen purchasing a book that portrays Israel as a colonial power facing Palestinian resistance, despite his consistent public support for the Jewish state, during a “Black Friday” shopping trip in ritzy Nantucket.
Media outlets captured Biden leaving Nantucket Bookworks holding a copy of The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917-2017 by Columbia University professor emeritus Rashid Khalidi, according to The New York Post.
“I do not speak to the Post (or the Times for that matter), so this is not for publication, but my reaction is that this is four years too late,” Khalidi told the Post regarding Biden’s reported purchase. The Post stated it did not agree to any terms conditioning Khalidi’s response as off the record or on background.
The book argues that “the modern history of Palestine can best be understood in these terms: as a colonial war waged against the indigenous population, by a variety of parties, to force them to relinquish their homeland to another people against their will.”
It’s not clear if Biden actually bought the tome or if it was gifted to him, Fox News reported.
Khalidi, who is of Palestinian and Lebanese descent, has referred to the first Trump administration as a “mouthpiece” for Israel and has criticized Israel for the humanitarian impact in Gaza following the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023. The attack resulted in the deaths of approximately 1,200 people inside Israel and the kidnapping of hostages, including Americans.
“It’s perfectly unclear, reading the Israeli press, what their political objective is. I mean, ethnic cleansing. That’s not a political objective. They’re doing that. They’re driving the population of the Northern Gaza Strip into the Southern Gaza Strip. But what their political objective is, is, to me, entirely unclear, in the writings of, as far as one can tell, from the Israeli press,” he said on the “Intercepted” podcast in November 2023.
Fighters from the group Hamas launched a surprise attack against Israeli communities in October 2023, killing more than 1,300 unarmed civilians. Israel responded by invading Gaza and, more recently, striking Hezbollah targets in neighboring Lebanon.
Biden has consistently expressed support for Israel but has faced criticism from Israeli advocates for imposing conditions on U.S. aid to the ally and for pausing shipments of heavy munitions to Israel earlier this year, Fox noted.
At the same time, pro-Palestinian activists, who have dubbed Biden “Genocide Joe,” have increasingly criticized both him and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the civilian casualties in Gaza. Biden has also reportedly expressed frustrations with Netanyahu in private, according to the New York Post.
The book Biden was seen holding, published in 2020, predates the Trump administration’s brokering of ties between Israel and five Muslim-majority nations. It criticizes Trump for relocating the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and for recognizing Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights, captured from Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War.
In the book, Khalidi also highlights Israel’s alleged discriminatory policies toward Palestinians.
“Settler-colonial confrontations with indigenous peoples have only ended in one of three ways: with the elimination of full subjugation of the native population, as in North America; with the defeat and expulsion of the colonizer, as in Algeria, which is extremely rare; or with the abandonment of colonial supremacy, in the context of compromise and reconciliation, as in South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Ireland,” he wrote.
He also hailed the first intifada by Palestinians against Israel, which occurred from 1987 to 1993 and left more than 2,000 people dead, noted The Post.
“The First Intifada was an outstanding example of popular resistance against oppression and can be considered as being the first unmitigated victory for the Palestinians in the long colonial war that began in 1917,” the book says.
