• Vice president of the Arab American Action Network
• Anti-Israeli activist

Born in Washington, DC on December 29, 1971, Ali Abunimah is a Palestinian American who serves as a Board of Directors member for the Arab American Action Network and the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center. He is also a co-founder of the Electronic Intifada website, which was created by activists affiliated with the International Solidarity Movement. His personal website, abunimah.org, acts as a clearinghouse for his writings, which are fiercely hostile toward Israel and the United States.

Abunimah authored the 2006 book One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, which rejects a two-state solution for the Mideast conflict and proposes instead the creation of a single, united, democratic state for Israelis and Palestinians alike.

In Abunimah's calculus, Palestinian violence and terrorism is caused entirely by Israel's "land confiscation," its "ongoing orgy of violence," and its "routine human-rights abuses" that have "made life under a seemingly endless occupation so intolerable." In February 2002 he characterized "Israel's humiliation and virtual imprisonment of [Yasser] Arafat" (after the Palestinian leader had failed to prevent or discourage a recent wave of suicide bombings) as confirmation that then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his supporters had "never given up the dream of a Greater Israel stretching from the Mediterrannean to the Jordan River and perhaps beyond." 

According to Abunimah, "Zionist leaders, academics, and propagandists are actually professional, malicious liars as much as they are violent, merciless murderers." From that premise, Abunimah reasons: "[I]f lying is Israel's best policy, … shouldn't the world … doubt the Zionists' official stories about … the holocaust, for example? … Indeed, if Zionists could lie about their present and ongoing torment of my [Palestinian] people, usurpation of my homeland and arrogation of my rights, and they do it rather obscenely, couldn't they likewise lie, equally obscenely, about the holocaust, an event that took place over half a century ago?"

Abunimah is strongly opposed to America's military operations in Iraq, whose 2003 invasion he called a "massive assault on a small, defenseless country by an uncontrollable superpower." "We should also remember," he added, "that America's armed forces are disproportionately composed of the economically and socially disenfranchised, people who, denied a slice of the 'American dream' at home by failing schools, racism, the prison industry, and growing economic inequality, must seek to escape by joining the military. Empires have always sent their poorest, least educated and most marginalized to fight in the distant provinces."

In the late 1990s, Abunimah met Barack Obama when the latter was a representative in the Illinois state senate. “He [Obama] impressed me as progressive, intelligent and charismatic,” says Abunimah. “I distinctly remember thinking, ‘if only a man of this caliber could become president one day.’”

In 2001 and 2002, the Woods Fund of Chicago, whose Board of Directors included Obama, made grants totaling $75,000 to Abunimah’s AAAN.

According to journalist John Batchelor, Abunimah “has remembered Mr. Obama’s speaking in 1999 against ‘Israeli occupation’ at a charity event for a West Bank refugee camp; and Mr. Abunimah … has also recalled Mr. and Mrs. Obama at a fundraiser held for the then-Congressional candidate Obama in 2000 at Rashid and Mona Khalidi’s home, where Mr. Obama made convincing statements in support of the Palestinian cause.” “[Obama] came with his wife,” Abunimah said. “That’s where I had a chance to really talk to him. It was an intimate setting. He convinced me he was very aware of the issues [and] critical of U.S. bias toward Israel and lack of sensitivity to Arabs.... He was very supportive of U.S. pressure on Israel.”

Said Abunimah in March 2007, “Over the years since I first saw Obama speak, I met him about half a dozen times, often at Palestinian and Arab-American community events in Chicago including a May 1998 community fundraiser at which Edward Said was the keynote speaker. In 2000, when Obama unsuccessfully ran for Congress I heard him speak at a campaign fundraiser hosted by a University of Chicago professor. On that occasion and others, Obama was forthright in his criticism of U.S. policy and his call for an even-handed approach to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.”

In June 2007 Abunimah said, “When Obama first ran for the Senate in 2004, the Chicago Jewish News interviewed him on his stance regarding Israel’s security fence. He accused the Bush administration of neglecting the ‘Israeli-Palestinian’ situation and criticized the security fence built by Israel to prevent terror attacks: ‘The creation of a wall dividing the two nations is yet another example of the neglect of this administration in brokering peace,’ Obama was quoted as saying.”

In January 2008, Abunimah told interviewer Amy Goodman: “I knew Barack Obama for many years as my state senator -- when he used to attend events in the Palestinian community in Chicago all the time. I remember personally introducing him onstage in 1999, when we had a major community fundraiser for the community center in Deheisha refugee camp in the occupied West Bank. And that’s just one example of how Barack Obama used to be very comfortable speaking up for and being associated with Palestinian rights and opposing the Israeli occupation.”

In March 2007 Abunimah alleged, with displeasure, that Obama had become more sympathetic to Israel in recent years. Said Abunimah: “If disappointing, given his historically close relations to Palestinian-Americans, Obama's about-face is not surprising. He is merely doing what he thinks is necessary to get elected and he will continue doing it as long as it keeps him in power.”

“The last time I spoke to Obama was in the winter of 2004 at a gathering in Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood,” Abunimah added. “He was in the midst of a primary campaign to secure the Democratic nomination for the United States Senate seat he now occupies. But at that time polls showed him trailing. As he came in from the cold and took off his coat, I went up to greet him. He responded warmly, and volunteered, ‘Hey, I’m sorry I haven’t said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race. I’m hoping when things calm down I can be more up front.’ He referred to my activism, including columns I was contributing to the The Chicago Tribune critical of Israeli and U.S. policy, ‘Keep up the good work!’”