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El Salvador vote divides 2 Arab clans

In 1913, two Palestinians, Elias Handal and Musa Ali Saleh, left their homes in Bethlehem for a two-month boat ride across the ocean to start a new life in a distant land.

First setting foot in Central America, selling fabric from sacks on their backs, the two friends never imagined that Saleh’s grandson and Handal’s great-nephew would today be facing off across El Salvador’s bloodied political divide as the two leading candidates for president.

If opinion polls are accurate, the winner of Sunday’s race will not only come from a Palestinian immigrant family but also from one of two families that began their New World journeys together.

Tony Saca of the right-wing ruling party and Schafik Handal of the leftist former guerrilla faction launch daily verbal attacks in a polarized campaign loaded with fear and with hate-filled memories of the civil war in the 1980s.

But for years, their families lived across the street from each other and even intermarried in Usulutan, about 50 miles east of the capital. Their parallel rise is the story of the growing influence of Arab immigrant communities in Latin America after years of discrimination, and of how a group of Palestinians left one war-torn region to struggle in another.

“He and I, we’re relatives,” Saca said of Handal. “It was part of the migration during the Ottoman Empire. They left so that their sons would not die in [World War I].”

While the Arab community is as divided as everyone else in El Salvador, a tiny nation where politics often is fought within the family, Arab leaders express pride that one of their sons will likely lead the country after years of prominence in the nation’s economic affairs–mostly as traders.

“Independent of who wins, the first feeling is one of satisfaction that our economic power will now be recognized at this level,” said John Nasser Hasbun, a Palestinian-Salvadoran who is a nephew of Bethlehem’s current mayor and a Handal supporter. “The second feeling is that the community is so divided.”

While caught up in the intense infighting in El Salvador, the community has not been able to avoid the bitter conflict in its homeland.

Dispute over plaza plaque

In January, a controversy erupted when Nasser and others built a small memorial park in San Salvador called the Plaza Palestina. El Salvador’s tiny Jewish community protested because the organizers omitted acknowledgement of Israel on the memorial’s brass map of historic Palestine.

Jewish leaders say the flap could threaten Israeli economic aid to El Salvador.

“It doesn’t bother us that there’s a Plaza Palestina, but you can’t have a map without Israel,” said Claudio Kahn, leader of the Jewish community, which numbers about 200 people. “It’s not right to think you can solve things over there [in the Mideast] from over here.”

Handal, 73, whose Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front guerrillas received support from Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Liberation Organization during the civil war, was endorsed by an Arafat envoy. If elected, he would move El Salvador’s embassy in Israel to Tel Aviv from Jerusalem.

El Salvador and Costa Rica are the only countries with their embassies in the disputed Holy City. Israel aided El Salvador’s right-wing governments and military during the country’s civil war.

Saca, 39, a former sports broadcaster and owner of a string of radio stations, has publicly tried to steer clear of Middle East issues as the candidate for the National Republican Alliance. Yet his name also appears as a donor on the controversial plaza plaque.

Among El Salvador’s 6 million people, there are about 100,000 Arabs. Ninety percent are Palestinian, and community leaders say about 90 percent of them are Christians from Bethlehem.

Their families began leaving the Holy Land in the late 19th Century to flee repression by the Ottoman Turks, and the flight peaked as World War I brewed and their sons were being pressed into military service.

The Palestinian-Salvadorans are part of a large Arab diaspora in Latin America. While they have thrived in trading, textiles and banking, it has been rare to see them run for president.

Adapting to adopted land

They long have faced prejudice and rejection among the country’s social elite. Known as “Turks” because many of their families arrived with Turkish passports, they kept to themselves, adopted Latino names and established schools and social clubs.

“In the last 10 or 15 years, there’s been more integration. Capital unites people very well,” said Javier Ibisate, an economist at San Salvador’s University of Central America.

Handal and Saleh arrived on a ship from Marseille, France, at a time when the railroad did not reach Usulutan. At first on-foot salesmen, they saved enough to buy a horse and then opened stores across the street from one other that are run by relatives today.

Saca’s grandfather, a Muslim, changed his name to Moises Gonzalez. The future presidential candidate lived in Usulutan until his father went broke in the cotton business and then moved to San Salvador where he began a career in sports broadcasting and invested in radio stations.

Eventually, Saca became president of the National Private Business Association. Relatives say the poverty of his youth helped shape his ambitions and right-wing political beliefs. He now boasts that he took no active part in the war and that his “hands are clean.”

“The war started, and we all suffered,” said Alberto Avolevan, 84, an uncle whose father was born in Jerusalem.

Two of Saca’s brothers and a sister repeated their grandfather’s sojourn when they departed for the United States. They live in California, from where they once supported their family back in El Salvador.

“We already had a bad situation in the family, and the war made it worse,” said Ricardo Eduardo Saca, 47, a brother who is a doctor outside Los Angeles.

A different journey

A generation older, Handal led a very different life as head of El Salvador’s Communist Party and one of the war’s most well-known guerrilla commanders.

Handal’s father and uncle followed their Uncle Elias to Usulutan in the early 1900s after their father disappeared. Handal’s father came as a stowaway and was almost thrown overboard when discovered.

“They came for the same reason that people from here are now leaving for the States, to search for a better life,” said Jose Orlando Handal, 66, the candidate’s brother.

The family’s Handal and Nephews store still occupies a prominent corner in town, while the extended clan has prospered with cattle-ranching lands, salt-extraction plants and a bakery.

Handal entered politics young, inspired by a strike against a 1940s military dictator. His activities led to several imprisonments and exiles, while a brother disappeared while in police custody and his father was forced to sell his share in the family business.

As the election nears, the two families fondly recall their mutual friendship: one of Handal’s cousins married Saca’s uncle, and Handal used to hunt with Saca’s father.

In Usulutan, Handals and Sacas still greet each other on the street, trading gentle barbs about the vitriolic political campaign. But behind the smiles, the feelings are stronger.

“It hurts you and infuriates you more because it’s people that you’ve known,” said Ana Isabel Handal, 68, the candidate’s sister.