I found the news that Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, is working to strengthen ties with the on again off again mostly defunct state of Palestine to be very interesting.

Venezuela plans to open an embassy in Palestinian territories and upgrade its ties to ambassadorial level, President Hugo Chavez said on Friday, to support Palestinians in their struggle against Israel.

“We have decided to designate an ambassador and open an embassy in Palestine,” Chavez said after talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

“We now have a charge d’affaires; we will name an ambassador in coming days as part of accords to boost our bilateral relations,” he said.

Among aid agreements signed Friday were scholarships for 20 Palestinians to study medicine in Venezuela. Chavez said he saw Venezuela offering many more educational grants.

“We must tell the Palestine people how many scholarships we will give to Palestinian youth so they come and study what they need,” he said. “They can be short and long, pre-graduate or post-graduate, technical and training studies.”

When Palestine can offer next to nothing to any nation/state that supports it (there is no money for military support, no natural resources to speak of, and most of the people that Venezuela is offering those scholarships to can be forcibly denied the right to exit Palestine or return to it once they’ve left, there seems to be very little that Palestine can offer Venezuela. Which really made me wonder, what in the hell is Chavez thinking? Is he really a great humanitarian after all?

But then I got to this part of the article:

Chavez charged the United States, using a recent agreement to expand U.S. troops’ access to Colombian military bases, aimed to turn Colombia into “the Israel of South America.”

The U.S. presence in Colombia endangered Venezuela due to the doctrine of “pre-emptive security,” he said. “They assume the right to attack any country with whatever excuse.”

“Colombia, the Israel of South America — this is an aim of the United States,” he said. The United States could spy from Colombia on other South American countries, he added.

Last month, Colombia and the United States signed a pact increasing U.S. access to military bases in Colombia. Washington is relocating its regional anti-narcotics hub to Colombia from Ecuador.

So, of course, when Venezuela is Palestine and Palestine is Venezuela, the rhetoric of Colombia being the Latin American Israel makes sense. Venezuela is the couragous resister of imperial violence and subjugation, Venezuela is crafty and spirited–the David standing against Goliath.

In essence, Venezuela is supporting Palestine so that Venezuela can have a bit of the Palestinian story. The only problem is, Venezuela gets a peice of that story of resistance without actually having to live through the violence that Palestinians are resisting.

Any little bit of help is going to help the Palestinians, so I’m not going to get too nit-picky or outraged over Venezuela’s appropriation of Palestinian experiences. I’m sure in my ways, most Palestinians hope that their stories get used by governments again and again just so that they can get some help from the desperate situation they live in.

But even as I’m not going to get too outraged, I think it’s good to notice what is going on so that we don’t all get too carried away with emotions and feelings. Chavez may be acting in a more humanitarian manner than other dictators, presidents, and/or politicians are–but he’s still a dictator/president/politician who is fully capable of using other people and nations to fit his own needs.

Something I hope all the activists on the left remember.