(AINA) -- The American Middle Eastern National Conference (AMENC), based in Washington, D.C., is pleased to announce that they have endorsed George W. Bush to be re-elected as President of the United States.

The AMENC is a coalition of Americans of Middle East descent who express the aspirations of various religious and ethnic backgrounds including: Arab, Maronites, Assyrian, Chaldean, Syriac, Persian, African, Copt, Berber, Sunni, Shiite, Orthodox, Melkite, Jews, Druze, Lebanese, Iraqi, Syrian, Egyptian, Libyan, Sudanese, Palestinian, Jordanian, Algerian, Yemeni, Arabian, Kuwaiti, Afghani, Iranian, Turk, Moroccan, Mauritanian, Ethiopian, and others.

The following is the text of AMENC's endorsement in full:

"We the undersigned, declare our endorsement of President George W Bush for a second term as a President of the United States. We base our endorsement on the President's support of policies we deem in line with the aspirations and agendas of the majority of Americans from Middle Eastern descent. We especially support the principles which the President has articulated in the areas of U.S. national and homeland security, the international campaign against terrorism and the promotion of human rights, democracy and self determination in the Middle East." This endorsement is based on the following:

1. The War on Terrorism: We support the Campaign against al Qaida and the other Jihadist Terrorist groups, including Hizbollah, and consider this war as a historic confrontation with an ideology which must be uprooted and denounced worldwide. The War on Terrorism is not only about arresting and eliminating Terrorists, but is also about creating changes in the region producing this ideology of mass death. We support the doctrine which considers any regime which protects the Terrorists and support them as a Terror regime which should be removed.

2. The War in Iraq: We thank the US Congress for authorizing this campaign, and we thank President Bush for taking the risk of conflict so that more than 24 million Iraqis are now freed from one of the most genocidal dictators in modern History. The removal of Saddam Hussein is a central part of the War against Terrorism. We denounce those who opposed the liberation of Iraq as indirect associates of Saddam's mass murderer. We support the democratic process in Iraq and feel that the re-election of President Bush would bring hope to the Iraqi democratic forces and ensure international support to the emergence of Iraqi democracy

3. Democracy and Human Rights: We thank President Bush for declaring a campaign to spread Democracy and freedom in the Broader Middle East. We as Americans from Middle Eastern and North African descent reject the notion that our mother societies do not deserve democracy. We praise the President's agenda of supporting Human Rights, especially the rights of Women, youth and minorities in the Middle East. We feel that with President Bush's policies and principles we will be able to assist our mother civil societies in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Algeria and elsewhere to move towards Democracy.

4. Syria's occupation of Lebanon: We thank the President for signing the Syria Accountability and Lebanon Sovereignty Act of 2003 and for instructing our US delegation for introducing, and passing the UNSCR 1559 calling for the end of Syrian occupation of Lebanon. Lebanese-Americans are particularly appreciative of these initiatives and resent the previous policies of allowing Syria to crush the Lebanese people.

5. Syria's reforms: We thank the President for pressing Syria to end its alliance with Terrorism, including with Hezbollah, the foreign Fighters in Iraq and Hamas and Islamic Jihad. And also for pressuring the Baathist regime in Syria to conduct democratic reforms.

6. Sudan and Mauritania: . Sudan and Mauritania: We thank the President and his Secretary of State Colin Powell for declaring the crisis in Darfur as Genocide and for extending help to end the 21 year civil war which has claimed over 2.5 million lives in southern Sudan. We thank the President who repetitively called for an end to Slavery in Sudan and Mauritania. We encourage the President to bring more pressure to bear on the radical Islamist regime in Khartoum, to finalize North-South Naivasha agreement, and use this agreement as a blueprint to end the violence in Darfur. The North African Americans, urge their brothers and sisters of the African American community to vote for President Bush as a way to free more slaves in Africa and defend our common African heritage from oppression.

7. Minorities: We thank the President for insisting on the rights of minorities, particularly the endangered ones such as the ChaldoAssyrians in Iraq and Syria and the Copts in Egypt. We believe that under a Bush second term, more autonomy should be extended to the ChaldoAssyrians in Iraq, more human rights recognized to the Copts of Egypt and recognition of all other minorities in the region so that they would survive the threat of Terror and discrimination.

8. Libya: We thank and congratulate the President for succeeding in the process of disarming the Libyan regime of Muaamar Qadhafi and feel that a second term of the Bush Presidency will press the Libyan regime to reform, and release the political prisoners.

9. Afghanistan: We praise the President for his leadership in removing the Taliban and helping in establishing a democratic Government in Afghanistan

10. Israel-Palestine Conflict: We value President's Bush call for a two states solution with a secure Israel and a Democratic Palestinian state living side by side.

11. Homeland Security: We thank the President for introducing and Congress for passing the Patriot Act. We stand by the President in his policies of developing counter Terrorism and furthering diversity, and tolerance. We praise President Bush for his stand during and since the barbaric attacks of September 11. We feel he expressed not only the sentiments of the majority of Americans but also the majority of Middle East Americans.

Based on these 11 principles of policy, we hereby call on more than 5 million Americans from Middle East and North African descent to vote for George W Bush as President of the United States for four more years

Professor Walid Phares, Ph.D, FL
Lebanese American

John Hajjar, Esq., MA
Lebanese American

Dr Joseph Gebeily, MD
Lebanese American

Engineer Tom Harb, FL
Maronite-American

Linguist Jacob Keryakes, NJ
Coptic - American

State Senator, John J. Nimrod, IL
Assyrian-American

Sheba Mando, IL
Assyrian-American

Jamal Kalabat, MI
Chaldean-American

Dr Zuhdi Jasser, AZ
Muslim-American

Farid Ghadry, MD
Arab Syrian American

Mohamed Eljahmi, MA
Arab Libyan American

Mohamed Mansour Kane, NY
African-Mauritanian-American

Jimmy Mullah, Washington DC
African-South Sudanese American

Abderhaman Tajeldin, NC
African-Darfur-American

Jamal Hassan
South Asian American, MD