Bethlehem – Ma’an – An anti-wall leader in Bil’in village suggested on Saturday that former US President George W Bush was just as worthy of receiving the Nobel Peace Prize as Barack Obama, who won on Friday.

“Why didn’t the committee give the prize to Bush?” asked Iyad Burnat, head of the village’s Popular Committee Against the Wall, in a statement on Saturday.

“I remember nine years ago Bush had a good speech about the establishment of a Palestinian state in the year of 2005,” he said. “Why didn’t you give the prize to this man at that time, and he got shoes instead? This is injustice!”

“You worked very hard, eight years with killing children, starting wars and supporting the occupation, and they gave the prize to another man,” Burnat added. “I am so sorry Mr Bush.”

Turning serious, the official said he heard the news that Obama won on Friday after he “came home from our nonviolent demonstration in Bil’in, after the soldiers shot tear gas and after seeing the violence of the Israeli soldiers.”

“When I heard this from the media I started to go crazy,” he said. “I asked myself why. The Americans are still in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Palestine is still occupied. In the recent news I saw that the Israeli soldiers closed Jerusalem, and I heard that many people were injured. We haven’t seen anything changed.”

“Sorry, but we are still under occupation and it makes us very crazy because we see every day and night the suffering of our children, and it’s killing us,” Burnat said. “We hear in the speeches that the president talks about peace, but nothing has changed.”

He asked “our friends in the Nobel Committee, why didn’t you choose quality? … Do you think that Obama can make peace, and why didn’t you wait until he actually made the peace? Maybe he will invade another country.”

The anti-wall leader said awarding Obama the Nobel would make people “more violent” for instilling false hope. “To deserve a Nobel prize you need to work, not talk. We need the work to be done now, not tomorrow. We need our land now, not tomorrow.”