By Ray Hanania

I support abortions when they occur very early in a pregnancy or when they involve situations where the mother’s life might be in jeopardy.

I also believe that a woman should have the right to abortion when she becomes pregnant as a result of rape or incest.

But I don’t support abortion as a form of birth control.

Mother’s Day this past week means a lot to me and always has. My mom passed, but I thank her every day for not turning to abortion when she learned her pregnancy with me might be a problem.

Thank you, Mom, for having me, giving me the chance to live and not choosing to abort me. You gave me life, and for that I will forever love you.

I am sure there are a few politicians — extremists — who wish my mom had chosen abortion. I was a blue baby with a large bubble of water around my head. My heart had issues, and I lived with a heart murmur.

Growing up as a child, having a heart murmur was cool. My friends could put their ear to my chest and hear the whoosh of the blood each time my heart pumped.

Of course, I didn’t realize it would lead to complications like AFib or worse.

Still, my mom gave me a chance. For that I am grateful.

Of course, had she not, I wouldn’t be here to be grateful.

My mother and father were from Palestine, the Holy Land. Dad was from Jerusalem, and my mom was from Bethlehem, the one where Jesus was born, not the one where the nation’s first municipal water pumping station arose.

Immigrants, including from the Arab and Muslim world, don’t believe in abortion. Most are conservative on many of the issues like being anti-abortion, or supporting religious expression including in schools and work and in everyday life.

They are the centrists of the world, where they embrace some issues from the right and some issues from the left, like supporting free speech and opposing censorship.

It puts them in a situation where they often are bullied and disparaged for their views, compounding the problems of racism and stereotypes associated with the worlds from which they come.

There is also the issue of fathers and fathers’ rights. I think fathers have an absolute right to be a part of a baby’s birth, and I am offended when fathers are told to stand down.

Maybe we should move the process of giving birth away from women and put it in a test tube in a clinic, where both parents would have equal rights and women wouldn’t have to worry about someone else telling them what to do with their bodies.

Abortion is one of those anger issues where no one compromises and no one respects the views that are different. It’s like gun control.

People blame crime on the presence of guns. Others note that violence is the result of people who use guns for bad reasons. Still others believe that owning guns is a constitutional right because one day, government might crackdown on us and we might turn into Russia.

Usually, I avoid it. But when someone at the U.S. Supreme Court decided to take matters into their own hands and released to the public, anonymously, a draft opinion written by conservative Justice Samuel Alito, that person took actions that were designed to undermine our democracy.

I hope they find and punish that person to the extreme for betraying the sanctity of the nation’s highest judicial office.

Still, I know there are people out there who believe abortion is more important — for and against — than the democracy in which we live.

Alito argues basically that the decision on abortion should be made by the people directly, not by a political movement and the federal court. Each state should determine what to do and how to handle it.

Others believe that Roe v Wade took the issues out of the hands of the public, which in the 50 states would mean many would go one way and many would go the other. They want a federal ruling to impose it on everyone.

Me? Well, I believe in democracy and the right to express an opinion. I’m sure that anger, hate and even politics will drive much of the response.

But I don’t care. That’s how I feel. I think I am the moderate here. There are so few that remain in this country.

Check out Ray Hanania’s columns and political podcasts at hanania.com.