25/11/2020
25/11/2020
REGIONAL and Western media outlets, including Israeli ones, are buzzing with the alleged news of a meeting between the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, sparking campaigns of betrayal from Arab factions that are known for their ties and objectives, as if Saudi Arabia committed an unforgivable sin.
Those in the frontline in defaming others of treason and insulting are forgetting the fact that their leaders coordinate with Tel Aviv, and even purchase weapons from it which end up reaching Iran via a third-party country.
What if the crown prince met with the Israelis, and Saudi Arabia went on the path of normalization? What is the harm in that?
Didn’t Riyadh offer everything it could to support the Palestinian cause from the 1940s to date? Didn’t Saudi Arabia in 1977 reject the initiative of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to visit Tel Aviv, and held reservations regarding the Camp David and Wadi Araba treaties?
On the other hand, what did the Arabs do? Were they able to uproot Israel? Or were they satisfied with denouncing, insulting and defaming others since the time the Balfour Declaration was announced in 1917?
What did the Palestinians themselves do to advocate their case to the world? At the time when the newbie entity “Israel” was weaving relations with various countries including Britain, and other European countries, the Soviet Union and Micronesia, the Arabs were boycotting anyone who signed an agreement with Tel Aviv.
In fact, that is when the Palestinians began carrying out terrorist operations in Europe, hijacking civilian aircraft, until they branded themselves as terrorists, which rendered the world to distance itself away from them … did this serve their cause?
Frankly, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states cannot go against the global consensus, which dictates that peace is the mandatory passage for stability in the region. Also, Saudi Arabia has its own national interests that will push for normalization with Israel.
This would happen despite Saudi Arabia’s clear position in this regard, which is that it will not accept the establishment of relations with Israel except after the recognition of the Palestinian state based on the Arab initiative that was born in Riyadh but which the Arabs shot down with rejection even before Israel drew its gun?
Meanwhile, the Palestinians, since 1948, have been divided into two opposing tribes on one hand, and factions hired by a particular side or country on the other hand.
It is unfortunate that they acted on the principle of maliciousness. When they saw that the Gulf states disagreed with Iran, they fell into the arms of Tehran. Their preachers openly cursed King Salman and the Gulf leaders from the daisies in Gaza, puppeted by another puppet called Hassan Nasrallah. They even support the Revolutionary Guards in sending their missiles to bomb Saudi Arabia from Yemen via the Houthis.
The Gulf nations have endured a lot from the Palestinians, such as the assassination of the Emirati State Minister for Foreign Affairs Saif Saeed bin Ghobash in 1977, orchestration of terrorist crimes in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, and the assistance offered to the Iraqi army during its invasion of Kuwait when they chanted “The road to Jerusalem passes in Kuwait”.
Despite all this, the Gulf countries did not abandon Palestine; in fact, they continued to fund its leadership and people, and open embassies, but they are still insulting us to this day.
Irrespective of everything else, normalizing ties with Israel and holding dialogue with it will help the Palestinians achieve their rights, but on the condition that they unite, and stop insulting us during the day and coordinate with Tel Aviv for security at night.
They must realize the fact that changing tactics towards achieving their objective – which is to establish a state – is inevitable; or else, it will never happen. In fact, its success will only happen with the help of the Gulf states, especially Saudi Arabia, even if relations between Riyadh and Tel Aviv exist.
By Ahmed Al-Jarallah
Editor-in-Chief, the Arab Times