Arab States Made Sacrifices for the Palestinians, and Got Nothing In Return

In Gaza, Hamas rules with an iron fist, imprisoning or killing anyone who dares to question its rule. In the West Bank, Mahmoud Abbas is in outward mien much less threatening than the keffiyeh-scarved men of Hamas, but he is as ruthless as they are.

Abbas is now entering the eighteenth year of his four-year term as President, and if anyone questions his rule, or his colossal corruption, that person is quickly silenced, by being threatened, arrested, or worse. Recently his most effective critic on social media, Nizar Banat, was beaten to death by Abbas’ goons.

Why are the Americans and Europeans continuing to provide money to the rulers of these police states? Do they not understand that Mahmoud Abbas of the PA and Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas are despots? Do they no realize how much money continues to be siphoned off by the corrupt rulers in both Hamas and in the Palestinian Authority? Just two Hamas leaders, Khaled Meshaal and Moussa ibn Marzouk, have each amassed fortunes of $2.5 billion, stolen from the foreign aid meant for the Palestinian Arabs. Mahmoud Abbas is no slouch, either; he and his two sons Tarek and Yasser have a family fortune now worth $400 million. “Why Arabs Are Fed up With the Palestinians,” by Khaled Abu Toameh, Gatestone Institute, July 12, 2022:

Palestinian Authority (PA) Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh recently revealed that, with the exception of Algeria, the Arab countries have stopped sending financial aid to the treasury of the PA.

Shtayyeh refrained from offering any reason as to why the Arabs had decided to cut off the funding to the Palestinians.

What could he have said? That the other Arabs are selfish swine? That won’t go over well. He can’t tell the truth – that the other Arabs gave us aid for many years, but we never showed them gratitude, we allowed our rulers to steal much of that money, we kept asking for more, and whenever they acted in furtherance of their own national interests, as by joining the Abraham Accords, we criticized their “betrayal” of the Palestinian cause.

Shtayyeh and the PA have condemned the Arab countries that signed normalization agreements with Israel during the Trump administration era. Some of these countries, especially the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, used to help the Palestinians in many fields, including financial aid and providing jobs to tens of thousands of laborers.

The Palestinian leadership has accused the UAE, Bahrain and Sudan of “betraying” the Palestinian people, Jerusalem, and Al-Aqsa Mosque (in Jerusalem) by agreeing to make peace with Israel.

It is these serious allegations that have alienated these countries and other Arabs, who are accusing the Palestinians of being ungrateful and biting the hand that feeds them.

Earlier this year, prominent Kuwaiti journalist Ahmed Al-Jarallah explained why he and many others are fed up with the Palestinians. Reminding the Palestinians of what the Gulf states have done for them over the years, Al-Jarallah wrote:

“We are the only ones who rescued them [Palestinians] in the year 1970 when they launched their war on Jordan. The late Sheikh Saad Al-Abdullah evacuated their leader Yasser Arafat from Amman. The Arabian gulf states, led by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, boycotted oil export to the western countries during the 1973 [Israel-Arab] war. Furthermore, Riyadh presented two initiatives to solve the conflict. Despite their [Palestinians’] support of Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait and their participation in acts of intimidation, abuse and killing against Kuwaiti citizens, the Gulf states continue to support the Palestinians. All of this is just the tip of the iceberg of what the Gulf states and their people offered to the Palestinians, who were and still are ungrateful.”

The Gulf Arabs have repeatedly helped the Palestinians who were at the time, and remain still now, ungrateful. They used their oil as a weapon during the Yom Kippur War in 1973, refusing to sell oil to countries that were deemed insufficiently supportive of the Palestinian Arabs. A Kuwaiti leader, Sheikh Saad Al-Abdullah, helped in 1970 to rescue Arafat and his men from Amman, after the failed Palestinian attempt to overthrow King Hussein of Jordan. Yet the Palestinians in Kuwait greeted the Iraqis who invaded Kuwait in 1990 as “liberators” and helped them to crush the Kuwaiti resistance.

And outside the Gulf, think of the sacrifices other Arab states made for the Palestinians. Egypt went to war three times on behalf of the Palestinian Arabs, expending men, money, and materiel, in 1948, 1967, and 1973. What did Egypt receive in return? Only this: Hamas members from Gaza have helped members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood to kill Egyptian soldiers in the Sinai.

The Truth Must be Told

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