O YOUR Highness the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, decide on it and make it happen.
After the signing of the Oslo Accords between the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and Israel about 30 years ago, the Palestinian issue is no longer just an Arab issue. Rather, it has become an Israeli-Palestinian affair. Therefore, it is necessary for everyone to look at their reality and their interests, instead of clinging to slogans, which are mere pipe dreams.
To put it bluntly, the people of the Gulf Cooperation Council no longer accept putting the interests of the Palestinians ahead of their own affairs.
This is due to the fact that it suffered from financial and political blackmail, and delayed development for the sake of the slogan “Palestine liberation” which the people behind the cause began to abandon. It no longer accepts false justifications for the necessity of a “state from the sea to the river” while there is security and political coordination between the authorities in Ramallah and Tel Aviv. In fact, they are today demanding a Jerusalem other than the historic Old City.
Yes, we are not at all concerned with what is happening in Gaza and the West Bank because it has become a source of political investment for the highest bidder, and an Iranian-Israeli game played by Palestinians.
This is why Gaza’s leaders kiss the hands of the Iranian leader because he has become their benefactor. In return, they take advantage of the aid provided by the Arabian Gulf states to build and own palaces in Monaco and other European cities. They spend huge sums of money on gambling tables because they believe that their spending doesn’t matter.
Your Highness, when the issue began in the 1940s, your late grandfather King Abdulaziz said to the Arabs, “Let the Palestinian people fight, and the Arab countries support them because they are the owners of that land.”
However, in 1948, the Arab countries mobilized to resist the Jews instead of following what your grandfather said, and they were defeated. This defeat was imminent because they did not know the land, they didn’t have weapons, and worst of all, each country was looking for their own gains.
Today, Israel has become a fait accompli, supported by European countries and the West with weapons and money. Its leaders had a clear plan, which was to recover the land of their ancestors, as they claimed, while the people of the land were abandoned when they were displaced to the diaspora, and slept for decades on promises to return within a month or two.
Today, the “promise” is 75 years old. Generations have been born in the diaspora and they only know Palestine through slogans and songs.
On the other hand, the rest of the organization’s parents have become wealthy people who live like kings. Their children have become businesspersons, and have their own projects. Their weddings cost millions, all of which are the money of Arab donations, especially from the Gulf, while we received nothing but insults and threats.
Your Highness, Yasser Arafat used to work and live in Kuwait in the 1960s. It supported the organization with everything, and provided it with Arab political cover.
When the “September” event broke out in 1970, the late Sheikh Saad Al-Abdullah traveled to Jordan, and accompanied Arafat on his private plane to Kuwait. However, this was a trick so that he would not be killed in Jordan.
The late Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad was also the first supporter of Arafat and the Palestinians. They were employed in Kuwaiti departments as if they were Kuwaitis. So what was Arafat’s reaction when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait? On that day, he demanded that the late Amir Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad be arrested and forced to sign a confession to relinquish rule of Kuwait. He incited that, “The road to Jerusalem passes through Kuwait”. The organizations wreaked havoc on earth, including committing murder and heinous crimes against Kuwaitis.
Your Highness, the Palestinian organizations have devoted themselves since 1967 to terrorizing Arabs, killing many of them, hijacking planes, and practicing terrorism under the slogan of “reminding the world of the issue.”
Some Arab leaders also exploited it for their own ends, starting with Egypt where some officers turned against the king, and 11 kings, namely the Revolutionary Command Council, replaced him. In Iraq, the young King Faisal and the leaders of the state were also brandished with the same slogan.
Instead of pointing the gun at the Israelis, they turned to Jordan and Lebanon, and killed tens of thousands of people.
Your Highness, we beg to ask - What have we gotten from the “cause” other than the calamities? Iran has come to rule four Arab capitals, and was aided by those investing in Arab blood under the slogan of the “Palestinian cause”. They shed blood in Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon, and Syria, and carried out terrorism against the Gulf states, starting with the assassination of the UAE Foreign Minister Saif Ghobash and ending with the Beirut Port explosion.
We have received nothing but bad news from the “cause”. To this day there are those who invest in it for personal goals. Therefore, we must approach matters in the right way, and see how the inimitable Arab leader the late Anwar Sadat understood the dimensions of this file, and worked to liberate Sinai, the Suez Canal, and Sharm El-Sheikh and Taba without war and only through negotiations.
This is due to the fact that the whole world supports Israel because of the childish terrorist acts committed by the Palestinians themselves.
Your Highness Prince Mohammed bin Salman, you do not have to do more than look at the Palestinian groups, to whom each of them sold the slogan “Liberate Palestine”, and what benefits and advantages their leaders obtain, in order to know that these people have forgotten their country for decades and have other goals, as well as realize that the world will not wait for the weak.
The Palestinian factions, which number about 20, live on political blackmail. Those who do not submit to it are assassinated, their image is distorted, or they are insulted. Meanwhile, they live a comfortable life in Israeli cities, and have their own companies in Israel.
Your Highness, pardon me as I am one of the Gulf nationals who lived through all the problems caused by these organizations.
While we were chanting for Palestine, they were plotting to kill us. While we were cutting off money from ourselves to give to them, they were spending it on sabotaging our country. They declared “Allahu Akbar” every time Saddam Hussein fired a missile at Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
Your Highness, listen to the Friday preachers in Gaza and the West Bank, and the insults hurled at the House of Saud, your father, you, and all the people of the Gulf countries.
Israel did not commit ten percent of the crimes committed by the Palestinian organizations against us, which is why we say on behalf of most of the Arabian Gulf people, “Decide on it and make it happen.”
By Ahmed Al-Jarallah
Editor-in-Chief, the Arab Times
