KFAR SABA, Israel — The Palestinian Arabs resent the fact that the Saudis and other Gulf Arabs are becoming much closer with Israel, while only paying lip service to the “Palestinian cause.” Hence the Palestinian terrorists are continuing their fomenting of terror attacks against Israelis in an attempt to gain the West’s — and the Gulf Arabs’ — attention and sympathy. It’s a strategy that has worked before.
With the advent of the Abraham Accords, members UAE (Emirates), Bahrain, and Morocco, and unofficially Saudi Arabia, are already enjoying mutual benefits with Israel in economic, military, and touristic ways, as envisioned by the American planners of the Abraham Accords in the Trump administration. In its region, Israel is powerful, wealthy, and influential with the U.S. Thus, the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) has lost the attention of, and the money from, most of its former backers. While the kleptocratic, racist Fatah party ruling the P.A. still begs the West and fellow Gulf countries for money, the Hamas terrorists ruling in Gaza don’t even try to appeal to Western countries, instead relying on Iran and Qatar to support it.
With this realpolitik background, there is still daydreaming by the Biden Administration, the E.U., the U.N., and even many Israelis for a peaceful two state solution between Jews and Palestinian Arabs. This is certainly a fantasy. The clear majority of the Palestinian Arabs have no interest in sharing “their” land with us Jews. Their negotiating strategy is all or nothing, all for them and nothing for us. Negotiations with the Palestinian Arabs are pointless until they recognize and digest that Israel is predominant in its homeland.
From a Jerusalem Post article by Khaled Abu Toameh, “Hamas and the PA left out of the Middle East,” the veteran Israeli Arab journalist wrote that the PA and its leader, Mahmoud Abbas, fear the talk of a new Middle East security alliance [Negev Summit], calling it a violation of the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, according to which, “The Arabs would establish normal relations with Israel only after a ‘full Israeli withdrawal from all the territories occupied since 1967… and the establishment of a sovereign independent Palestinian state… with East Jerusalem as its capital.’”
The year 2002 is two decades ago and lots of water has flowed under the bridge. Israel is sticking more or less to the status quo, which has benefited the Jewish state very well, while the Palestinian Arabs’ strategy of adamant refusal to seriously negotiate has left them well behind the curve. And where is the curve leading to? A major coalition of Sunni Arab countries and Israel benefiting from their combined wealth, energy resources, and military power.
On Sunday, March 27, foreign ministers of the UAE, Morocco, Bahrain, and Egypt arrived in Israel for a two-day Negev Summit at Sde Boker, the kibbutz where David Ben Gurion retired. The Arab representatives gathered together with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Interim Prime Minister Yair Lapid.
The Negev Summit, the first Israeli summit with four Sunni Arab country representatives, symbolizes the immense shift in Middle Eastern politics. The meetings (the second was held in June in Bahrain) focused on regional concerns regarding Iran’s nuclear power, the likelihood of an updated nuclear deal, and condemnation of recent heightened terrorism within the region.
This security and economic cooperation with countries which at first blacklisted Israel, and later surreptitiously traded with it, marks the beginning of a new era in the Middle East. The countries interested in trade and prosperity are lining up against those Muslim nations whose primary aim is eradicating Israel from the Middle East: Iran primarily, with its acolytes Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, P.A., and partially Iraq.
As it is currently in the P.A., there has been a big drop in support for Fatah as well as for a two state solution. If there ever were an election (not likely while 86-year-old P.A. chairman Mahmoud Abbas is alive, serving in the 18th year of his “4-year” term), Hamas would win an easy majority. Abbas is deplored by more than 3/4 of P.A. citizens. The result, if Hamas takes over, would be a second “Gaza,” right in the center of Israel, partnering with Gaza on Israel’s southern border. What’s the difference between the Fatah party and Hamas? Fatah leaders wear suits; Hamas leaders also wear suits, at least the millionaire leaders. But both are terrorist organizations whose goal is the liquidation of Israel. At least Hamas doesn’t hide its intention to throw the Jews into the sea.
From the Gatestone Institute: “The Palestinians have once again shown that they have not given up the dream of destroying Israel and replacing it with an Islamist state funded by Iran and its terrorist proxies, including Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Hezbollah. 70% of the Palestinians are opposed to an unconditional return to peace negotiations with Israel. Another 58% expressed opposition to the two-state solution. Public opinion polls published over the past year have demonstrated a dramatic surge in Hamas’s popularity among the Palestinian public. The polls have shown that a majority of Palestinians support the ‘armed struggle’ (a euphemism for terror attacks) against Israel.”
Here are some of the most salient reasons that we can only expect terror and more terror from Fatah and Hamas, and why negotiations with them are futile: Terrorists are glorified and even get paid for their murderous acts; pervasive terrorist incitement affects even those who aren’t affiliated with either group; social media vilifies Jews and Israel 24/7; children learn to hate Jews from an early age, with militarized summer “camps,” school books which extol terror, and streets and plazas named after terrorist “martyrs;” the Temple Mount, known to the Muslims as Haram al-Sharif, is constantly used as a fulcrum with which to lever fear and hatred of Jews and Israel. This is proclaimed in the regular calls to “Save Al Aksa” (the mosque on the Temple Mount which is equated with the Haram al-Sharif). These alarms bring tens, sometimes hundreds, of thousands of mostly younger Muslims to the holiest Jewish site, the Temple Mount, to wreak havoc on worshipers praying at the Western Wall below the mosque, and to battle with the Israeli police and Border Guards.
Fatah and Hamas will never negotiate a peaceful outcome to the religious war that they foment against the Jews. No amount of land will satisfy them, no amount of money will buy them off, no number of Jews who become tired and leave Israel will be sufficient. But if Israel continues to prosper along with its Abraham Accords partners, perhaps eventually most adversarial Muslims in our locale will acknowledge that, “The dogs bark and the caravan moves on,” and decide to make a better life for themselves with, not against, Israel. This writer knows that placating the Palestinian Arabs with money (or land) is not the answer, like Ronald Lauder believes. (See Note)
Pre 1948 my nana shopped with Jewish friends. She is Christian. She shared recipes with her Muslim neighbours. WE were ALL Palestinian. It’s because of this I will never stop believing in all people on the land living in a way that was intended with all religions. That is not for the money or politics but for the people leading the people into peace. That is ALL people leading the people in peace. So you can take this bitter article and place it into the darkness it belongs in where it can stay forever. I actually the good Jewish people would not be happy to read such darkness. For if I believe that only my people are good and not that all people are good then I am not myself anymore.
There is more than one reason for the failure of the Oslo Accords, but at the basis lies a fundamental difference in how the conflict is viewed.
To American ears, the meaning of “two states” is unambiguously straightforward. The struggle between Israel and the Palestinians, to them, is a struggle between two indigenous peoples fighting over the same space of land in which they share a history. A fair solution, then, would be one in which Israel is the state of the Jewish people, and alongside it will exist a separate Palestinian State.
Nevertheless, according to the Palestinians’ view, this is not a conflict between two national movements but a conflict between one national movement (the Palestinian) and a colonial and imperialistic entity (Israel). Hence, Israel will end like all colonial phenomena — it will perish and disappear. Moreover, according to the Palestinian view, the Jews are not a nation but a religious community, and as such not entitled to national self-determination which is, after all, a universal imperative.
The Palestinians’ idea of a fair “two state solution” is one completely Arab state in the West Bank and one democratic binational State of Israel that allows the right of return for descendants of Palestinian refugees. It is a “two state solution,” but not the one American Jews would recognize or Israel could survive.