Arabs: "Palestinians Repeat the Same Mistakes"
by Khaled Abu Toameh • September 21, 2020 at 5:00 am
At this pace, Palestinians might wake up one morning to discover that they no longer have any friends in the Arab countries at all.
"The Palestinians failed to establish their state. They failed because they did not want to establish a state. Here I mean the political leaders, some of whom still insist on repeating revolutionary phrases. The establishment of a Palestinian state will be a burden on the Palestinian leaders and will prevent them from practicing corruption.... The Palestinian Authority is no longer suitable to represent the Palestinian people." — Iraqi writer Farouk Youssef, Al-Arabiya, September 19, 2020.
"Israel did not destroy Syria; Israel did not burn Libya; Israel did not displace the people of Egypt; Israel did not destroy Libya, and Israel did not tear up Lebanon. Before you Arabs blame Israel, take a look at yourselves in the mirror. The problem is in you." — UAE Islamic cleric Wassem Yousef, Twitter, September 16, 2020.
"Palestinian leaders failed to invest in opportunities. They failed to take strategic decisions and chose [instead] to forge an alliance with Iran." — Saudi writer Yusef al-Qabalan, Al-Riyadh, September 18, 2020.
The biggest losers, of course, are again the Palestinians -- who are quickly losing the sympathy of a growing number of Arabs.
The Palestinians have recalled their ambassadors to the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in protest of the signing of the peace deals between the two Gulf states and Israel. The Palestinians are now threatening to withdraw their envoys from any Arab country that follows suits and establishes relations with Israel.
In addition, several Palestinian factions have urged the Palestinian leadership to withdraw from the Arab League to protest the refusal of the Arab countries to condemn normalization with Israel. Earlier this month, the Arab League foreign ministers refused to endorse a Palestinian draft resolution condemning the UAE for its decision to make peace with Israel.
"The resolutions of the Arab League are mortgaged to the Zionist American administration," the factions said in a statement. "Normalization [with Israel] is a huge betrayal of the Palestinian issue and a stab to the sacrifices and pain of the Palestinians and Arabs."
