The Middle East: An Alarm Bell to the Biden Administration
by Khaled Abu Toameh • June 3, 2021 at 5:00 am
If you want to look at the positive aspect of this whole thing...many [Palestinian lists] had very young people... reformists -- people who want democracy, who want regime change, who are saying, "We are fed up with corruption. We want new, young leaders. It is time to get rid of the old guard represented by Abbas."
The Biden Administration was quick to announce the resumption of financial aid to the Palestinian Authority, unconditionally... which I think was a mistake.... If you are rewarding the Palestinian Authority without demanding anything in return, you will have no leverage with the Palestinian Authority anymore. You have already given them what they wanted, so why should they do what you ask them in the future?
If the Biden Administration thinks that President Abbas will return to the negotiating table with Israel and resume the peace process because they have resumed the financial aid to the Palestinian Authority, that is not going to happen. If it happens, President Abbas will not be serious about the peace process....
President Abbas is also now under attack by many Palestinians.... He will not be able to make any concessions to Israel because people will say, "You are an unelected leader. You are a dictator. You have been in power for more than 15 years without elections. Who voted for you?" This will all have a negative impact on any future peace process.
What worries me is not that Fatah and Hamas are at each other's necks and killing each other. They have been doing that for years. What worries me is that... all these leaders are continuing their incitement against Israel.... That is what is driving all these terrorists to go out and carry out all these attacks.... [and] emboldening the radicals. It is promoting terrorism.
You delegitimize Israel in the eyes of your people, the Palestinians, to a point where your people will never accept any kind of an agreement or compromise with Israel.
This incitement has to stop.... I would have liked to see the Biden Administration tell the Palestinian Authority, "Listen. We will resume financial aid to the Palestinians, but before we do that, on Palestine TV, can you please stop calling for jihad? Can you please stop publishing or broadcasting all these messages that encourage violence?" But the Biden did not demand any of these things....
If you want to rejoin the [Iranian nuclear] agreement, at least make sure that they abide by it.... that they are not hiding things. You cannot just walk back into an agreement without verifying it. A nuclear bomb in the hands of Iran is not only a threat to Israel.
Listen to what the Arabs are saying: "We are also worried. These mullahs in Iran will not hesitate to use any type of weapon... who is going to prevent them in the future from using nuclear bombs against moderate Arabs, moderate Muslims, or any other Arab or Muslim?"
When we talk about a solution [to the Arab-Israeli conflict], I can think of 10,000 solutions. Everyone here has a solution.... If you ask Hamas, they will tell you... replace Israel with an Islamic state. If there are some Jews who would like to live as a minority, they are welcome. Otherwise, get out of here or I will destroy all of you.
President Abbas has a solution. He is saying Israel must give me 100% of what I am demanding, which is all of the West Bank, all of Gaza, and all of East Jerusalem. On top of that, I want the right of return... to bring millions of Palestinian refugees into Israel itself.... I want the Palestinian state next to Israel. Then I want to turn Israel into another Palestinian state by flooding it with millions of refugees. These are unrealistic solutions. No one takes them seriously.
I think that at present, all Israel can do is work with any Palestinian who wants to work with you and shoot back at any Palestinian who shoots at you.... Maybe, right now, there is no solution that will satisfy the needs or the demands of the Palestinians.
Unfortunately, any Palestinian state you have in the near future will be the same. We have reached a situation... where people in the West Bank, even in Gaza, tell me, "We hope one day, we will have a democracy like the one the Jews have in Israel." Do you know how many times I hear in Ramallah people telling me, "We wish one day that we will have our own Knesset"?
Any Palestinian leader under the current circumstances who tells Israel, "Okay, Israel, I will sign an agreement with you that will give me 90% percent," will be shot.... executed in a public square and condemned as a traitor. President Abbas knows that.... Because Palestinian leaders keep telling their people that anyone who makes concessions to Israel is a traitor.
If you are going to give us a Palestinian state that is going to look like Sudan in the past, or Syria, or Lebanon, and all those other failed states, no thank you. Just leave us alone.... We do not want another failed Muslim, Iranian‑backed dictatorship in the Middle East. It is bad for the Arabs before it is bad for Israel.
Many journalists in the mainstream media appear not to be interested in certain stories here, particularly ones that reflect negatively on Arabs or Palestinians. Most are only searching for stories that reflect negatively on Israel, that have an anti‑Israel angle.
That leaves the rest of us opportunities for publishing stories that the mainstream media in the West do not want.
In addition to Palestinian affairs, I also follow the Arab world -- where it is important to discuss Iran.
In the last few weeks, many people in the Arab world, especially in the Gulf countries -- Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates -- are extremely worried about the way the Biden Administration and the Western powers are dealing with Islamic Republic.
