United we stand with Palestinians

PALESTINIANS have been fighting amongst themselves even prior to the death of Yasser Arafat and it is easy to assume that this is the true character of Palestinians - that they just cannot unite at all. Indeed, the Zionist lobby will say that "Palestinians will never lose the chance to lose the chance of peace".

Such propaganda is very powerful and overbearing, and it has worked in the West since the end of World War II in 1945; that Palestinians are inept sore losers, incompetent peace negotiators, and poor visionaries and that their abject state of human development is due to nothing else but the fault of their Palestinian leaders.

Thus, no matter how many concessions the Palestinians were willing to make, either since 1948 when Israel was created through the one-sided Balfour Treaty, or after the Six Day War in 1967, all Tel Aviv had to do was to raise the bar when negotiating.

If Palestinians asked for the "right of return," where the several million-strong Palestinian diaspora was dispossessed of their lands - which forms the first layer of their true identity and political economy - the Likud and Labor government would say "no".

The moment the Israelis put their foot down, everything that they negotiate will always go downhill. Why? To begin with, even if there is a two-state solution, the best and the brightest of the Palestinians would find it difficult to return.

In a two-state solution, the Palestinians would have a shell, rather than a structure that can process the return of those who had been chased out of their country and lands due to various conventional wars against the Israelis.

But the late Yasser Arafat was not wrong to have always told the international press that "a hand cannot permanently cover the sun." Something is bound to give in a war of attrition against Israel.

He and his colleagues - the various parties in the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) - signed the peace accord with the government of Prime Minister Yitzhuk Rabin in 1994 to inch slowly towards a real two-state solution, with the caveat that the right of the return of the first wave of the Palestinian refugees would never be struck off.

Since the demise of Yasser Arafat, PLO has broken into several groups and with Hamas winning most of the election(s) in Gaza, which neighbours Egypt, and President Mahmoud Abbas taking hold of what remains of the ramparts of the West Bank, the Palestinians are clearly split by Israel into various factions.

Give the circumstances at work, where Palestinians are being manipulated by Israel, their Zionist movement and an American president who is panicking about being re-elected by Nov 3, 2020, Malaysia should not do what Bahrain has done by establishing a diplomatic relationship with Israel.

There are 57 predominantly Muslim countries in the world, of which the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, not excluding Egypt, Morroco and Turkey have had some form of relationship with Israel. Of these countries, Turkey is perhaps betrayed by Israel the most, as Israel continues to conduct a stealthy campaign to back the Kurds or PKK against Ankara. Unless Israel wants genuine and comprehensive peace beyond an authentic two-state solution with Palestinians, Malaysia should not join the bandwagon to recognize a country like Israel that continues to practise apartheid. Perhaps it is time for a new alliance - an Alliance of Muslim Nations - led by more progressive Muslim nations like Turkey, Malaysia, Indonesia, Qatar, Pakistan and Iran to recalibrate the thought process as to how the many issues faced by the Muslims globally, are tackled credibly. Otherwise, there will be just "baklawa" and "lamb mandi" meetings as we see in the impotent OIC (Organisation of Islamic Cooperation)!

Dr Rais Hussin is the president/CEO of Emir Research, an independent think-tank focused on strategic policy recommendations.