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Middle East: ‘Saudis and Emiratis Now Call the Shots’

"Beyond the grandiose tirades and pontificating final statements, each ‘urgent’ meeting ratifies only the league’s inaction. It is too tempting to picture this assembly (excellencies, corpulencies, marshal-presidents, rebels-turned-honourables, men elected in dubious landslides or by the slimmest of margins) at its large round table, conversing with furrowed brows before condemning Israel’s depiction of the war as ‘self-defence’ and demanding, of course, that the country ‘immediately abolish these brutal and inhumane measures’ (11 November 2023).

And what else? Threats of a military response? Calls for international sanctions on Israel like those Russia faced after invading Ukraine? A motion supporting South Africa’s case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to stop Israel’s ethnic cleansing or even genocide in Gaza? A radical re-examination of the normalisation process and – why not? – severing of diplomatic ties? Cutting Gulf sovereign wealth fund investment in the US to discourage bomb and ammunition deliveries to Israel? An oil embargo, as in 1973 after the Yom Kippur war? La shey! None of the above.

This tendency to equivocate is hardly new. In 2018, in another urgent decision following much hot air, the League announced it would develop a ‘strategic plan’ to counter the Trump administration’s move of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Wallah, swear to God, just wait and see! Six years later, the wait goes on.

How to explain such passiveness …?

Even Hizbullah, which calls the shots in Lebanon, is holding back, preferring a low-intensity conflict.” (Akram Belkaïd, Le Monde Diplomatique, March 2024)

And not a single attack in the Western countries that are complicit in another ‘liberal murder’. Since it started carrying out violent attacks in different parts of the world, ISIS has not carried out a single attack inside Israel. Reportedly, ISIS’s argument was that Palestine was and should not be ‘its priority in jihad’.

“Normalising relations with Israel,” continues Belkaïd, “buys a blind eye from Western countries on infringements of personal freedoms and political rights – plus support from pro-Israel lobbies in the US Congress.” It also keeps financial ‘aid’ flowing into Egypt.

“In Saudi Arabia, imams quote the Quran to explain that Palestine is also the Jewish homeland or to place blame entirely on Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood for the current tragedy.”

“Eager to move on, Arab leaders are abandoning Gaza. Only time will tell at what price.” 

Gulf, Israeli and Western capital will gain: arms industries, construction companies, the NGOs industry, etc.

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