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DESPITE signs of defiance from the Arab states, most significantly Saudi Arabia, to US President Donald Trump’s Gaza ethnic cleansing plan, which visualises forced displacement of some two million Palestinians, a “clean out … to build Middle East’s Riviera”, the coming week will make clear if the Arab leaders’ words were just words or will translate into something more concrete.
This coming Thursday, Qatar, Egypt, Jordan, the UAE and hosts Saudi Arabia will discuss the ‘Arab plan’ reportedly being prepared by Egypt ahead of the Feb 27 Arab summit in Cairo as a counter-proposal aimed at peace and reconstruction in Gaza without displacing the Palestinians.
UAE ambassador to the US Yousef al Otaiba said in Dubai last Wednesday he saw “no alternative” to the Trump plan, fuelling scepticism about the stance of the Arab world. These doubts are magnified by the fact that the UAE is one of the main OIC Arab members to be Israel’s partner in the Abraham Accords; it is also a destination where IDF soldiers go for R&R without fearing the law.
Those who continue to harbour doubts about the real position of the Arab and the wider Muslim world point to a number of factors regarding their fears. The first is that despite strong statements against Israel’s mass murder in Gaza, it has remained business as usual for many of these states.
What is not unpredictable is the Palestinians’ will to fight for the liberation of their land.
Whilst Israel imposed a brutal Gaza lockdown and allowed in only a trickle of supplies to the besieged Palestinians, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan, according to Israeli claims denied by Jordan, left the land supply route unimpeded from the Gulf ports through their territories to Israel.
Turkey, too, has lashed out at Israel’s Gaza campaign in tough words but the oil supply from Azerbaijan via Georgia and the Turkish port Ceyhan via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline continued to the apartheid state. It supplies nearly 30 per cent of Israel’s oil needs. This was critical during its military campaign.
The Erdogan government also facilitated the rise of its proxy HTS administration in Syria, which enabled Israel to swallow additional chunks of the Golan Heights including the strategically important Mt Hermon from where Israel can monitor both South Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley, a Hezbollah stronghold, as well as Damascus to its northeast.
Notwithstanding these examples, it is also true that Saudi Arabia (which like almost all Arab and Gulf states views Islamists such as the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas as a threat to the status quo and its rule) has consistently called for a two-state solution as part of the ‘normalisation’ of relations with Israel before it enters into the Abraham Accords.
Also, the Gaza war saw Turkey’s annual $7 billion trade with Israel reduce to less than half. Turkish trade and industry sources say the remaining volume is not due to state deals, which have been banned but because of agreements between foreign-owned companies in Turkey and the apartheid state.
These facts need to be factored in but for a balanced analysis it is also important to look at the compelling factors for Arab states to oppose displacement.
Egypt has vehemently opposed displacement from Gaza to its territory for two reasons. The first, of course, is it might prove a shot in the arm for the Islamists that this government and its predecessors have fought against. Combined with the Hamas presence among displaced Palestinians, the Muslim Brotherhood may regain its power that President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has brutally suppressed.
No less important is Egypt’s fear that any future action in the occupied territories by Palestinian fighters may bring Israel’s retaliation to its soil and suck it into a new, vicious conflict, which might shred the Camp David peace accords it concluded with Israel under American auspices in 1978.
Jordan’s position is even more precarious with some 35pc of its population of 11m already comprising Palestinians, many of whom are angry at the Gaza genocide, the West Bank settlements expansions, and Israel’s riding roughshod over many areas under the Palestinian Authority. Another influx of Palestinians may well ignite the tinder box that is very unstable as it is.
An encouraging sign comes from what the Saudi government, media, public figures, and academics have been saying within the country and also while talking to foreign media. They have the same message: a two-state solution is a prerequisite to any normalisation. Saudi academic Mutlaq al-Mutairi of King Saud University has been reported as saying that Saudi Arabia will support the Arab plan even if it means compensating Egypt and Jordan for the aid that Trump has threatened to cut off.
The US president is known for taking obnoxious, absolutist positions in order to kick-start negotiations and make deals. He also remains extremely unpredictable. But what is not is the Palestinians’ will to fight for freedom and the liberation of their land as we heard from those sitting on the rubble of their homes under which lie the remains of their loved ones. They said they weren’t going anywhere.
Egyptian real estate tycoon Hisham Talaat Moustafa, quoted by Egypt’s Daily News, has proposed a $27bn reconstruction plan for Gaza as an alternative to Trump’s which he termed an “illogical and unfeasible” proposal. His plan visualises no displacement from Gaza.
Speaking on MBC TV, Mr Moustafa outlined his vision for creating 200,000 housing units in Gaza within three years. He proposed utili-sing the resources of 40 to 50 construction companies and allocating $20bn to construct enough units to accommodate 1.3m residents. A further $4bn would be invested in infrastructure, and $3bn in educational, healthcare, and commercial services.
Is Mr Moustafa’s plan part of the well-advanced Egyptian plan that unnamed officials have been referring to? And will Arab leaders prove wrong Saad Zaghloul, the leader of Egypt’s nationalist movement in 1919, who had scoffed at the idea of Arab unity by asking “zero plus zero equals what?”
The writer is a former editor of Dawn.
Published in Dawn, February 16th, 2025
