Since the time of year is right, I think it is appropriate to quote Pontius Pilate’s infamous retort: Quod scripsi, scripsi (what is written, is written — roughly so).
This time however, the writing is not on a cross, but on a wall, a very big wall. This wall is the Arab nation in its glorious twenty-two states. They have collapsed a summit in Tunis and resurrection is not sure to follow.
For the first time ever, the Arab people were on the agenda of a meeting of Arab leaders. The people were there in form and tangible substance, condensed in one word: Reform.
To put it in a nutshell, the Arab leaders have everything and the Arab people have nothing. It logically follows that Arab leaders have to give something away.
It did not take long for the Arab summit to collapse, though the history of such summits should have assured the leaders that they have always been meaningless and an utter waste of time.
But something is “written”, or has been written and the wall is blaring. Life as we have known it is changing and no one can stop it.
The placid sands stretching from the Atlantic to the Gulf are agitating menacingly. It might comfort the conspiracy theorists to say that the resident on the other side of the Atlantic is blowing hard into the sand. If so, then in my book the said resident is being a “good neighbor”.
If it is legally, morally, and socially acceptable to borrow a pot from your neighbor in your hour of need, why not a constitution? “In God we trust.” If that is not an Islamic assertion, I don’t know what is.
If you are into the Zionist conspiracy theory, then Israel just showed you why it is strong, triumphant, and alive. Sharon, the elected prime minister, is being indicted (or on his way to such a fate) for something that a minor manager in an Arab company would do in a day’s work, let alone a leader or his son.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Arafat could not find anyone better than the French to “investigate” huge sums of money coming into the country in her name. Contrast and compare. Sorry to fall back on my lecturing dictum, but there you have it.
The veils are collapsing, the theories are exploding, and the Palestinian cause was nothing more than a peg on which Arab leaders hung their petticoats.
The Arab street genuinely sympathizes with the Palestinian street. But both streets are blocked and have been so for decades.
This is the reality and the hard truth. Either we see it, or it will burn us with the purity of its glare.
The only thing to do is pity the child deluded into sacrificing himself when his leaders and elders sip coffee on an air-conditioned terrace.
