Three calamities hit the world last week. The first was the fury of Katrina that devastated New Orleans and the second the Iraqi stampede deaths on a Tigris bridge. The third was Pakistan’s decision to establish diplomatic relations with Israel.
Though the Arab and Muslim public was shocked by Pakistan’s decision to begin relations with the Zionist state, the behind-the-scene efforts between the two countries have been going on for quite some time. It was not surprising that the Muslim parties and groups in Pakistan reacted angrily by observing last Friday (Sept. 2) as a day of mourning. Only those who are familiar with Pakistani people’s deep sentiments over Islamic issues, particularly Palestine and Jerusalem, could fathom the depth of the disappointment and bitterness felt by the people of that country. The most outstanding feature of this nation is the Islamic identity on which the country was founded. Anything that damages that identity deeply hurts the people. That is why the government’s drift toward Israel is viewed as a huge political blunder. This can let loose forces that could wreck the very foundations of the present administration. The situation in the country could be compared to the developments in Mauritania where the people’s anger at President Walad Al-Tai’s decision to established normal diplomatic relations with Israel led to an uprising that finally unseated him.
Even if the domestic reactions are ignored, the Pakistani move is apparently a catastrophe because it amounts to the most heinous diplomatic crime in the Islamic world. True, Turkey established diplomatic relations with Israel long ago and Israel maintains unannounced relations with several Muslim countries. Turkey is a secular country that considers itself politically closer to Europe than to Muslim and Arab countries and never wanted to identify with the Muslim countries. On the contrary, Pakistan is a country built on Islamic identity and the Palestinian suffering is the issue closest to their hearts. Muslims view the attempts of a few Muslim countries to make secret deals with Israel as outrageous though it is less detestable than open relations. The secretiveness of the relations, moreover, is a sign that they respect their people’s sentiments. To have open friendship with Israel, however, is to legitimize all the horrible violations and illegitimate activities perpetrated by the State of Israel. It also sends a signal to other Muslim countries to welcome Israel to their midst.
For the past five decades the Muslim and Arab countries have been considering any relation with Israel as a taboo. They feared that any open friendship with Israel would eventually lead to the Palestine issue being removed from the Arab agenda. In other words, friendship with Israel in the present context means sidestepping the Palestine issue and whitewashing the Zionist state’s ethnic cleansing program in Palestine.
Islamabad’s decision also means that Israel has succeeded in misleading several countries into believing that its pullout from Gaza is in compliance with the UN Resolution No. 242 and the road map for peace. If the Israeli pullout is understood as the initiative to found an independent Palestinian state and thus solve all related issues it betrays a lack of understanding of the realities. The ground reality is that Gaza has not yet become free from the occupation as Israel is adamant on besieging the territory and controlling all land, sea and air entry and exit points to it.
Islamabad’s move to befriend Israel also sheds light to the extent of American influence on Pakistan’s decision-making process. Even the religious education in the country is not free from the mounting American pressure. It also proves the huge price a sovereign nation has to pay to become a US protégé.
Pakistan’s justification to seek Israeli friendship is that it would enable the country to play a serious role in the peace process. No one including Israelis seems to take this claim seriously. While welcoming Pakistan’s decision as “historic,” Israeli newspapers did not hide their suspicion that Islamabad’s real motive was to get closer to Washington. An Israeli political analyst wrote that Israel was lucky to become a ticket counter for any one who wants to gain entry to the heart of the US. Israel is playing the role of ticket collector who pockets the price of tickets anyhow. Another disturbing news carried by an Israeli newspaper was that Israel’s “harvesting season” had come and prizes would be showered on Sharon by Arab and Muslim countries for withdrawing from Gaza. The report added that Pakistan’s move was one of those expensive prizes. Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot wrote about the Israeli representatives in Dubai: “They are diplomats working in total secrecy to comply with the wishes of the authorities there.” Such reports have come several times before but were denied by the Dubai authorities as baseless.
Until now we did not take seriously the Israeli claim that at least 10 Arab and Islamic countries would establish normal relations with Tel Aviv before the year was out. But the developments before and after the pullout have succeeded in making it almost a reality. The faltering Arab unity and the tightening American hold on the region are, undoubtedly, two major factors that accelerate the fulfillment of Israeli efforts.
The disastrous tendency of individual countries establishing relations with Israel had its beginning with its signing separate peace agreements with Egypt first and then with Jordan. The inevitable consequence was the weakening of both the Palestinian and Arab positions. The weakness has been exploited to the maximum by Israel. Its influence now extends across all Muslim and Arab countries rendering the joint Arab stand useless, particularly over the Palestinian issue.
Israel is now striving to close the file of the Palestinian issue and drop it from the Arab and UN agendas.
The commendations and prizes from the Muslim countries would obviously help Israel achieve this goal. Such a situation may be acceptable even to some Arab countries but revolting to the Muslim and Arab public with unpredictable consequences.
The Arab quest for the peace and settlement of the Palestine issue has lost its momentum. The earlier consensus was that if Israel withdraws to its 1967 positions, Arab countries would normalize relations with the Jewish state. This was initiated by King Abdullah, custodian of the two holy mosques (then he was the crown prince) at the Beirut summit. Therefore any individual Arab country’s attempt to normalize relations with Israel should be within the framework of the Beirut resolution.
I wish that the Arab summit, which has been postponed until the Egyptian presidential elections are over, renewed the initiative of King Abdullah at Beirut summit so that Israel would not get more Arab countries to normalize relations with it without any commitment in return.
.
