We Arabs in the third decade of the twenty-first century, are living through the worst period in history, as we see the occupying entity so-called Israel with its seven million settlers, is capable of humiliating us, even though our number exceeds four hundred million people. Despite its occupation of beloved Palestine, since 7 October 2023, Israel has begun committing the most heinous crimes of genocide in Gaza, destroying the infrastructure over the heads of its residents, and depriving them of food, water and electricity. As a result many children are dying of hunger, while the governments of 22 Arab countries act as if the matter does not concern them and as if the people of Gaza are not part of the Arab nation?
In this article I would like to highlight the impressions and reactions of our brothers who will succeed us a hundred years from today towards this shameful position of our governments.
I quote here the statistics of the killings and destruction committed by the occupation forces since its war on Gaza on 7th October 2023 until mid-December 2023, that is, in just nine weeks. As Israel killed more than 31,000 Palestinians in Gaza since the start of its operation, including more than 13,000 children, 9,000 women, another 7,000 people are missing, presumed dead under the rubble of destroyed buildings. By mid-December, Israel had dropped 29,000 shells on Gaza, destroying or damaging 70 per cent of homes, hundreds of cultural sites, and dozens of cemeteries searching for their dead. Experts say the scale and pace of destruction in Gaza is among the most severe in modern history.
Today, eight months after the date of aforementioned statistics, the situation has become completely different, as the number of martyrs has reached 41,000 and 90,350 wounded, most of them children and women, as a result of the brutal aggression on Gaza until yesterday, 21 August 2024. It is ridiculous to hear that President Biden, who is complicit in genocide, does not agree with the number of victims.
I am pleased to quote below the statistics of causalities, destruction and siege from an American newspaper. As usual, all American media without exception, are in solidarity with and support everything Israel does against the Palestinians in general, and Gaza in particular, including the genocide against its oppressed people. We Arabs in general realize that the financial power of the Jews is what controls the media in the United States, so their absolute support for Israel does not bother us. America is Israel, and vice versa. Recently, several videos have emerged from America, including more than one video of Bernie Sanders, the senior U.S. senator from Vermont, who is Jewish, suggesting that America is ruled by Jewish lobbyists, as well as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). But this time, Foreign Affairs magazine took an unusual path, deviating from Jewish desires, and wrote the bitter facts in its issue dated 23rd June 2024, where it stated the following:
Quote: “After nine months of Israel combat operations in the Gaza Strip, Hamas is not defeated and is not close to being defeated either. Israel invaded the Gaza Strip with about 40,000 soldiers, forcibly displaced 80% of the population, killed more than 37,000 Palestinians, dropped at least 70,000 tons of bombs on the Strip, damaged more than half of its buildings, and restricted the region’s access to water, food and electricity, leaving the entire population on the brink of starvation” Unquote.
Israel continues its land, sea and air battles, and America and the Western countries do not want this war to stop, because they have a hidden and dark agenda that they want Israel to achieve and this is what the Arab rulers who recognize the state of Israel asked US president Joe Biden to achieve, which is to eliminate all resistance movements in the region, even if this leads to the killing of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and Lebanese. Believe me, they will fail. Some Arab rulers cannot tolerate the existence of resistance in the region because they know that their people are with the resistance, and with all armed resistance movements to liberate lost Palestine, even though they recognize the existence of Israel. The war continues and the devils support the Zionist entity with weapons, equipment and financial aid to kill the oppressed Palestinian people who are deprived of their most basic rights, to the point that they cannot find food, water, or even a shroud, or land in which to bury their dead.
The question that the Arab people will ask a century from now, in August 2124, is: Where were the Arab Rulers, their armies equipped by America and the West, their oil and gas, their billions and investments, and finally The Arab League that is supposed to unite its members and defend their legitimate causes? Wasn’t Gaza in 2024 part of the Arab world? Didn’t the Arab rulers see what was happening to the innocent Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank? The horrific scenes of killing and destruction coming from Gaza made a non-Arab or even non-Islamic country like South Africa not tolerate such horrific crimes against the Palestinians and file a genocide case against Israel before the International Court of Justice? But it seems that the Arab rulers were not interested at all as if Gaza was in Africa? Then the Arabs of the twenty-second century ask: Were the Arab rulers without conscience?
As everyone knows, the people of Gaza are Arabs, speak the same language, and follow the same religion. Is it reasonable for them to remain silent and close their eyes and ears to the screams of the children of Gaza, as if the matter did not concern them, but rather concerned South Africa? The Arabs of the 22nd century add: There is no doubt that the Gaza issue had been a major dilemma for Arab rulers in the third decade of the 21st century, and by their silence, they became part of genocidal war on Gaza in the eyes of their own citizens.
The Arabs continue in their talk, saying: Just as the Arabs in the 21st century were shocked and suffered from the killing and destruction that the Arab people were subjected to in Gaza, we, the Arabs of the 22nd century, suffer and grieve over Gaza, even though all the disasters occurred a hundred years ago. They wondered: Did these rulers not feel the revolution and turmoil that was happening in the consciences of their people? Or did the rulers not care but knew that America alone was capable of harming them and not their citizens because they were well controlled and could not harm? This is true, and even the citizens did not want to harm their rulers. But certainly the Arabs wanted to see at least some action on the part of the rulers to pressure their ally and guarantor of their thrones, America, to stop the Israeli massacres against their brothers in Gaza. This is how the Arabs in the next century, 2100 AD, liberated from all foreign control, will imagine the conditions that prevailed in Gaza and the Arab countries.
And I say with all humility and appreciation to our Arab brothers in the twenty-second century: First: I thank you for your good feelings, your deep anger, and your understanding of us, the oppressed Arabs, who were unable to provide any significant assistance to our brothers in Gaza. Second: We Arabs in the twenty-first century, have ignored our rulers and the Arab League, knowing full well that they are useless. However, despite all the destruction and sacrifices that have occurred in the afflicted Gaza Strip, many positive steps have been achieved, thanks to the steadfastness of the resistance movements and their supporters from the Axis of Resistance, who have succeeded during the past ten months in returning the Palestinian cause to the forefront and to the eyes of the world.
The people of the world have realized that there is an oppressed group of people who have been expelled from their homeland of Palestine since the Belfour Declaration in 2017 and they are struggling to regain their usurped rights and these are not terrorists as described by the United States, Israel and their agents. Today, the Palestinian cause has emerged with all its force at the forefront of the international community’s priorities, after Israel, through its lies over decades, its repeated attacks, and the efforts and money of its supporters from the evil countries in the West, were able to draw the curtain on the Palestine cause. Thank God, their efforts were in vain, and the oppressed Palestinians achieved miracles through their sacrifices. Another positive step being that the resistance of the Palestinian people has stopped other Arab countries with an American orientation from recognizing Israel which were lining up to recognize the Zionist entity. Today, the Palestine cause has become a top priority for the world, the United Nations, the Security Council, International Justice Councils and the peoples of the world, not to mention that the peoples of America and Europe are repeating the scenes from the Vietnam era in demonstrating against the Israeli genocide in Gaza.
Everyone in the world, except the leaders of the United States, Britain and the European Union, feels that there is an oppressed and helpless group of Palestinian people whose country has been occupied since 1948, and that the Middle East will not witness security and peace if the Palestinians are ignored for their legitimate rights. What happened at the United Nations General Assembly, where all countries except the United States and Israel, voted in favour of establishing a Palestinian state, came in light of the steadfastness, resistance and great sacrifices of the people in Gaza. At the top of the list of positives is ending the suffering of the Palestinian people, even if some of the known devils may not like that, and giving them their rights, even if they are incomplete, to establish the State of Palestine on the lands occupied in 1967. It is expected that the process of establishing the Palestine state will begin after the end of the Israeli aggression on Gaza.
I thank the readers for reading the article, and I do not forget to thank my free Arab brothers in the next century 2124 AD for their solidarity with the Palestinian people and the oppressed Arabs in the twenty-first century.
This article was published in the Times of Oman’s sister publication Al-Shabiba on 19.8.2024. This article has been translated from Arabic into English by the author.