Nesrine Malik: Abandoned by governments, Palestinians rely on the kindness of strangers
Until Camp David in 1978, Egypt had been Palestine’s main ally and the strongest military power in the region after Israel. The peace treaty returned Sinai to Egypt in exchange for recognition of Israel. With that normalisation, Egypt closed the door to any sort of Arab military assistance to the Palestinians for ever.
We inherited that era’s bitter disappointment. Palestine had
been such an integral part of Arab identity for so long that it came to be
known as “the case” or “the file” – an urgent unresolved issue at the heart of
our world. After the Camp David agreement, “the case” went from being a rousing
call for solidarity to something more melancholy and scattered.
The collapse of the Soviet Union and the Iranian revolution
motivated Arab and Gulf governments to ingratiate themselves with the US, and
that wouldn’t work if Israel remained
their public enemy number one. So even the lip service paid to the Palestinian
cause in the period immediately after Camp David fell away, and the
Palestinians were slowly rubbed out of the public consciousness from the 1990s
onwards….
Some
information for Israelis (and the rest of us)
Israel is committing the crime of
apartheid: Human Rights Watch
Israel Guilty of Apartheid, Ethnic
Cleansing of Palestinians: UN Rapporteur
Palestinians Shot In Kusra Clash
With Israeli Settlers
Israel admits it revoked residency
rights of a quarter million Palestinians
URI AVNERY - Is Israel an apartheid
state? // Israel announces east Jerusalem settlements
Israel subjecting Palestinian children
to 'spiral of injustice' - Children in military custody