Hay, golden nuggets in deal

Other Voices

ABy Ahmad alsarraf

fter waiting for long, the American President and his sonin-law, in the presence of the Israeli Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition in Israel, revealed the “Deal of the Century”, which the Palestinian leaders were quick to reject, even before knowing its details.

Other parties – international, regional and local – took different positions on the deal. Most Arab countries showed ambiguity. Senior journalists and bloggers opposed the agreement and others supported it, as the last opportunity to establish a Palestinian state, and yet others went on to highlight Israel’s ambitions and the malice of the hardliners will not leave a future for the new state, while it will continue to nibble, especially after Hamas gave up its weapons.

The opponents of the agreement may be right, but what is the next step other than standing in the cold, heat and homeless, waiting for a miracle that will not happen soon? Even the current miserable situation remains uncertain, with the Israelis insisting on the implementation of their terms of the deal, regardless of whether the Palestinians accept or reject them, especially since the Arab and Islamic worlds and the Palestinians themselves have never been so different and fragmented such as the case now.

Some say that what is on the table today will not be available tomorrow, and rejecting the deal today is part of a series of Palestinian refusals that preceded it. The British Peel Commission in 1936 proposed a two-state solution and gave the Palestinians 90 percent of Palestine, but its solution was rejected. In 1947, the United Nations proposed a solution, which met the same fate, and the rejection was the fate of the

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Eisenhower project in 1957 and the proposals of Habib Bourguiba, 1965, on the basis of “take and demand”, the Rogers Project 1978 and the Camp David Accords in 2000!

My personal stance is not different from the position of the millions who have lived in the cause since its first day, and therefore I do not find myself with the supporters or with the opponents, but with the Palestinian people, who were not asked about their opinion by anyone for nearly a hundred years.

One hundred years of struggle, individually and randomly, and seventy years of displacement, suffering and exposure to all kinds of discrimination, deprivation and humiliation, and killing from all sides, the sisterly before the friendly let alone your enemy no one ever has asked the Palestinians about the reality of their aspirations.

Seventy years in which the cause was never witnessed been free and inclusive elections for the Palestinians living in their lands and the Palestinian Diaspora; seventy years in which we have only heard the names of famous leaders that emerged, who fight and kill, and accept and reject various agreements, all in the name of the Palestinian people, without the latter having any opinion or role.

There is no doubt that every party has the right to express whatever opinions he/she wants, accepting the agreement or kicking it with feet, but what about the legitimate owner of the right?

Why do Hamas and Abbas have the right to determine the fate of more than five million Palestinians, who have suffered injustice and live in the worst conditions, whether in the Diaspora or living in ‘cloth’ camps and shanty houses, deprived of all human rights, have the same right?

The solution is not in what Trump, Netanyahu, Abbas, Hamas, or Emmanuel Macron nor any Arab leadership or people say, but rather in what the Palestinian people say, without asking them and knowing their decision, every talk about their fate remains unfair.

e-mail:

a.alsarraf@alqabas.com.kw