Thirty-nine years ago, on Oct. 6, 1973, the third major war between the Arabs and Israel broke out
writes
Abdulateef Al-Mulhim, of the Saudi Navy (retired).
The two sides were engaged in two other major wars, in 1948 and 1967.
The
1967 War lasted only six days. But, these three wars were not the only
Arab-Israel confrontations. From the period of 1948 and to this day many
confrontations have taken place. Some of them were small clashes and
many of them were full-scale battles, but there were no major wars apart
from the ones mentioned above. The Arab-Israeli conflict is the most
complicated conflict the world ever experienced. On the anniversary of
the 1973 War between the Arab and the Israelis, many people in the Arab
world are beginning to ask many questions about the past, present and
the future with regard to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The questions
now are: What was the real cost of these wars to the Arab world and its
people. And the harder question that no Arab national wants to ask is:
What was the real cost for not recognizing Israel in 1948 and why didn’t
the Arab states spend their assets on education, health care and the
infrastructures instead of wars? But, the hardest question that no Arab
national wants to hear is whether Israel is the real enemy of the Arab
world and the Arab people.
I decided to write this article after I
saw photos and reports about a starving child in Yemen, a burned ancient
Aleppo souk in Syria, the under developed Sinai in Egypt, car bombs in
Iraq and the destroyed buildings in Libya. The photos and the reports
were shown on the Al-Arabiya network, which is the most watched and
respected news outlet in the Middle East.
The common thing among all
what I saw is that the destruction and the atrocities are not done by
an outside enemy. The starvation, the killings and the destruction in
these Arab countries are done by the same hands that are supposed to
protect and build the unity of these countries and safeguard the people
of these countries. So, the question now is that who is the real enemy
of the Arab world?
The Arab world wasted hundreds of billions of
dollars and lost tens of thousands of innocent lives fighting Israel,
which they considered is their sworn enemy, an enemy whose existence
they never recognized. The Arab world has many enemies and Israel should
have been at the bottom of the list. The real enemies of the Arab world
are corruption, lack of good education, lack of good health care, lack
of freedom, lack of respect for the human lives and finally, the Arab
world had many dictators who used the Arab-Israeli conflict to suppress
their own people.
These dictators’ atrocities against their own people are far worse than all the full-scale Arab-Israeli wars.
In
the past, we have talked about why some Israeli soldiers attack and
mistreat Palestinians. Also, we saw Israeli planes and tanks attack
various Arab countries. But, do these attacks match the current
atrocities being committed by some Arab states against their own people[?]
In Syria, the atrocities are beyond anybody’s imaginations? And,
isn’t the Iraqis are the ones who are destroying their own country?
Wasn’t it Tunisia’s dictator who was able to steal 13 billion dollars
from the poor Tunisians? And how can a child starve in Yemen if their
land is the most fertile land in the world? Why would Iraqi brains leave
Iraq in a country that makes 110 billion dollars from oil export? Why
do the Lebanese fail to govern one of the tiniest countries in the
world? And what made the Arab states start sinking into chaos?
On May
14, 1948 the state of Israel was declared. And just one day after that,
on May 15, 1948 the Arabs declared war on Israel to get back Palestine.
The war ended on March 10, 1949. It lasted for nine months, three weeks
and two days. The Arabs lost the war and called this war Nakbah
(catastrophic war). The Arabs gained nothing and thousands of
Palestinians became refugees.
And on 1967, the Arabs led by Egypt
under the rule of Gamal Abdul Nasser, went in war with Israel and lost
more Palestinian land and made more Palestinian refugees who are now on
the mercy of the countries that host them. The Arabs called this war
Naksah (upset). The Arabs never admitted defeat in both wars and the
Palestinian cause got more complicated. And now, with the never ending
Arab Spring, the Arab world has no time for the Palestinians refugees or
Palestinian cause, because many Arabs are refugees themselves and under
constant attacks from their own forces. Syrians are leaving their own
country, not because of the Israeli planes dropping bombs on them. It is
the Syrian Air Force which is dropping the bombs. And now, Iraqi Arab
Muslims, most intelligent brains, are leaving Iraq for the est. In
Yemen, the world’s saddest human tragedy play is being written by the
Yemenis. In Egypt, the people in Sinai are forgotten.
Finally, if
many of the Arab states are in such disarray, then what happened to the
Arabs’ sworn enemy (Israel)? Israel now has the most advanced research
facilities, top universities and advanced infrastructure. Many Arabs
don’t know that the life expectancy of the Palestinians living in Israel
is far longer than many Arab states and they enjoy far better political
and social freedom than many of their Arab brothers. Even the
Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza
Strip enjoy more political and social rights than some places in the
Arab World. Wasn’t one of the judges who sent a former Israeli president
to jail is an Israeli-Palestinian?
The Arab Spring showed the world
that the Palestinians are happier and in better situation than their
Arab brothers who fought to liberate them from the Israelis. Now, it is
time to stop the hatred and wars and start to create better living
conditions for the future Arab generations.
