You have no idea how many resolutions at the UN Pakistan has sponsored or co-sponsored on the Palestine issue. In the times of Nehru, India did go to bat for the Palestinians, but after him, this support has constantly been on the decline.
Zia did have a part to play in the 70s uprising in Jordan, but more than made up his relationship with Yasser Arafat who was a regular visitor to Pakistan during Zia's time.
Sponsoring resolutions is mere rhetoric my friend. How does that help Palestinians on the ground. Is Israel following those resolutions? I'm talking about direct actions that have helped the Palestinians here.
How much monetary aid to Palestine? How many schools and hospitals has Pakistan sponsored? How many university scholarships provided? Is this also not part of the help to Palestinians?
Zia played his part, but why do that in the first place? Even the Israeli weapons transfer have been mentioned in other places but lets leave that as speculation.
Although its quite possible that Zia insisted on their being no overt connection with Israel as long as he gets the arms. A dictator does not really have to take the public into confidence. the Pakistani people might have cared a lot for Palestinians. But Zia was thinking that he is fighting a war and using soviet marked weapons to kill soviet soldiers would be great. Egyptian produced weapons would have Egyptian markings and would be easily linked to Egypt as compared to the directly shipped weapons to the Palestinians.
The problem is some people like Mengla see any "perceived" feelings of neglect by India to the Palestinians and then shout that look at India's two faced dealings--they are actually Israel's best friends.
And fully ignoring the fact that Turkey has been the only Muslim country to be an Israeli ally and not only held joint military exercises but co-produced and did R&D on defense with them. Any condemnation about that?
I am just trying to highlight the hypocritical way some Pakistanis are portraying this although I appreciate others who do not.
The reason of this ambiguity with Zia in Jordan and Turkey and Israel being best friends is the Cold War backdrop but I won't go into that here.
Altogether, Pakistan has always supported the Palestinian cause and continues to do so with the same gusto and vigor today which is quite contrary to India's support which is increasingly becoming marginal by the day as the GoI and the Indian security establishment tries to chummy up to Israel.
Qualitatively, Pakistan's support for the Palestinians, as compared to that of India is much better.
What you have to understand is in India, you will hear all kinds of voices but only the consensus will move forward. There will be fringe Muslims who will be calling for the destruction of Israel and that it doesn't have any right to exist assuming this is their way of showing full support to the Palestinians on one hand to the fringe Hindus who will call for unconditional support for Israel only because of their "perceived" shared hatred of anything Muslim with the Israelis.
And then you have everything in between.
But the consensus is that Palestine is not just a Muslim-Jew issue, but a humanitarian issue. Not just Indian Muslims but Indians of all faiths have and are protesting against Israeli actions peacefully, not burning tires or cars in anger.
And this consensus will eventually be shown by the GoI. Lets leave aside the historical stuff where India is a regular contributor to UNRWA-even in the BJP-led regime. Just in 2009, India provided $20million in aid to Palestine as well as voted FOR the Goldstein report on the war crimes investigation for Gaza. So I fail to understand how Indian support has been "reduced". Supporting Palestinians does not mean just calling for the end of Israel. India might not support HAMAS, but neither does majority of the Arab states including Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Jordan because of its arrogant and destructive policies. This does not mean that either of these countries don't have a soft corner for Palestinians and infact it was KSA who came up with the 2002 Arab peace plan and instrumental in George Bush publicly declaring American policy for the first time for a two state solution.
Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm not aware of Pakistan (comparing with India) providing such development aid directly or to UNRWA either now or before.
Here is a article on Abbas' visit to India in 2008 that provides a recent overview.
India Stands Committed To Palestinian Cause
I'm just tired of
some Pakistanis making hypocritical statements probably based on inane posts by some Indians as well on what GoI or India as a whole stands for on the Israeli-Palestine issue. Fringe opinions of blaming everything of Palestinians is not mainstream in India. And of course, I hope a similar opinion of blaming everything on Israelis should be there either.
But in this case, Israel has no excuse to go shooting multiples time at activists at all. And that has been the GoI stand as well. That force in this case cannot be justified.
Hopefully this puts it in the perspective
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There is actually a running thread here
http://www.defence.pk/forums/world-affairs/58459-indian-aid-palestine.html
Again the objective is not to boast about this, but inform.
, if only the people of my nation spend more time working. However this is the best and most creative.
