How the Arabs Have Betrayed Palestine – Again
The Arab world, led by the predecessors of today's Saudi Arabia, willingly relinquished sovereignty over Palestine to a superpower a century ago. Nothing has changed
The Arab betrayal of Palestinians has a long history, and a stirring one. It predates Trump’s "Deal of the Century" by exactly one century. It could be called: the Deal of the Past Century.
On January 3, 1919, shortly after WWI ended, Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann met with Emir Faisal, whose father, Hussein bin Ali, the Grand Sharif of Mecca, had just proclaimed himself King of the Arabs. The meeting took place at a London hotel, where Weizmann and Faisal signed a
secret agreement, brokered by T. E. Lawrence, in which Faisal pledged his support for the Balfour Declaration in exchange for Zionist support for an Arab state in the former Arab provinces of the disintegrated Ottoman Empire. The territory of that potential Arab state
excluded Palestine.
In pursuit of his Hashemite ambitions, Faisal endorsed the Jewish colonization of Palestine as the necessary
quid pro quo. He recognized the national and historical rights of Jews to Palestine, where "all measures shall be adopted" to implement the Balfour Declaration, including "immigration of Jews into Palestine on a large scale."
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Chaim Weizmann, left, wearing an Arab headdress as a sign of friendship, and Emir Faisal ibn Hussein in Transjordan in 1918Credit:
In February, the two leaders traveled to the Paris Peace Conference to pitch their agreement before the victorious Allies, where Faisal reiterated his concession to exclude Palestine from his demand for Arab independence. Because of its "universal character," he told his European patrons, "Palestine is to be left on one side for the mutual consideration of all parties interested."
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Following the conference, a bewildered Weizmann wrote to his wife Vera that he had found Faisal a "very honest man," who, to Weizmann’s sheer astonishment, was "interested in Damascus and the whole of northern Syria (but)
not interested in Palestine."
March 5, 1919 NYT reports Faisal's comments: 'We Arabs look with the deepest sympathy on the Zionist movement...and wish the Jews a most hearty welcome home...Our two movements complete each other'Credit: Wikipedia
In March, the New York Times published a letter by Faisal to Felix Frankfurter, under the headline "
Prince of Hedjaz Welcomes Zionists," in which the Emir reiterated his support for the Zionist cause, writing: "Our deputation here in Paris is fully acquainted with the proposals submitted by the Zionist Organization to the Peace Conference, and we [Weizmann and I] regard them as moderate and proper, and are working together for a reformed and revived Near East."
To his dismay, the Allies did not grant Faisal his independent Arab state. Instead, they devised a mandate system that divided the Arab land between Britain and France. It gave France control over Syria and Lebanon, while the British took control over Palestine and Transjordan.
Faisal left the Paris conference with a dreadful sense of betrayal. He himself had betrayed his Ottoman masters to fight alongside the British, only to be betrayed by the British after the war. He then tried to make amends. A few months later, in July 1919, the Syrian National Congress, formed in support for his putative Arab Kingdom of Syria, adopted a resolution that rejected the French mandate over Syria, declared Palestine an inseparable part of Syria, and opposed Jewish immigration t
Syrian National Congress booklet showing the borders of Faisal's "Arab Kingdom of Syria," including Palestine. 8 March 1920Credit: Wikipedia
But it was too late. That year the French expelled Faisal by force from Syria, and three years later, Britain was given a United Nations mandate to implement the Balfour Declaration in Palestine. As a compensation, the British installed Faisal as king of Iraq, his brother Abdulla as king of Jordan, while the Hejaz became part of Saudi Arabia.
Faisal died in 1933, his dream Arab state, still under European mandates, vanishing like ripples of a distant mirage. Having presaged the loss of Palestine in the name of Arab independence elsewhere, the only part of his vision that would ultimately be fulfilled was the Belfour Declaration.
Weizmann, meanwhile, would go on to invoke Faisal’s pledge on every diplomatic occasion. In 1936, in what read like a eulogy for his Arab friend, he told the British Peel Commission on Palestine: "There was one distinguished Arab who was the Commander-in-Chief of the Arab armies, the then-Emir Faisal. I frankly put to him our aspirations, our hopes, our desires, our intentions, and I can only say - if any oath of mine could convince my Arab opponents - we found ourselves in full agreement, and this first meeting was the beginning of a lifelong friendship, and our relationship was expressed subsequently in a treaty."
By 1946, all Arab countries except Palestine had gained independence. The British Mandate would linger on in Palestine for two more years, as if to ensure the fulfillment of Faisal-Weitzmann’s vision.
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On October 18, 1947, on the eve of the Partition Plan vote, Weizmann addressed the United Nations: "There was a time when Arab statesmanship was able to see this equity in its true proportions. That was when the eminent leader and liberator of the Arabs, the Emir Faisal, later King of Iraq, made a treaty with me declaring that if the rest of Arab Asia were free, the Arabs would concede the Jewish right freely to settle and develop in Palestine, which would exist side by side with the Arab states. The condition which he then stipulated, the independence of all Arab territories outside Palestine, has now been fulfilled."
The next year, the British finally left Palestine, and Israel declared independence.
Angry Palestinian protesters set portraits of the king of Bahrain, prime minister of UAE and Oman's new Sultan during a protest against Trump's peace plan. Hebron, West Bank, Jan 30, 2020Credit: AFP
On May 16, 1948, two days after Israel’s declaration of independence, Weizmann sent a message to a celebration rally at Madison Square Garden in New York. He evoked his treaty with Faisal as a milestone in Israel’s path to independence, before declaring: "The Jewish State always ready and eager to enter into neighborly relations and to join with them in a common effort to increase the welfare and prosperity of the Near East." But then the Arab neighbors declared war on Israel, to
reclaim Palestine, and by the time it ended, the loss of Palestine was complete.
A century after the historic Faisal-Weizmann meeting, a sense of historical
déjà vu now creeps over Palestine as Faisal’s successors, the current rulers of Saudi Arabia, have embraced Trump’s "Deal of the Century," which all but hands Israel the rest of Palestine in the name of "
peace, prosperity, and a brighter future."
The Trump deal would place an undivided Jerusalem, including its Old City, under Israel’s control, and give Israel the right to annex all settlements as well as the Jordan Valley - nearly a fourth of the West Bank. The plan envisions a "conditional" Palestinian state that will be completely demilitarized and devoid of an army and air force, and over which Israel will continue to exercise full military and airspace control. This "
state-minus," as Benjamin Netanyahu has cynically dubbed it, would be a discontinuous, canonized archipelago in the West Bank and Gaza, as plainly exhibited in the
plan’s map, surrounded by a sea of Israeli settlements and military installments.
From Israel’s perspective, the Trump’s plan is indeed the deal of the century. Not since the century-old Balfour Declaration have Israel’s leaders had a foreign ally who is willing to promise them sovereignty over most of Palestine. And not since the Faisal-Weizmann agreement have they had an Arab ally who is willing to concede to that promise.
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