SAudi Arabia has suddenly experienced a diplomatic awakening after lukewarm engagement with a struggle in Gaza. Today, Egypt, Jordan, Qatar and United Arab Emirates leader Gaza will gather in Riyadh to discuss the proposal of Donald Trump for American acquisition. (Eager to see as a global deal maker, Saudi Arabia will also host talks on Ukraine this week.)
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was terrified by Trump’s derogatory “Riviera Yojana” to re -organize Gaza after eviction of his people in neighboring countries. Along with Arab leaders, he hopes to propose an alternative plan with the establishment of a Palestinian kingdom, in which Eastern Jerusalem is in its capital. Crown Prince has insisted that there will be no generalization of Israel without the Palestinian state.
In the short term, he can succeed in preventing the eviction of Palestinians from Gaza and preventing their proposed rehabilitation in Egypt, Jordan and even Saudi Arabia. The summit has promised to raise sufficient funds for reconstruction by leaving the Palestinians in temporary shelters on their land.
The immediate and more challenging object of the summit agenda must have been finding an alternative power to change Hamas as the Gaza government. Prince Mohammed is an enemy of many Islamist movements, but his disdain for Hamas is deeper. He is responsible for derailing his plan to complete generalization with Israel after 7 October 2023.
Crown Prince’s determination to normalize relationships with Israel. Saudi Arabia wants to develop Israeli technology, military equipment, intelligence information and close business relations. Even more importantly, he hopes that such a step will lead to close security relations with the United States.
In the long term, Prince Mohammed is unlikely to succeed for two reasons. First, Israel would prove to be a major obstacle, given that Benjamin Netanyahu refused to accept the Palestinian kingdom and sovereignty.
Second, an alternative plan that completely bypasses Hamas is very less likely to succeed. Political organization may leave governance in Gaza in return for reconstruction, but it will not only disappear. Unlike 1982, when the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was pushed out of Tunisia from Lebanon under Yasar Arafat, Hamas is fighting on his ground after Israeli’s occupation in the south of the country. After the departure of the PLO, the later Lebanese Christian massacre of the Palestinian refugees in Sabra and Shtila is still alive in Palestinian memory. Hamas will not accept any plan that will eliminate Palestine as it is imagined around the world by many generations of Palestinian exile and people who resorted to slaughter than 15 months.
The Saudi alternative plan is powered by pure self-blessings, namely, to reduce against the instability of many billion regions, themselves are included. The forced eviction of Palestinians will essentially spread to Hamas, his fighters and political Islam – mainly Muslim Brotherhood – will be deliberately and successfully suppressing such ideology. None of the Arab regime wants Hamas fighters and their extended communities to see people living in their countries.
The Muslim Brotherhood ideology calls for governance according to Islam, but at the same time talks about democracy. It is a global movement that appeals to many young Muslims, including Saudi, which is interested in some kind of Islamic democratic rule, according to its interpretation of both Islam and democracy. For example, it immediately puts the monarchy rule in danger.
Prince Mohammed focused on economic and social liberalization, both included suppressing the Muslim Brotherhood version of Islamism. Any attempt to evict Palestinian Hamas will definitely revive political Islam.
In addition, whether Palestinians should be forced to leave their territory, Prince Mohammed is afraid of the Saudi public’s response and was depicted as the Arab Emperor who “sold Palestine”. Saudi citizens have more solidarity than their rule with Palestinians because they were later motivated to be a leader between Arabs and Muslims when it was compatible with the interest of the monarchy. Prince Mohammed has since been published to adopt “Saudi Arabia for Saudi Arabia” and “to make Saudi Arabia great”, resonating Trump and adopting slogans hoping to divorce Saudi for regional and global Muslim reasons. However, Saudi has already made its religious duty internal with billions and Muslims. So far, Rajkumar Mohammed has pushed to suppress solidarity by openly support or callers for demonstrations by Palestinians.
It is still not clear what Gaza’s rule would look like. Despite the destruction, neither Prince Mohammad nor other Arab countries can successfully decide the fate of Gaza, who themselves are without association with the Palestinians. While many Arab countries have already signed generalization agreements with Israel, no one has brought peace. In fact, the opposite is for a simple reason. Palestinians were sidelined themselves. Only a compromise between Israel and Palestinians that guarantee the Palestinian state and sovereignty will bring a long -lasting peace. “Saudi awakening” will be passed without creating conditions for this peace if not all Palestinian factions, including Hamas, are sitting on the table of talks.
Madavi Al-Rishid is a visiting professor at the British Academy’s Fellow and the Middle East Center, London School of Economics. He is the writer of Son King in Saudi Arabia: Reform and Daman
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