Saudi Arabia Rejects US Embassy Transfer To Jerusalem As World Anger Mounts Over Gaza Deaths
17 May 2018Arab News
Saudi Arabia’s government on Tuesday said it opposed the US decision to
relocate its Israel embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
“The Kingdom rejects the American administration’s decision to transfer its
embassy to Jerusalem,” the council of ministers said in a statement carried by
the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA).
“This step represents a significant prejudice against the rights of the
Palestinian people which have been guaranteed by international resolutions,”
it said.
“The government of Saudi Arabia has already warned of the grave consequences
of such an unjustified move,” SPA added.
In a call to the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas late on Tuesday, the king
condemned the brutal aggression against unarmed civilians and prayed for those
killed and wished a speedy recovery for the injured.
King Salman also reiterated the Kingdom’s support for the restoration of the
legitimate rights of the people of Palestine in accordance with the
resolutions of international legitimacy and the Arab peace initiative.
The Kingdom has called for a an emergency meeting of foreign ministers of Arab
League member states to unite efforts and take urgent measures to protect the
Palestinian people.
The government meeting led by King Salman reiterated Riyadh’s condemnation of
Israeli gunfire that killed dozens of Palestinians along the Gaza Strip border
on Monday.
The Cabinet also condemned the Israeli army’s deliberate targeting of
Palestinian civilians in Gaza. The council called on the international
community to assume responsibility for stopping the violence and protecting
the Palestinians.
Israel’s killing of Palestinians a grim reminder that Nakba is not over
On May 14, 1948, the creation of the state of Israel was declared, formed out
of Palestine, and the next day became known as the day of the “Nakba,” or
“catastrophe.”
More than 700,000 Palestinians ended up as refugees, as they fled or were
driven off their land, and the first Arab-Israeli War began.
This year, on the eve of the 70th anniversary, the US opened its relocated
embassy in Jerusalem, and at least 55 Palestinians were shot by Israeli forces
while protesting along the Gaza Strip’s border, a grim reminder that the Nakba
is not over.
“For Palestinians, the Nakba is also a continuing affair that only started in
1948, but continued through 1967 and until today, with Jerusalem,” Ghassan
Khatib, a former Palestinian government minister, told Arab News.
“Seven decades have passed since Al-Nakba, the biggest crisis in the history
of Palestine,” Basem Abdullah Al-Agha, ambassador of Palestine to Saudi
Arabia, told Arab News.
“The state of Israel was created on the Palestinian people’s home, from which
6 million Palestine refugees continue to suffer from the cruelty of exile and
loss of human security, and with ever-expanding Israeli settlements,
Palestinians continue to live under occupation.”
World anger mounts over Gaza deaths
Israel faces mounting regional and international pressure over the deaths of
Palestinian protesters on the Gaza border, with South Africa, Turkey, Belgium
and Ireland withdrawing their ambassadors from Tel Aviv and the UN Commission
on Human Rights calling for an independent inquiry.
Almost 60 Palestinians were killed in clashes with Israeli troops during
protests to mark the 70th anniversary of Nakba — the expulsion of Palestinians
from their homes — and the opening of the US Embassy in Jerusalem.
Saudi Arabia’s Cabinet on Tuesday reaffirmed the Kingdom’s rejection of the
decision to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem, a day after its official
opening.
“This step represents a significant bias against the historical, permanent
rights of the Palestinian people in Jerusalem,” an official statement said.
Secretary-General of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Saeb Erekat
said that the Palestinian leadership would file a legal case against Israel
with the International Criminal Court over settlement activity on occupied
Palestinian territory.
Former Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister Marwan Muasher, now senior vice
president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told
Arab News that the killing of Palestinian protesters, coupled with the move of
the US Embassy to Jerusalem, shows why “Israel cannot be trusted” to bring
about peace in the region.
“I believe Jordan’s preferred course of action is the adoption of a policy
that would keep Palestinians on their soil and that would not cooperate with
Israel in any way,” he said.
Nour Al-Emam, a lawyer and member of the Palestine National Council, said the
US was now complicit in the killings of unarmed Palestinians by the Israeli
occupiers.
Media coverage of the killings in Gaza has also been criticized. Writing on
his personal Twitter account, media specialist Mureed Hammad said that the
“world media has shown a different face to dealing with Palestinian blood.”
James Martin, a Jesuit priest and editor-at-large of the Jesuit magazine
America, condemned The New York Times for saying that Palestinians had “died”
rather than Palestinians were “killed.”
Some Arab voices are also objecting to the silence of many Arab leaders.
Mohammad Ersan, the host of a Radio Al-Balad talk show in the Jordanian
capital, ended his program on Tuesday by asking if the Israeli ambassadors in
neighboring countries would be sent home. His comment followed a decision by
Turkey to order Israel’s ambassador to leave.
Veteran Israeli peace activist Gershon Baskin told Arab News that the opening
of the US Embassy in Jerusalem “is harmful to chances of peace and goes
against international accepted positions that the future of Jerusalem must be
decided and resolved by Israel and Palestine together.”
The Nakba is not only about the refugees, according to Khatib.
“The Nakba is the turning point for all Palestinians. And commemorating the
Nakba is about taking a stand for resistance, and in particular for
self-determination and statehood.”
Third-generation Palestinians, who have made a home somewhere else, struggle
with national identity and where to call home. “I’m a Palestinian who grew up
in Saudi Arabia,” said 28-year old Dania Husseini, whose family hails from
Jerusalem.
“I guess I’m one of those who have an identity crisis. I don’t fit into the
typical Palestinian culture or the Saudi or the Western, really. I have a
mentality of my own that developed after living in all the environments I
lived in and met the people that were part of them.”
Whether refugees or not, it is not hard in the Arab world to find someone
whose life wasn’t altered forever by the Nakba.
Arab News columnist Ramzy Baroud was born and raised in a Gaza camp. His
family village, Beit Daras, was erased from the map.
The father and grandmother of Arab News writer Daoud Kuttab fled Jerusalem’s
Musrara neighborhood for the Jordanian city of Zarqa.
You will find their stories in our eight-page supplement today, which marks
Nakba day and the toll it has taken over seven decades.
And in the story of Dr. Bishara A. Bahbah, whose family still holds the deed
to their orchard in the Lod-Jaffa area, you will find some hope. As he said:
“Even if Israel takes our lands, they can never take away our brainpower and
our unshakable will and determination to succeed.”
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EsinIslam.Com
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