Amid the noise of the bombs that are shaking Gaza and Beirut these days, the silence of the Arab countries is surprising. Beyond some words of condemnation and hackneyed calls for dialogue from its leaders, there have been no significant measures against the excesses committed by Israel in response to the infamous attack it suffered a year ago at the hands of Hamas. Demonstrations have not even been seen in the streets, something that has happened in numerous Western countries and in others with a Muslim majority.
Of the seven Arab countries that have diplomatic relations with Israel (and excluding Sudan, mired in civil war), only Jordan, which established them in 1994, has withdrawn its ambassador. Egypt, the first to sign a peace treaty with the Jewish State in 1979, attempts a difficult balance as a mediator between it and Hamas. The United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco, for their part, have maintained the ties established as a result of the Abraham Accords (2020). And Saudi Arabia has not closed the door to joining them in the future.
This attitude clashes with decades of use of the Palestinian cause as a unifying element. Hence, some gestures of support are made (such as joining the genocide case against Israel launched by South Africa before the International Court of Justice), while measures are taken against pro-Palestinian activism (as has happened in Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Jordan).
The reality is that Arab leaders do not want to confront Israel. In most cases, this is due to their relations with the United States, a country on which they depend for their security (in the case of the Gulf monarchies) or for their financial survival (Egypt or Jordan). But not even someone in the antipodes like the Syrian president, Bashar al Assad, an ally of the resistance axis led by Iran, has so far made no attempt to come out in support of Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia that saved his regime from the popular uprising of 2011. which was immediately appropriated by Sunni extremists.
What they all have in common is the fear of street mobilization due to their lack of democratic legitimacy. And the Palestinian cause has historically been a catalyst, first in the hands of leftists and, more recently, Islamists. No matter how many excesses Israel commits, deep down it is doing the dirty work of putting a stop to the Islamists, be they the Sunnis of Hamas or the Shiites of Hezbollah.
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