Earlier this week, on November 15th, Palestinians marked “Independence Day,” the anniversary of when Palestinian independence was declared in the historic Palestinian city of Algiers by Yasser Arafat who was born in the historic Palestinian city of Cairo. Despite the fact that the government of the Palestinian Authority in Judea and Samaria and that of Hamas in Gaza refuse to build new houses or towns for their people at home, the PA has been very active in establishing embassies all over the world.
Ma’an News reported on an independence day celebration at the Palestinian embassy in Kuwait. Well, reported is a bit generous, since what they really did was reprint the speech given by the Palestinian ambassador, the “honorable” Dhari Ajran. His speech was largely unremarkable, overflowing with grandiose and colorful language that I’m sure sounded very pretty, but had little actual meaning. But there were two very important take-aways from this speech.
First, Ambassador Ajran explicitly laid out the reasons for the Palestinian and Arab-led vote at UNESCO last month. Most Western countries ended up supporting or abstaining from the vote by highlighting the late addition of a line reaffirming the ‘importance of the Old City of Jerusalem and its walls for the three monotheistic faiths, Islam, Christianity and Judaism.’ There were many who said Israel overreacted to the resolution saying that just because it didn’t mention the Hebrew names for the Temple Mount and Western Wall, it doesn’t mean it is sought to deny the Jewish connection to them.
But that is exactly what the Ambassador says was the motivation behind the resolution!
“Kuwait… sponsored and recognized fully that the Palestinian issue is a Kuwaiti issue carried by Kuwaiti officials to all international forums, most recently Palestine’s victory at UNESCO and the issuance of the historic decision that the Al-Aqsa mosque and the Buraq wall, and underneath it and around it is a right for Muslims only and not others.”
But the Ambassador’s speech was also remarkable for another reason. Not for what he said, but for what he didn’t say. Most people have forgotten that in 1991, towards the end of the First Gulf War and after, Kuwait expelled over 400,000 Palestinians. If you have never heard of this, you aren’t alone. You won’t heard about this massive ethnic cleansing at any pro-Palestinian event. No organizers Israel Apartheid Week will mention this mass expulsion. And of course, there were no protests in the Western or Arab worlds nor any UN resolutions condemning the Kuwaiti government for its carefully planned and well documented actions. In fact, Kuwaiti diplomat Sheikh Saud Nasser al-Sabah told the Washington Post that
“thousands [of Palestinians] who do not have jobs will be deported or their permits will not be renewed. … And I think we have a perfect right to demand” it, he said. “It’s not just us in the government demanding it, it’s the people in the street who are demanding it.” … Having a large number of Palestinians in Kuwait would not be “helpful to our security,”
Not only that, but the nearly 200,000 Palestinians who fled Kuwait before or during the Iraqi occupation were not allowed to return and had their land and belongings confiscated as well.
How did the Palestinians get over this horrendous “Nakba on the Gulf?” All it took was some time and an apology. Not an apology by Kuwait, but one by Mahmoud Abbas:
“We apologise to Kuwait and the Kuwaiti people for what we did,”
So apparently it is possible for the Palestinians to apologize for starting or supporting an unnecessary war that ends up leading to mass flight and expulsions of Palestinians and confiscation of abandoned property… as long as none of it is done by Jews.
