Anwar Ashqi's visit to Israel and the Arab initiative for peace
The official and personal reactions of Palestinians and Arabs to Anwar Ashqi's visit to Israel and his meetings with Knesset members and politicians from various factions were diverse and varied.
Away from the initial emotional reaction to the visit and subsequent statements by the former Saudi intelligence officer, as well as debates among parties close and distant to the event, the reactions can be divided into three categories:
The first category consists of those who immediately launched campaigns of criticism and condemnation upon the announcement of the visit. They continued their critique and analysis of the visit and its anticipated outcomes, considering the retired Saudi general's visit as opening the door wide to normalization with Israel and labeling it a 'betrayal of the Palestinian people and their cause.' In the rush to respond and comment on the event, and the competition to escalate the condemnation campaign, especially on social media, they overlooked some facts that could have been verified before the instinctive, random criticism fueled by malice, often far from constructive and painful criticism directed at the right party and away from serious scrutiny of the visit's background and true purpose.
The facts that have not been sufficiently scrutinized by these colleagues are:
1. This is not Anwar Ashqi's first visit to Israel. Information shows that this is at least his second official visit, with one or two secret visits away from media attention in between.
2. This is not the first visit by an important Saudi figure to Israel. He was preceded by princes from the ruling family, businessmen, youth delegations, and military experts who visited Israel in past years, with Israelis reciprocating with numerous and varied visits to Saudi Arabia.
3. This visit did not come behind the back of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah; on the contrary, the Ramallah authority was fully aware of the visit in advance, participated in planning it, and was well informed of the official protocol. Rajoub's participation in the visit and talks was not a coincidence or a slip-up leading to a greater fallout, as some Ramallah officials claimed!
4. This visit will not open the door to normalization with Israel. Opening the door to normalization metaphorically means that this door was still closed at the time of the visit, which is itself a grave analytical error regarding the political reality in the region. Normalization with Israel began at least about forty years ago and has never ceased. Today, more than eight Arab countries have diplomatic, economic, intelligence, military, or tourism relations with Israel. Some Gulf Cooperation Council countries, led by Saudi Arabia, top the list of Arab states that have maintained normalization relations with Israel for years across various fields.
5. Saudi Arabia maintains close relations with Israel, especially in the military and scientific fields. Israel is a loyal ally to the ruling family in Saudi Arabia in its wars in Yemen, Syria, against the resistance, and its conflict with Iran. It is no longer a secret that Israel participates with Saudi forces in their air war over Yemen. Nor is the scientific cooperation between Israel and the Gulf states in agriculture, infrastructure, water desalination, and youth delegations exchange a secret anymore.
6. And the last and most important truth is that the peoples of these countries, which have been normalizing relations with Israel for years, have not blindly followed their political leaders and surrendered to the status quo. On the contrary, the peoples in these countries remain the safety valve that deters the wide opening of normalization doors. Despite all the oppression they have faced, these peoples still believe in the sanctity of the Palestinian cause and still see the Zionist entity as the primary enemy in the region. The criticisms of Al-Ashqi's visit, despite my initial support for it, were mostly outbursts of frustration far from the constructive strategy to empower peoples as individuals and institutions against the ruling establishments in their countries. These ruling classes have, for years, placed their eggs in the Zionist nest. Hence, most criticisms, unfortunately, are sweeping and do not differentiate between the people and the ruling dictatorship.
The second category are those who welcomed the visit, and they are divided into two sections:
The first section of supporters are those who openly supported it, endorsed it, and planned the visit with the Israelis, such as the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah. The second section includes some neighboring Arab countries that have been waiting for such a visit to take new steps in normalization with Israel. These countries fully understand that the Saudi public normalization with Israel acts as a pardon for them and their upcoming steps in the regional alignments, based on Saudi Arabia’s central role in the Arab and Islamic worlds, which carries distinctive weight and respect. This category fully realizes that we are now in a different reality in the region after the failure of the project to divide Syria and build the Middle East according to the American neoliberal map, and that we are now facing a new Middle East with new entitlements that I will address later.
The third category are those who follow the ostrich policy, burying their heads in the sand... “neither seeing nor hearing.”
They are also divided into two sections; the first are those who are pleased with the visit and the opening of quiet diplomacy with Israel to gain advantages in the structure of the new Middle East, headed by Hamas, which has not expressed its opinion on the visit because the majority of its audience is still “not ready” to accept the new Middle Eastern reality and what all this means for the Palestinian cause. The second section includes some elements of the Palestinian left and some Arab countries. They remained silent about the visit because they have not yet taken a clear position on the regional conflict in the Middle East and the new alignments that have become a reality casting their shadow over the entire Middle Eastern politics. They preferred to wait out of strategic confusion or political opportunism.
The importance of Al-Ashqi’s visit to Israel does not lie in normalization or its absence, as this has unfortunately become a reality and an announced strategy of some Arab rulers, albeit with different speeds and intensities. The importance of the visit was in the underlying matters that the visit sought to reach. The visit was a reconnaissance balloon to gauge official and popular reactions before starting a very important step in the region.
Anwar Ashqi did not make the visit without the approval and blessing of the ruling family in Saudi Arabia, and this visit did not come without prior briefing of the 'allies.' The timing of the visit and the accompanying media campaign were carefully planned and fully prepared, not coincidental. Ashqi's statements about the purpose and program of the visit revealed his primitive diplomatic weakness, which embarrassed friends and provoked their resentment.
The primary goal of the visit was to test reactions to efforts to revive the Arab initiative presented by Saudi Arabia at the Beirut summit in 2002 and the possibility of starting practical steps to achieve it after the failure of the French initiative, which was a thin transparent cover for the Arab initiative. These reactions began months ago, specifically after the signing of the Iranian nuclear file and the advance of the Arab Syrian army with the resistance in crushing Islamist terrorism on Syrian and Iraqi lands, and the beginning of laying new foundations for a new Middle East in which Iran is the main regional player alongside the resistance alliance.
Israel, Saudi Arabia, and their allies in the region and the West are very concerned about the failure of their project in the Middle East and also worried about the growing Iranian role supported by the resistance alliance in the East.
Israel, Saudi Arabia, and their allies lost the battle to subdue Iran on the nuclear file, lost the battle to topple resistant Syria, and failed to limit Hezbollah's role in the region. They now face a diplomatic and military disaster in Yemen, and all they have left is to limit the resistance alliance’s role at the popular level. Unlike the third faction, they fully realize that we are facing a new Middle East with two main axes: the resistance axis led by Iran and the axis of reaction led by Saudi Arabia and Israel. The latter axis lost a backbone pillar, which is Erdogan’s Turkey and its Ottoman project, after the coup and Turkey’s withdrawal from the arena for years to mend internal wounds and the complete collapse of Erdogan’s mad ambitions. This sudden loss of the third pillar in the axis of reaction and tyranny in the East hastened the announcement of the Arab initiative and efforts to convince Israel to officially accept it. Ashqi’s visit came to test popular reactions to this step and its public acceptance.
After the diplomatic and military defeat against the resistance axis, the axis of reaction and tyranny only has left the most politically influential card in the Arab and Islamic nations and the most attractive to Arab and Islamic masses from the resistance axis, which is the Palestinian card.
What Saudi Arabia and its allies are currently planning is to limit the overwhelming advance of the resistance axis by ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and finding a solution with the approval of both parties so that the resistance in Lebanon has no excuse to bear arms, and so that Iran and Syria no longer raise the banner of liberating Jerusalem after most Arab capitals have abandoned it and surrendered to the reality of the Zionist occupation of Palestine.
The program prepared for this scenario includes preliminary and official approval from Israel of the Arab initiative and the start of symbolic steps to achieve it, with Saudi Arabia guaranteeing the blessing of the authority in Ramallah for it, and Qatar and Turkey, on their part, guaranteeing Hamas's blessing of this step. The step envisions the establishment of a Palestinian state initially on the territories occupied in 1967, starting with a fully sovereign state in Gaza and wide self-rule in Area A in the West Bank. In parallel, three committees of international experts and advisors will be appointed to search for solutions to the remaining issues: a committee for the refugee issue, a second for borders and natural resources, and a third for Jerusalem. No time limit will be set for the work of these committees to ensure Israel's approval of this step, knowing that after the financial and diplomatic bankruptcy of both the Ramallah Authority and the Gaza Authority, their affairs and decisions are no longer in their hands but in the hands of those who finance them and support their political existence, protecting them from collapse. Based on the principle, 'He who eats from the Sultan's bread is struck by his sword.'
The solution, some features of which have leaked in Western and American think tanks, envisions Israel annexing areas of dense settlements, especially in the Jerusalem and Nablus areas, with compensation to the Palestinian Authority for these lands by areas in the Negev adjacent to the Gaza Strip and expanding the influence of Jerusalem to reach Jericho, so that later the Palestinian Authority can be given a symbolic capital in this area called 'Jerusalem.'
Regarding the refugee file, the project envisions the establishment of an international fund of 20 to 30 billion dollars to compensate the refugees, with Israel accepting the symbolic return of a number of refugees from Lebanon to the territories occupied in 1948 and convincing Egypt to lend the Palestinian Authority lands in Sinai equal in area to the Gaza Strip, with access to the sea and tourism, where three to four Palestinian cities will be established to accommodate about one million refugees who want to return and compensate them generously. This will enable them to build a service economy in Sinai and maintain open geographic continuity with the rest of the Gaza Strip and the lands handed over to the Authority in the Negev. All this will be done in parallel with opening a secure corridor between Area A in the West Bank and Gaza, building a port in Gaza, and reconstructing the airport, allowing Palestinians to feel sovereignty and noticeable economic relief!
This solution, with Saudi sponsorship, Fatah and Hamas blessing, and American and European patronage, is what remains for the axis of reaction and tyranny to save face after successive setbacks in the region. We will see signs of this solution in the coming months after the final resolution in Syria and the beginning of the crushing of terrorist militias there. The American-Russian consensus on the new Middle East, acknowledging the Russian-Iranian role there, is the beginning of embarking on this file. Russia will not object to such a solution after Palestinian approval, and how could it be 'more Catholic than the Pope?'
