Are the Palestinians prepared to seize the moment?

The current year, 2023, witnessed developments in the international and regional tracks, and reading them carefully, without romanticism, shows that they are in the Palestinian strategic interest, making 2023 a turning point in international and regional policies in favor of the Palestinian cause, which makes developing the internal situation an imposition on the Palestinians that is a sin for laziness. In its performance, in order to take advantage of the opportunities these developments entail, it has become clear that they outweigh the threats they entail in the path of freedom, independence, and an independent state.

In the current year, 75 years have passed since the Palestinian Nakba, which is the foundation of the Palestinian narrative, the establishment of the State of Israel on 78% of the area of Mandatory Palestine, and the formulation of the international system that emerged after World War II, with its values and principles in which the Palestinian people were excluded from public destiny. 55 years have passed since Israel occupied the remainder of Palestine (the West Bank, including East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip), and 30 years have passed since the signing of the Oslo Accords, which is the basis on which the Palestinian Authority was established.

While Israel has received, over the past decades, full support and support from its partners in the world (the colonial West), whether materially, politically or popularly, which has led it and still believes that it is a state above the law that does what it wants with the Palestinians, their property and their sanctities without accountability or oversight, and what is wrong with the Palestinians and the Arabs? Muslims and the entire world behind them, except to accept it as a fait accompli and submit to its conditions, which prompted its current Prime Minister, Netanyahu, to brag about saying in recent years that Israel seeks peace with the Palestinians and the Arabs! But it is a free peace, and without charge! That is, peace in exchange for peace, not peace in exchange for land and rights for the Palestinians, and peace according to Israel’s vision, especially the vision of the extreme right that now rules the state, not peace according to international legitimacy and its resolutions, which number more than a thousand resolutions.

However, this year can be considered a turning point in the course of the conflict, especially since it has witnessed and continues to witness transformations at the internal Israeli, Palestinian, regional and international levels, all of which indicate that the Zionist colonial project in Palestine is a project built on failure and has reached its end, and there are no options. Its supporters have no choice but to acknowledge the reality of failure, and that the time has come to lift the historical injustice against the Palestinian people and give them their rights, or some of them, to freedom, independence, self-determination, and the establishment of their own sovereign state on their land.

At the internal level of Israel, the political, cultural and media community there is witnessing a deep debate and controversy driven by a question, even if it does not surface, which is: Why has Israel not become a safe, just, prosperous, and democratic Jewish state, as the first founders wanted it to be, after all these decades since its establishment? Then why is Israel's deterrent power eroding in the face of its enemies, many of whom are in the region, despite all the military, technological and economic capabilities it possesses and political support from the great powers that have dominated the global system since the end of World War II?

Why has the number of Jews on the land extending from the sea to the river become less than the number of the country's indigenous owners? Why has the percentage of Jewish immigrants to Israel since the beginning of Jewish immigration to Palestine more than a century ago not exceeded 43% of the total number of Jews around the world?

Why did the Palestinians not surrender and raise the white flag despite their ongoing catastrophe for 75 years?

Why do 52% of the state’s Jewish citizens still consider the Palestinians to be the greatest external threat to the state, compared to 24% who believe that the Iranian nuclear program is the greatest threat, according to the indicators of the Israeli National Security Scale for the year 2023? More importantly, why has this country become, in the eyes of a large percentage of Jews in Israel and around the world, an apartheid and apartheid state, while it was presented to them as an oasis of democracy and a refuge protecting Jews from Nazi and anti-Semitic crimes?

As for the global level, there is a shift in the view of Israel, whether at the level of international institutions such as the United Nations and its affiliated institutions, or at the level of the great powers at this moment in time in which the global system is witnessing a radical transformation and transition from a unipolar system to a multipolar system, or at the level of public opinion. Especially American public opinion, especially among Jewish communities.

One of the most prominent changes in this regard was the United Nations’ commemoration of the Palestinian Nakba as a crime committed against the Palestinians, which opens the doors, even if it is 75 years later, to the necessity of punishing the perpetrators of this crime, and then declaring all the poles of the world order, whether the old one that has not yet died, or This is the desired new thing that has not yet found its feet due to the necessity of getting justice for the Palestinian people and establishing their independent state, which was clearly demonstrated at the recent BRICS summit in Johannesburg.

As for public opinion, all the pro-Israel awareness and public opinion formation centers owned by Jewish lobbies around the world are no longer able to change the labeling of Israel as an apartheid and apartheid state, especially among the senior generals of the Israeli security system and among the American Jewish communities, which is a matter that It is expected to spread within American institutions of government within a decade.

The Saudi-Israeli normalization and Saudi Arabia’s conditions for signing the expected normalization treaty are considered among the most prominent developments witnessed this year at the regional level. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman set these conditions in his rare and long interview on the American Fox News channel four days ago with three conditions: (Giving the Palestinians what They need it, normalization that unites the region, making life easier for the Palestinians, a good life for the Palestinians.

While the Crown Prince did not mention an independent Palestinian state as a condition for normalization, Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan added this condition in the Kingdom’s speech before the United Nations General Assembly on Saturday, 9/23/2023.

The above shows that the current year has already inaugurated a turning point in regional and global politics in favor of Palestine, which puts an end to Netanyahu’s boasting that Israel is ready to make peace with the Palestinians and Arabs for free and without compensation from Israel. Today, Israel is facing the truth and must decide where to go? Will it admit failure, or will it continue to continue deceiving its people and Jews around the world?

Perhaps this is what prompted President Abbas to say from the podium of the United Nations in his speech several days ago that he is “delusional who believes that he can make peace in the region without giving the Palestinian people their full rights.” Yes, it is, Mr. President, but in return we must prepare for what is coming and make all the changes. What is required in order to avoid sin and gain the respect and pride of future generations.