[News] Arab Failures: The Unspoken Complicity in Israel's Genocide

[Anti-Imperialist News]

counterpunch.org
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/03/27/arab-failures-the-unspoken-complicity-in-israels-genocide/>
Arab Failures: The Unspoken Complicity in Israel's Genocide
Ramzy Baroud
Math 27, 2025
------------------------------

Image by Mohamed Nohassi.

Explaining Arab political failure to challenge Israel through traditional
analysis—such as disunity, general weakness, and a failure to prioritize
Palestine—does not capture the full picture.

The idea that Israel is brutalizing Palestinians simply because the Arabs
are too weak to challenge the Benjamin Netanyahu government—or any
government—implies that, in theory, Arab regimes could unite around
Palestine. However, this view oversimplifies the matter.

Many well-meaning pro-Palestine commentators have long urged Arab nations
to unite
<https://pchrgaza.org/israel-resumes-military-offensive-and-escalates-genocide-endangering-2-3-million-lives-in-gaza/>,
pressure Washington to reassess its unwavering support for Israel, and take
decisive actions to lift the siege on Gaza, among other crucial steps.

While these steps may hold some value, the reality is far more complex, and
such wishful thinking is unlikely to change the behavior of Arab
governments. These regimes are more concerned with sustaining or returning
to some form of status quo—one in which Palestine’s liberation remains a
secondary priority.

Since the start
<https://www.npr.org/2025/03/23/nx-s1-5337938/palestinian-deaths-gaza-israel#:~:text=On%20Oct.%207%2C%202023%2C,end%20the%20war%20have%20stalled.>
of the Israeli genocide in Gaza on October 7, 2023, the Arab position on
Israel has been weak at best, and treasonous at worst.

Some Arab governments even went so far as to condemn
<https://www.presstv.ir/doc/Detail/2023/11/17/714788/Bahrain-condemns-Hamas-Israel-war-Gaza>
Palestinian resistance in United Nations debates. While countries like
China and Russia at least attempted
<https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3253398/israel-says-chinas-support-palestinian-right-self-defence-may-be-seen-support-october-7-attack>
to contextualize the October 7 Hamas assault on Israeli occupation forces
imposing <https://euromedmonitor.org/en/gaza> a brutal siege on Gaza,
countries like Bahrain placed
<https://www.timesofisrael.com/bahrain-leader-condemns-hamas-oct-7-onslaught-calls-for-release-of-hostages/>
the blame squarely on the Palestinians.

With a few exceptions, it took Arab governments weeks—or even months—to
develop a relatively strong stance that condemned the Israeli offensive in
any meaningful terms.

Though the rhetoric began to shift slowly, the actions did not follow.
While the Ansarallah movement in Yemen, alongside other Arab non-state
actors, attempted
<https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-03-18/why-yemen-s-houthis-are-the-target-of-us-airstrikes>
to impose some form of pressure on Israel through a blockade, Arab
countries instead worked
<https://www.newarab.com/analysis/will-uae-israel-land-corridor-replace-red-sea-routes>
to ensure Israel could withstand the potential consequences of its
isolation.

In his book *War*, Bob Woodward disclosed
<https://thecradle.co/articles/israel-must-defeat-hamas-arab-leaders-told-blinken-days-after-7-oct-report>
that some Arab governments told then-US Secretary of State Antony Blinken
that they had no objections to Israel’s efforts to crush Palestinian
resistance. However, some were concerned about the media images of
mutilated Palestinian civilians, which could stir public unrest in their
own countries.

That public unrest never materialized, and with time, the genocide, famine,
and cries for help in Gaza were normalized as yet another tragic event, not
unlike the war in Sudan or the strife in Syria.

For 15 months of relentless Israeli genocide that resulted
<https://www.npr.org/2025/03/23/nx-s1-5337938/palestinian-deaths-gaza-israel#:~:text=On%20Oct.%207%2C%202023%2C,end%20the%20war%20have%20stalled.>
in the killing and wounding of over 162,000 Palestinians in Gaza, official
Arab political institutions remained largely irrelevant in ending the war.
The US Biden administration was emboldened by such Arab inaction,
continuing to push <https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48162> for
greater normalization between Arab countries and Israel—even in the face of
over 15,000 children killed
<https://abcnews.go.com/International/number-children-missing-separated-families-gaza-high-21000/story?id=111365036>
in Gaza in the most brutal ways imaginable.

While the moral failures of the West, the shortcomings of international
law, and the criminal actions of Biden and his administration have been
widely criticized, for serving as a shield for Israel’s war crimes, the
complicity of Arab governments in enabling these atrocities is often
ignored.

The Arabs have, in fact, played a more significant role in the Israeli
atrocities in Gaza than we often recognize. Some through their silence, and
others through direct collaboration <https://www.moec.gov.ae/en/cepa_israel>
with Israel.

Throughout the war, reports surfaced indicating that some Arab countries
actively lobbied
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20250318-uae-secretly-lobbying-us-to-work-against-egypts-post-war-gaza-reconstruction-plan-officials-say/>
in Washington on behalf of Israel, advocating against an Egyptian-Arab
League proposal aimed at reconstructing Gaza without ethnically cleansing
its population—an idea promoted
<https://www.politico.eu/article/trumps-plan-to-ethnically-cleanse-gaza-is-illegal-says-un-backed-judge/>
by the Trump Administration and Israel.

The Egyptian proposal, which was unanimously accepted
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/4/what-is-egypts-plan-for-the-reconstruction-of-gaza>
by Arab countries at their summit on March 4, represented the strongest and
most unified stance taken by the Arab world during the war.

The proposal, which was rejected by Israel and dismissed by the US, helped
shift discourse in the US around the subject of ethnic cleansing. It
ultimately led to comments made on March 12 by Trump during a meeting with
Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin where he stated
<https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/article-845772> that “No one’s
expelling anyone from Gaza.”

For some Arab states o actively oppose the only relatively strong Arab
position signals that the issue of Arab failures in Palestine goes beyond
mere disunity or incompetence—it reflects a much darker and more cynical
reality. Some Arabs align their interests with Israel, where a free
Palestine isn’t just a non-issue, but a threat.

The same applies to the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, which continues
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2024/12/20/in-collaboration-with-the-us-israel-palestinian-authority-escalates-crackdown-on-resistance-in-west-bank/>
to work hand in hand with Israel to suppress any form of resistance in the
West Bank. Its concern in Gaza is not about ending the genocide, but
ensuring the marginalization of its Palestinian rivals, particularly Hamas.

Thus, blaming the PA for mere ‘weakness,’ for ‘not doing enough,’ or for
failing to unify the Palestinian ranks is a misreading of the situation.
The priorities of Mahmoud Abbas and his PA allies are far different:
securing relative power over Palestinians, a power that can only be
sustained through Israeli military dominance.

These are difficult, yet critical truths, as they allow us to reframe the
conversation, moving away from the false assumption that Arab unity will
resolve everything.

The flaw in the unity theory is that it naively assumes Arab regimes
inherently reject Israeli occupation and support Palestine.

While some Arab governments are genuinely outraged by Israel’s criminal
behavior and growingly frustrated by the US’ irrational policies in the
region, others are driven by self-interest: their animosity
<https://rusi.org/publication/irans-nuclear-diplomacy-how-gulf-feels-threatened>
toward Iran and fear of rising Arab non-state actors. They are equally
concerned about instability in the region, which threatens their hold on
power amid a rapidly shifting world order.

As solidarity with Palestine has increasingly expanded from the global
South to the global majority, Arabs remain largely ineffective, fearing
that significant political change in the region could directly challenge
their own position. What they fail to understand is that their silence, or
their active support for Israel, may very well lead to their own downfall.

*Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He
is the author of five books. His latest is “**These Chains Will Be Broken*
<https://www.amazon.com/These-Chains-Will-Broken-Palestinian/dp/1949762092>*:
Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” (Clarity
Press, Atlanta). Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the
Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim University (IZU).
His website is **www.ramzybaroud.net* <http://www.ramzybaroud.net/>
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