Gaza’s Darkest Lesson: Exposing the True Allies and Enemies of Palestine

As solidarity with Palestine has increasingly expanded from the global South to the global majority, Arabs remain largely ineffective. (Design: Palestine Chronicle)

The bizarre, yet predictable, spectacle surrounding the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) vote on Draft Resolution 2803 was not just telling—it was a devastating political exposé. This resolution, which effectively granted the Israeli occupation legal cover for its ongoing military presence in Gaza, demonstrated a profound institutional betrayal of the Palestinian people.

UNSC Resolution 2803 should have faced overwhelming global censure and a swift, principled Russian-Chinese veto. Yet, neither materialized. The facile explanation—that Russia and China feared being blamed for the resumption of the genocide—is a deliberate smokescreen.

The reality is starker: the Israeli genocide in Gaza has never paused; it has merely morphed. Crucially, the resolution’s demand, which conditions Israel’s supposed “gradual withdrawal” upon the complete disarmament of the Palestinian resistance, is a chilling invitation for the inevitable, full-scale return of mass extermination to the utterly destroyed Strip.

The true enabler of this political tragedy was the covert diplomatic capitulation of regional powers. The lack of a veto and the absence of any formidable Arab opposition were premeditated, cemented when key Arab and Muslim States issued a collaborative statement on November 14, 2025, calling for support of the Trump Gaza plan and the subsequent UNSC resolution.

This endorsement of a US plan, fundamentally drafted in partnership with Washington and the colonial entity in Tel Aviv, which aims to partition Gaza and irrevocably separate it from the West Bank, compels the central, agonizing question: whose side are these Arab regimes fighting on?

Beyond reciting empty platitudes about ending the genocide, the collective Arab officialdom did little to hold the Israeli occupation accountable or apply any substantive pressure on its Western benefactors. Their actions, often conducted in the shadows, revealed a deep alignment with the imperial agenda:

The Private Demand for Annihilation

According to the investigative journalist and author of War, Bob Woodward, in his interviews with key administration figures, several prominent Arab countries privately conveyed to former US Secretary of State Antony Blinken their fervent desire for the Israeli occupation to destroy Hamas.

This chilling private sentiment, utterly contradictory to their public posture, confirmed a strategic objective shared with the occupation: the total eradication of armed Palestinian resistance.

Undermining the Red Sea Economic Siege

Select Arab states actively participated in establishing overland trade corridors that served as vital, alternative routes for the Israeli economy.

This action was a direct, calculated maneuver to undermine the morally and strategically effective Red Sea siege placed on Israeli shipping by Ansarullah in Yemen, thereby negating the potent economic pressure exerted by the group.

State-Sponsored Anti-Palestinian Propaganda

Specific Arab media conglomerates, particularly those heavily funded by Gulf monarchies, waged a vicious propaganda war.

This campaign was engineered to disseminate anti-Palestinian narratives, justify the occupation’s atrocities, vilify the Resistance leadership, and deliberately marginalize the Palestinian cause from the pan-Arab consciousness.

Collaboration with Occupation Forces against Aid

Credible reports emerged suggesting that elements within certain Arab countries provided support or logistical aid to armed criminal groups operating within Gaza.

These groups were implicated in working alongside the Israeli forces to sabotage aid distribution, specifically targeting the Resistance infrastructure and, most cruelly, killing desperate Palestinians attempting to access humanitarian relief.

Strategic and Narrative Paralysis

Arab states demonstrated a complete failure to forge a cohesive, forceful strategy to counter the Israeli genocide. Their inability to present a unified, powerful, and relentless narrative on the global stage allowed the Western-Israeli narrative of “self-defense” to overwhelmingly dominate, exposing a deep-seated political and moral paralysis.

Suppression of Public Solidarity

The hypocrisy was laid bare when several Arab governments cracked down on their own citizens, actively blocking solidarity activists from reaching the borders near Gaza.

They arrested some prominent activists and violently prevented others from holding mass rallies, proving that official “sympathy” was subordinate to preserving security relationships with the West and the Occupation.

Indifference and Blatant Distraction

While the genocidal destruction of Gaza was underway, numerous Arab nations ostentatiously continued hosting lavish, high-profile events, including major music festivals and international sports tournaments.

This deliberate spectacle of normalcy served to minimize the atrocities, divorce the ruling elites from the tragedy, and ensure the business of distraction continued unabated.

The Centrality of Palestine

Palestine has historically been the epicenter of Arab collective identity and the defining cause for the Arab masses. Indeed, the very formation of the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) were direct institutional responses to the mounting injustices inflicted upon Palestinians by the colonial and Zionist project.

By demanding Arab solidarity, Palestinians were not removed from this historical mandate, which began long before the official establishment of Israel on the ruins of occupied Palestine. Indeed, starting on April 20, 1948, before the official withdrawal of the British Mandate, Arab volunteers – the Arab Liberation Army – began pouring into Palestine to fill the void left by formal states, which were themselves mostly under colonial control or hegemony at the time.

Following WWII and the relative liberation of most Arab states, Palestine became the core imperative of all Arab political causes, with Egypt in particular stepping up to shoulder that generational responsibility.

But at every critical juncture, betrayal perpetually lurked in the shadows, where empty lip service was paid merely to conceal deep-seated conspiracies and intrigues. Over time, Palestine was cynically assigned a far less urgent position in Arab priorities. Yet, the hope endured among Palestinians that the collective identity uniting them with the Arab masses — a unity of history, shared religions, and common experience — would ultimately prevail over the narrow, personal gains of the ruling regimes.

The Clarity of Betrayal

The last few years, however, have delivered the inevitable rude awakening. While some principled actors in Lebanon and Yemen displayed genuine Arab solidarity — often through immense sacrifice — the vast majority of the Arab body politic acted as if entirely unperturbed by the ongoing genocide, or even worse, partially or openly aligned with the interests of Israel and the US.

That betrayal, however agonizing, will ultimately prove beneficial as it has provided the devastatingly clear distinction Palestinians and their supporters desperately needed to continue the quest for justice. At a time when countries like South Africa and Colombia, among many others, take substantive legal and diplomatic steps to hold the Israeli occupation accountable and halt its genocide, while Arab countries actively sustain the Israeli economy, Palestinians now have a real opportunity to distinguish unequivocally between genuine allies and false brethren.

Though this shattering realization will not alter the Palestinian people’s identity as part of a larger Arab collective self-definition, nothing will ever mitigate the fact that the Arab regimes watched Palestinians die in masses and did nothing.

The profound repercussions of this historical realization shall echo among Palestinians for generations. It will serve as an indelible, historical witness against those regimes that opted to maintain their lucrative ties with Washington and Tel Aviv at the fatal expense of a nation being systematically eradicated.

The ultimate, tragic lesson is that Palestinians must look inward and forward, knowing that their only true and reliable support comes from the solidarity of the global freedom movement, not from compromised capitals in their immediate region.

– Dr. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of six books. His forthcoming book, ‘Before the Flood,’ will be published by Seven Stories Press. His other books include ‘Our Vision for Liberation’, ‘My Father was a Freedom Fighter’ and ‘The Last Earth’. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net