It caused the 1948 “Naqba”—the Catastrophe—but it was not Israel alone. It was politician Nuri as-Said’s Iraqis who sold out after secret deals made on the island of Rhodes; it was Jordan’s King Abdullah trying to reach backroom deals with Israel’s Golda Meier; but above all it was the arrogance and self-righteousness that made us refuse every advantage that came our way, lose every war we fought, and fail to develop a literate, democratic, secular society as an answer to Israel’s challenge. The all-or-nothing strategy meant “all” for the monarchs and mullahs, and “nothing” for the Palestinians.
Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State
Tarek Fatah
Wiley, 2008, pp 78, 79
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