US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's met with the Saudi crown
prince on Monday as part of efforts to de-escalate regional tensions
[photo: SPA]
Warming to his conviction that Israel receives special treatment he
called what is happening in Gaza “a failure of humanity” and asked “how
many more people need to die before we get anywhere?” Prince Khalid said
Israel should be treated no differently than any other country: “if
anyone else had done what the Israelis are doing today you would have
seen them cut off from the rest of the world, you would have seen
sanctions.” Nothing of that sort is happening: “I just don’t see that
fair behaviour and the blind spot towards Israel is a real problem
because it provides a blind spot to the peace.”
The ambassador said it wasn’t a looming normalisation deal with
Israel that provoked the Hamas attack: “there would have been a lot of
motivation, not least and probably most important is the continued
Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. This conflict goes back 100
years. That is the reason October 7 happened.”
When asked what role if any Hamas would have after the war ends the
ambassador paused briefly before using the example of Ireland to answer
the query: “the largest party in Ireland today, many of its members
would have been recognised as terrorists 40 years ago here in the UK.
There’s always room to change if we have the opportunity and the hope.”
That rather puts the Saudis at odds with Washington. The US position,
articulated by Secretary of State Blinken is that Hamas would have no role
(with the Israeli position being to utterly extirpate Hamas by any
means necessary) and that it would be the Palestinian Authority and 87
year-old President Abbas, in office without an election since 2005, who
would have the inside track.
The ambassador subsequently added that the PA “has a lot of resources
to move in” to Gaza after the fighting stops but the international
community and most importantly the Palestinians would need to be
involved. He was opaque on whether the Saudis would be part of the ‘day
after’ rebuilding project.
Behind the scenes Riyadh is keeping the normalisation channels open through Blinken
who is busy trying to contain the war and prevent a regional spill over
while talking of “a political path forward” to Palestinian statehood.
For the Saudis publicly linking the call for a stable and independent
Palestinian state to normalisation with Israel is a political and not a
moral position, one that requires constant reiteration as the Israelis
pound Gaza into rubble and kill civilians with impunity whilst ministers
in the Netanyahu government openly call for a campaign of genocide to
continue.
Prior to 7 October Mohammed bin Salman could not be bothered to hide his frustration
with the Palestinian cause and was keen to push on with recognition of
Israel. So whatever moral qualms the Saudis may have will more likely
than not be trumped by political considerations and his ambassador’s
call for a stable, viable and independent state of Palestine will be set
aside, one more betrayal for the Palestinian people to bear.
You can find the full BBC interview with Prince Khalid here at 2:14:00