NORMALIZATION WITH ISRAEL IS FORBIDDEN FOR SUDAN BUT ALLOWED FOR OTHER ARAB LEAGUE MEMBERS isn’t that unfair?
By Mahmoud A. Suleiman
Many waters have passed under the bridge, as the saying goes, since the Six-Day War that led to the Nakba, aka the great catastrophe, and the defeat of the Egyptian army during the presidency of President Gamal Abdel Nasser who resigned following the defeat, but he returned to office after popular demonstrations called for his reinstatement. Although the rest is a history but it is appropriate to add that, by 1968, Nasser had appointed himself Prime Minister, launched the War of Attrition to regain lost territory, began a process of depoliticizing the military and issued a set of political liberalization reforms. After the conclusion of the 1970 Arab League summit in Khartoum, sadly Nasser suffered a heart attack and died. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamal_Abdel_Nasser His funeral in Cairo drew five million mourners and an outpouring of grief across the Arab world. Before the passing away of President Abdelnasir, the Arab League – formally the League of Arab States- met with all its members in Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, in August 29, 1967, when and the decisions known as the Three Nos, which include No Peace with Israel, No Negotiation with Israel and No Recognition of Israel, and the result was that these three commitments did not prove their credibility in the year of the Coronavirus Pandemic in 2020 which coincided with the American elections during the reign of the presidency of President Donald Trump in power in the White House in Washington DC.
The Israel–United Arab Emirates normalization agreement, officially called the Abraham Accords Peace Agreement: Treaty of Peace, Diplomatic Relations and Full Normalization between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the State of Israel, was initially agreed to in a joint statement by the United States, Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
As for the question of which Arab countries have diplomatic relations with Israel, the answer at hand goes as follows: Israel maintains full diplomatic relations with two of its Arab neighbours, Egypt and Jordan, after signing peace treaties in 1979 and 1994 respectively. In 2020, Israel signed agreements establishing diplomatic relations with two other Arab countries, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.
Is this Normalization with Israel permissible for the Nightingale and forbidden for birds of other race or any gender? This is the million dollar question as they say! The phrase sixty-four dollar question, $64 question, sixty-four thousand dollar question and variants denote a crucial question or issue. It originated in the question posed at the climax of Take It or Leave It, a US radio quiz for a prize of sixty-four dollars.14 Sep 2017. A question that is very important and difficult or complex to answer! Moreover, the question that everyone wants to know the answer to. .https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/sixty-four-dollar+question
The Sudanese People have Never Agreed on the So-called National CONSTANTS/Principles
It did not happen that the components of the Sudanese people agreed on the So-called National Fundamentals or Principles that the leaders of some Sudanese political parties tended to constantly brag about what they call the principles of Sudan, while it did not happen that the components of the Sudanese people ever met and agreed on the so-called national constant principles.
This phrase, which some political party leaders continue to recite, has struck the Sudanese people with boredom and anger at other times, and therefore time has come for those leaders of political parties to stop using them to blackmail and exploit the absence of enough knowledge and at other times they exploited Sudanese people as a result of their absolute support to whatever emanating from the Party Headquarters without fact-checking; Sometimes, this applies even more to political parties that are related to religious sects or have extremist fundamental ideological beliefs.
It’s fair to say that the components of the Sudanese people if Not the whole world is sick and Tired to their back teeth of the Running Saga and the Row over the Normalisation between Sudan and Israel.
As respects our House of Representatives, it would in principle be the same.
It was easily done, and without any cost or sacrifice of principle.
But every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle.
As it is said sometimes, a difference of opinion does not spoil the friendliness of an issue!
The Question as to what are the national constants/ principles – in other words National Principles, and the legitimate question is who defines them? This question is timely and which is beyond doubt a legitimate question that awaits an answer and continues waiting for a convincing answer. There are matters that are not agreed upon or have not been offered the chance to negotiate before, but some totalitarian regimes and some political party ideologists try to impose them on citizens on a principle that must be accepted whether you like it or not; as an accomplished fact, fait accompli!
Looking at the foregoing one would ask as to who is the authorized person to impose or explain the meaning of nationally constant principles in the first place? Furthermore, what are the national constant principles, and who defines them?
It is a True fact, that Khartoum was the meeting place for the leaders of the national liberation movements in southern Africa, and it was intended by the Angolan Revolutionary Augustinho Neto, Zimbabwean Joshua Nkomo and the Namibian Sam Nujoma. Sudan also opened its doors for all of them, set up their camps and prepared their political and armed cadres, to support them in their battles against the apartheid regime. In the Sudanese Capital Khartoum, Patrice Lumumba, the Congolese, dreamed of crossing to safety, before being assassinated by treason in the Congo. He was neither an Arab nor a Palestinian, but he was an African leader. From it Zimbabwean (revolutionary) Robert Mugabe announced a new wave of the liberation Revolution that toppled the rulers of Rhodesia. Here was the Zambian Kenneth Kaunda, the Tanzanian Julius Nyerere, and the South African lions were Nelson Mandela’s companions, and in Khartoum was Miriam Makeba singing for the Revolution against the apartheid regime from Sudan, and none of them was Palestinian or Arab. Furthermore, were the Eritrean rebels, with their various organizations finding refuge, and preparing to wrest their legitimate right to their homeland. From Khartoum, Ernesto “Che” Guevara the Argentine Marxist Revolutionary, physician, author, guerrilla leader, diplomat, and military theorist was making his way to escort the rebels in the Congo Basin, in full view of the entire world’s intelligence.
Those who ruled Sudan were not among those who could be placed in the category of intelligence descriptions, and described them as left-wing radicals or revolutionaries; they were only Sudanese who were fully aware of their position in the midst of the liberation war on the African continent, and they stood in support of it. Arab or African identity was not a condition for declaring victory and solid Sudanese standing with the causes of African peoples. The struggle and standing with the revolutionaries were not conditional upon payment of any kind. When the Sudanese poet Taj Al-Sir Al-Hassan composed his wonderful Poem “Asia and Africa” in support of the struggles of the peoples in the two continents, and all the forces of liberation in the world, he did not think that a day would come, and there would be at the top of power in Sudan someone who was ignorant of this bright history or despised it, and sells Sudan and its positions on Roadside and incredible gallantry. There is no room to obscure the facts of history and Sudan’s historical and constant link with support for national liberation issues, and its honorable standing on the right side of history with the peoples and national liberation movements, especially the Palestinian National liberation Movement (Fatah).https://www.google.com/search?q=Palestinian+national+liberation+movement.&oq=Palestinian+national+liberation+movement.&aqs=chrome..69i57j0i22i30i457.3449j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
The previous political positions of Sudan in support of liberation movements in the world do not necessarily make Sudan a hostage for everyone who wants to use the name of Sudan for his ideological and partisan political purposes, as is happening now on the issue of normalization with Israel. The world has changed since those political eras and the time has come when the national interests of the Sudanese people should be emphasized and offered the priority. The fact that the Sudanese transitional government tried to give priority to Sudanese interests is not necessarily that it denies the issues of the rest of the world’s people under occupation, but as they say that stubbornness is doomed to death and remorse, where remorse is not beneficial. It seems to the observer that the Arabists politicians do not read history thoughtfully or deliberately try to forget about the political facts, including that certain Arab countries, at least two, have stood against the inclusion of Sudan as a member of the Arab League, claiming that Sudan is not a true Arab and but it is an African. On the other hand, while Sudan is not trying to win over other people’s rights, including the Arabs, but the time has come to devote itself to its national, regional and global political affairs without being a prisoner to racist Arab nationalism. It is necessary to start and be free from the shackles that some Ideologist politicians trying put around the necks of the Sudanese people over questionable political issues without being consulted.
In the coming weeks, we will not be very surprised if other Arab countries joined the list of their peers in the process of normalization with Israel.
Mahmoud Darwish the Palestinian poet and author who was regarded as the Palestinian national poet and who won numerous awards for his works and who has been reported to have used Palestine as a metaphor for the loss of Eden, birth and resurrection, and the anguish of dispossession and exile as saying: “My country is not always right. But I can only exercise a true right in my own country. ”https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/palestine
Dr. Mahmoud A. Suleiman is an author, columnist and a blogger. His blog is http://thussudan.wordpress.com/