Why didn’t the Arabs sympathize with Iran?
By Nawaf Shathel Taqa
April 14, 2024
Under normal circumstances, Arabs were supposed to sympathize with Iran when it launched its latest attack on Israel because of the Zionists’ crimes against our people in occupied Palestine. Still, the vast majority of Arabs did not show that sympathy. A friend of Iranian origin became angry with me and accused the Arabs of treason after I sent him an article published by a prominent Iraqi writer in which he objectively analyzed Iran’s instrumental strategy towards Israel. There are many reasons for the lack of Arab sympathy for Iran, most notably that Tehran itself has openly declared that it is targeting Israel in response to the latter’s attack on its consulate in Damascus, meaning that this is not related to Israel’s crimes in Gaza. I will not go into the scandal of prior coordination and contacts between Tehran, Washington, and Tel Aviv regarding the attack and its timing; this prompted Israel to give its school students a specific holiday when it was informed about the precise timing of the strike. This strike has not yet resulted in any injury.
However, the reasons for the Arabs’ lack of sympathy for Iran are more profound than the above. As far as the Iraqis are concerned, they cannot forget that Iran has been sharing with the United States for more than twenty years control of Iraq’s resources, plundering the country’s wealth, and supporting a corrupt political system established by the American occupation. Most Arabs have understood that the apparent “dispute” between Iran and Israel is a servitude for influence, a servitude for who controls the crumbling Arab political system that governs us, and thus over who will inherit its legacy. What is happening today is an absolute servitude under the cover of an apparent dispute over the future of the nation between a malevolent Persian neighbor who dreams of reviving a defunct empire and a racist Israeli entity that dreams of occupying our lands and exterminating us all, just as it is doing today against our people in Gaza. Today, both sides, Iran and Israel, realize that their sick dreams can only be realized through understanding and harmony with the superpower, and this may explain what happened and what will happen.
Arab Nationalist Forum: translated by Ibrahim Ebeid.
