With so much outrage over how the Gazans are being treated in the crossfires of the war between Israel & Hamas, one must ask a simple question: “Why won’t other Islamic nations grant refuge to Gazans until the conflict is over?” The answer is that it is because everywhere the “Palestinian-Arabs” go, they bring trouble. Such was the case in Malaysia just recently. In light of the ongoing suffering of so many in the Gaza conflict, the nation of Malaysia decided to open their borders in August of 2024 they permitted 127 Gazans (41 of whom were injured from the war) to enter their nation and receive medical treatment. How did the Gazans repay them for their generosity? They rioted. The riot happened in apparent protest of their travel restrictions as some wanted the process of their application to return to Gaza to be sped up. In response to the disagreements, some of the Gazans rioted, setting small fires & smashing furniture. Palestinian Ambassador to Malaysia, Walid Abu Ali expressed sadness & embarrassment over the incident, stating:. “This is not our ethics and goes against our culture. The government of Malaysia and the Palestinian embassy are doing our best to help.” However, is is statement that “This is not our ethics and not a part of our culture” actually true? The reality is, it’s not.
Well, history shows that many of these nations are in truth, not too fond of the Palestinians. After Israel took over the West Bank after the 1967 War, thousands of Palestinian Arabs, along with PLO leadership, fled to Jordan. Once established in the country, the PLO based themselves in Jordan and launched ongoing raids into Israel. However, the PLO did not stop there. Yasir Arafat also began to established a “state within a state” in the nation of Jordan. He used his terrorists to begin taking over portions of the country and imposing taxes on citizens to help fund his ongoing campaign against Israel. When Jordanian police officers tried to stop this, they were killed. It wasn’t long before Arafat began to try and overthrow Jordanian King Hussain & take over the country himself. Former PLO terrorists Tass Saada who was Yasir Arafat’s personal driver confessed that he himself attempted to assassinate the Prince of Jordan during this time period. Eventually, King Hussain got fed up and on Sept. 1970 (Known as Black September), he ordered his military to carry out an all out attack against the PLO terrorist factions operating in his country (Link to Video). Over 25,000 Palestinian militants and civilians were killed by Jordanian forces while their leadership fled to neighboring Lebanon. What then happened in Lebanon? When Lebanon took in the PLO and thousands of Palestinian refugees after Black September, the nation became destabilized and led to clashes between Lebanese Christian militias and Palestinian militants (mainly the PLO). This ultimately plunged the nation into a disastrous Civil War that lasted from 1975-1990. Over 150,000 people were killed and a million more displaced. Most Palestinians who remained in Lebanon are subject to state-sanctioned discrimination and are banned from over 39 professions, including medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, and law. Even Palestinians born in Lebanon are denied citizenship and are subjected to state sanctioned discrimination. So suffice to say, neither Jordan, nor Lebanon are eager to take in more Palestinians, even on a temporary basis.
Syria is still involved in their own Civil War, so obviously that’s not a very go option, so what then of Egypt? Well as it presently stands, Egypt already has 9 million refugees, 300,000 of whom fled from war-ravaged Sudan. The Egyptian President el-Sissi fears that if more refugees come in from Gaza, it will destabilize the nation even further as many would not return to Gaza, and even if they did, el-Sissi says it would take months before the fighting was over between Israel and Hamas. Moreover, the Egyptian leaders are well aware of the chaos that the “Palestinian refugees” brought to Jordan & Lebanon, & they don’t want to deal with it themselves. Moreover, they already witnessed their nation nearly fall to the Muslim Brotherhood and they know that Hamas is the armed wing of the Brotherhood and that they actively supported the Brotherhood when they tried to take over Egypt during the Arab Spring. The Egyptian leaders therefore fear that these same militants follow the civilians of Gaza into Egypt and will help the Brotherhood regain enough strength to topple their government and take over the country. The incident in Malaysia also showed that even when these “Palestinian refugees” are moved to nations far away from the conflict, they bring trouble. Such was the case in Kuwait. Prior to the 1991 Gulf War over 300,000 Palestinians “refugees” lived in Kuwait. However, the PLO, along with most of these refugees supported Saddam Hussain invading and annexing the country. So once the Kuwaiti government regained control, nearly all of the Palestinians, which represented nearly 18% of the country at that time, were expelled from Kuwait.
Everywhere Palestinians refugees go, Palestinian militants follow, and wherever the Palestinian militants go, destabilization arises, which eventually leads to armed conflict. Thus we can see that while Arab nations don’t seem to have much issue with Palestinian militants fighting Israel, they don’t want to have to fight them themselves, and therefore, they find that the easiest way to avoid this is to simply not allow Palestinians into their states at all, even if it’s only on a temporary basis. Seems to me that Walid Abu Ali statement of: “This is not our ethics and goes against our culture.” Is not true. It has been part of their ethics & culture for many decades, and shows no signs of changing.
Sources:
Darwish, Nonie. Now They Call Me Infidel: Why I Renounced Jihad for America, Israel, and the War on Terror. New York: Penguin Group, 2006.
Gabriel, Brigitte. Because They Hate: A Survivor of Islamic Terror Warns America. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2006.
Glick Caroline. The Israeli Solution. New York: Crown Forum, 2014.
Jeffrey, Jack and Samy Magdy. “Why Egypt and Other Arab Countries are Unwilling to take in Palestinian Refugees from Gaza.” Associated Press. Oct. 18, 2023. Accessed from https://apnews.com/article/palestinian-jordan-egypt-israel-refugee-502c06d004767d4b64848d878b66bd3d.
“Malaysian Military Confirms Incident Involving Palestinians at KL Facility, Says no Fights or Injuries.” Channel News Asia. Jan. 06, 2025. Accessed from https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/malaysia-palestinians-wisma-transit-kuala-lumpur-commotion-4838806.
Mrou, Bassam. “Stay or Go: Palestinians in Lebanon Plunged into Poverty.” Associated Press. Oct. 21, 2022. Accessed from https://apnews.com/article/middle-east-syria-beirut-lebanon-business-4965d46cbc27cf17b8876d0247f0b4b6.
Saada, Tass and Dean Merrill. Once an Arafat Man. Clarksville, Tennessee: Riggins International Rights Service, Inc., 2008.