Is The Arab League a Sell Out?

The original uniting the Arab countries was not in 1945, it was during the outbreak of World War 1; during the time T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) was in the Middle East; approximately around 1918. This was the time of the original formation of the Arab League.

During this same time period, is also when the country boarder’s were created to what one see’s today as separate countries, prior to this time, Middle Eastern countries had not set country boundaries.

The Idea of doing these two thing’s, as well as the creation of the Arab League, was to unite the Middle East against any attempt of another invasion by foreign power’s within any Arab country.

Arab League to visit Israel

Abdul-Ilah al-Khatib, Jordan's foreign minister, will visit Israel with his Egyptian counterpart [AP]

9 July 2007

The Arab League is to send envoys to Israel for the first time to discuss an Arab peace initiative and how it might support the embattled Palestinian president.

Sunday's announcement by diplomats from both sides came as Israel's cabinet approved the release of 250 Palestinian prisoners to bolster Mahmoud Abbas in his power struggle with Hamas.

Jordan's foreign ministry said its minister, Abdul-Ilah al-Khatib and Egyptian counterpart Ahmed Aboul Gheit would arrive in Jerusalem on Thursday for talks with the Israeli prime minister and other senior officials.

Peace proposal

Mark Regev, a spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, said the foreign ministers would lead an Arab League mission to Israel to discuss the Arab peace plan, which would trade full Arab recognition of Israel for an Israeli withdrawal from all lands captured in the 1967 Middle East war and the creation of a Palestinian state.

"They will be talking about how the Arab peace proposal can help energise the rapprochement between Israel and the Palestinians," Regev said.

"This is the first time the Arab League is coming to Israel.

"From its inception the Arab League has been hostile to Israel. It will be the first time we'll be flying the Arab League flag."

Amr Moussa, the Arab League secretary-general, said on Sunday: "The upcoming visit of Egypt's and Jordan's foreign ministers to Israel upon the request of the Arab committee of peace initiative is to conduct necessary contacts with Israel."

The two foreign ministers, whose countries have peace agreements with Israel, have been designated as the League's official point men for the Arab peace initiative.

In another gesture of support for the Palestinian president, Tzipi Livni, the Israeli foreign minister, met Salam Fayyad, the new Palestinian prime minister, in Jerusalem on Sunday.

Palestinian killed

Meanwhile, in the West Bank late on Sunday, Israeli forces ambushed and killed a Palestinian fighter in the town of Jenin, Palestinian security and hospital officials said.

Islamic Jihad said Mohammed Nazal, 24, was one of its leaders.

Israel rejected the Arab plan outright when Saudi Arabia first proposed it in 2002, at the height of the Palestinian uprising. But it softened its resistance after some Arab states endorsed the plan again in March, sharing their concerns about Iran's growing influence.

Israeli officials have said they welcomed aspects of the plan, but reject its call for a return of all of the West Bank and an implied demand to resettle Palestinian refugees from the 1948 war that followed Israel's creation, and their descendants, in Israel.

Arab countries and the West have been pushing for renewed Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking since Hamas's takeover of the Gaza Strip last month.


Source