Arab League Secretary-General: ‘Severing relations with Israel is not a prudent policy’

Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit, 82, has since childhood witnessed the turbulent relationship between Arab countries and Israel, whose creation in historic Palestine in 1948 sparked a seemingly eternal conflict. Its latest manifestation — the Israeli invasion and offensive in Gaza — has already left a death toll approaching 54,000. Meanwhile, Arab intellectuals point to the contradiction between their governments’ condemnation of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government and the lukewarm attitude they criticize for a lack of concrete action.

Only five of the 22 Arab League states — Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain — maintain diplomatic relations with Israel; none have broken them off over Gaza. Gheit justifies this by arguing the need to talk to the Israelis to achieve peace. The Cairo-born diplomat participated in the negotiation of the 1978 Camp David Accords, which made Egypt the first Arab country to recognize Israel. He recounts this in Witness to War and Peace, the book he presented on June 2 at the Casa Árabe in Madrid, where he spoke with this newspaper.

Question. The meeting convened by Spain last Sunday to build an international coalition against the Israeli blockade of Gaza, at which you represented the Arab League, ended without a final communiqué. Were there any disagreements?

Answer. No one opposed any of the proposals. The purpose of the meeting was to prepare for the conference on a two-State solution for Israel and Palestine on June 17 in New York. I would emphasize that, in Madrid, countries such as the United Kingdom, Italy, and France participated for the first time, and that the Maltese Foreign Minister even announced the recognition of Palestine. The discussions focused on calling for an end to the killings and accusing Israel of causing a famine in Gaza to displace the population. We all agreed that Israel’s actions were criminal under international law, including those European countries I mentioned. Even Germany participated. The change in attitude of some states known to be friendly to Israel, who are now talking about sanctioning it and halting trade if the attack on Gaza continues, is striking.

Q. Concrete measures were mentioned at that meeting. Why haven’t Arab states with diplomatic relations with Israel, such as Egypt, severed them?

A. Severing relations is not a prudent policy when it comes to negotiating with the parties: Egypt and also Qatar [which does not officially recognize Israel] are trying to mediate to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza, which requires communicating with both sides, including Israel [the other being Hamas]. If there are no diplomatic relations or communication, it would be impossible to get anything from Israel. Relations between Egypt and that country are merely formal, but very cold. And the same goes for Jordan and the rest of the Arab states [that recognize Israel]. Egypt cannot recall its ambassador to Israel for consultations, because it does not have one [the Egyptian government refused to appoint a new ambassador to Tel Aviv in 2024]. There is hardly any trade or cultural relations. The Israeli Cultural Office in Egypt is closed. There is no life in that relationship, which is normal because the Egyptian people are affected [by Gaza] like never before.

Q. An Arab League country, Jordan, helped Israel intercept missiles that Iran launched at that country in April 2024.

A. Neither the Arab League nor I personally have any confirmation of this. These are claims disseminated by the media. Those missiles flew over Jordanian skies, and some fell on its territory, so that country was defending its airspace.

Q. Does the fear of a new war with Israel weigh more heavily in the Arab states than the majority support for the Palestinians among their populations?

A. We Arab countries do not want war. We aspire to a peaceful resolution to this situation. We Arabs proposed a peace plan in 2002, at the Arab League summit in Beirut, which proposed Israel withdraw from the occupied Palestinian territories [Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem] in exchange for all Arab states establishing diplomatic relations with that country. Israel rejected the plan because its objective remains the same as always: to expel the Palestinians from their lands and seize all of historic Palestine. We are witnessing a dramatic history of the use of force against a defenseless, unarmed people.

Q. What is the Arab League going to do now that Israel has launched a new offensive in Gaza?

A. We want to take everything Israel is doing to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the International Criminal Court. We also try to defend the Palestinians at the United Nations General Assembly.

Q. Are you referring to the resolution that Spain wants to present to the ICJ ordering Israel to lift the blockade on the entry of aid?

A. We fully support all initiatives to defend the Palestinians. The issue is that the West allows Israel to act the way it does without firm punishment. Spain is taking an ethical stance and has moved ahead of all European states regarding Gaza. That’s why it enjoys impressive standing in the Arab and Islamic region. The problem is that there are European states with great influence that continue to live with the idea that Jews must be defended because they were persecuted in Europe. That persecution happened in the past, while the persecution of the Palestinians is happening right now. Europe should understand this difference and that the Palestinians are paying the price for that past.

Q. Do Egypt and other Arab countries fear a large influx of Palestinians if Israel succeeds in expelling them? Does that influence their position?

A. The forced, or even non-forced, mass displacement of a population is illegal under international law. The international community calls it ethnic cleansing.

Q. Is Israel already committing this ethnic cleansing?

A. I firmly believe it. The forced or voluntary displacement of Palestinians from their land to Egypt or other countries would not prevent Israel from continuing to attack them within those countries, which would provoke wars between Israel and those host states. And then we would return to the situation we had 30 or 40 years ago. Israel is constantly trying to expand its territory at the expense of Arab countries [the Israeli army maintains an occupation of parts of Lebanon and Syria], under the guise of seeking security.

Q. When U.S. President Donald Trump announced his plan to build what he called the “Riviera of the Middle East” in Gaza, Egypt and the Arab League presented an alternative reconstruction plan. Do you think they will be able to implement it?

A. The League completely rejects Trump’s plan. It’s an ethnic cleansing that we will not allow. Not only in the countries surrounding the Strip [Egypt and Jordan], which Trump mentioned as receiving Palestinians, but in any state.

Q. And what about the Arab League plan?

A. That plan has as its priorities a ceasefire, agreeing on a new administration in Gaza and the West Bank, which will be managed by the Palestinian Authority (PA), and providing security to Gaza on a temporary basis through some international arm.

Q. Are you referring to an international military force?

A. Yes. With Arab and international forces. Reconstruction could then begin.

Q. Israel refuses to allow the PA to rule the Strip.

A. Israel rejects anything other than consent to its complete domination of all of Palestine. It’s a country that’s always trying to expand its territory at the expense of its neighbors and behaves like states that did the same in the 19th and 20th centuries. There are many examples in European history that you and I know, but I don’t want to mention names.

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