Palestinian Arabs snubbed at Arab League Economic Summit

Asharq al Awsat reports that the Palestinian Authority is frustrated at the refusal of the Arab nations to give some $430 million it requested for projects in Jerusalem.

The PA delegation, headed by Riyad al Maliki, said it regretted that the summit ignored the Jerusalem issue. The economic ministers decided to table the idea until the next summit in March in Baghdad.

Maliki said "we tried to re-focus on the issue of Jerusalem, and to remind Arab leaders that Jerusalem was waiting for them...alas, they rejected it."

Maliki said that the summit in Sirte last year resulted in pledges of $500 million to support the Arab claim to Jerusalem - and only 7% of those pledges were actually paid.

We have seen this happen before. As the West has been accelerating their throwing cash at Palestinian Arabs in the cause of "peace," the Arabs have written off the Palestinian Arabs as a waste of money and time. They will make statements of support - and there were statements in support of Jerusalem at the summit as well - but they will no longer put their money where their mouths are.

This trend accelerated dramatically after the Fatah/Hamas split, as Arab nations asked themselves why they should support an entity that couldn't even keep itself together.

Perhaps the West should look more carefully at the Arab calculus to write off the Palestinian Arab cause.