The Arab League has held the fate of Palestinians hostage almost since its inception in 1945, exploiting Palestinian statelessness and dependence to distract from internal problems among the other 21 members. Palestinians have since 1948 been restricted to a deep pit in the League's basement from which they cannot climb out, and remain at the mercy of the other 21 League members. With some frequency, the League lowers a basket on a long rope, containing a squeezable bottle of skin lotion, which the Palestinians are ordered to apply.
"It rubs the lotion on its skin," said the League. "It puts the lotion in the basket."
Palestinians have grown loath to raise objections to their treatment at the hands of their fellow Arabs, which involves keeping them imprisoned in squalid conditions, rather than leaving them to determine their own future. Each time the Palestinians have resisted, they have been doused in cold water.
"It rubs the lotion in its skin or it gets the hose again," the League said.
Matter-of-fact threats, however, do not always suffice to get the Palestinians to comply. On one recent occasion the threat prompted not a placing of the lotion in the basket, but pleading for mercy and wanting to be let go. That outpouring of pleading sparked a harsh vocal response from the League.
"Put the lotion in the basket!" it yelled, uncharacteristically addressing the Palestinians in the second person and emphasizing the demand with profanity. Under normal circumstances, the League refrains from addressing them in the second person, which carries associations of humanity and selfhood, so as to avoid confronting the misery its policies and attitude wreak on the very real, very human Palestinians. Since, however, for its own purposes the League needs the Palestinians to apply the lotion and put it back in the basket, it cannot absolutely abandon the second person and is occasionally forced to break with the policy of employing the pronoun "it." When that happens, the League can be seen to briefly struggle visibly with pain and self-doubt, but those are quickly dispelled by the shouted assertion of dominance.
Outside international efforts to rescue the Palestinians have so far come to naught, as the League members and their allies in the UN control the conditions under which the Palestinians are kept. The League continues to ignore requests by Palestinians to determine their own future and enjoy the benefits of freedom that citizenship in an actual state confers, instead subjugating Palestinian fate to the precious domestic and political needs of other League members.
Experts do not expect the situation to improve without a real transformation of the league. According to political analyst Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a genuine metamorphosis must take place if the Palestinians are to be removed from the dry well, which is not currently in the interests of the League as it sees them.