To our brothers with all our love!

Whether during Saddam’s aggression and occupation of Kuwait, his threats to the rest of the Gulf states, and the subsequent alignment of millions of Arab brothers with him, or in the current alignment with Iranian aggression, we would understand if Saddam’s Iraq or Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were competing with the Gulf states through generous contributions and annual billions in support for Arab states and peoples, or by offering employment and decent livelihoods to millions of Arab brothers who send tens of billions to support their families and the economies of their home countries. In reality, however, Iran (and Saddam before it) not only fails to engage in such benevolent actions, but Iran’s activities and those of its sinister proxies in Hormuz, the Bab al-Mandab Strait, and the Red Sea have driven up the cost of living for their own peoples, caused billions of dollars in lost revenue—similar to the impact on Suez Canal income—and forced states and peoples to pay higher prices for energy, urea, and petroleum products.

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Some of us in the Gulf wonder: Is the reason that Iran claims to support the Palestinian cause and opposes Israel? The truth is that the governments of the peoples aligned with Iran are fully normalized with Israel, without any objection from those peoples or their representatives in their various parliaments. There are no protests or demands to cut ties with Israel or annul agreements with it. The argument that standing with Iran is due to its support for the Palestinian people and cause is entirely refuted by clear facts. The Gulf states have shed blood, provided funds, and sent armies to fight Israel, and have offered employment opportunities to hundreds of thousands of Palestinians—actions Iran has never undertaken, neither under the Shah nor under the Islamic Revolution. The Iran Gate scandal and writings by Dr. Trita Parsi, head of the Iranian lobby in Washington, confirm that covert intimate relations never ceased for a moment. No Iranian has ever been known to have been killed in war or resistance operations against Israel in support of Palestine, unlike the Gulf states. Moreover, Iranian intervention has completely destroyed several Arab countries, weakening them and thereby weakening their capacity to confront Israel.

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The final point: 1. It is most bitter that those who claim to align with Iran out of sympathy and support for the Palestinian people are contradicted by the fact that it is always the Gulf states that stand with the Palestinians after they are implicated in revolutions that lead to aggression and destructive repercussions. Every time destruction occurs, the Gulf states rebuild. Furthermore, those who claim such alignment have rarely, if ever, provided direct support to Palestinians, as Gulf states and peoples have, except for raising inflammatory slogans that mostly amount to undermining the cause and harming its people. 2. Another clear truth: When Arab brothers needed us, we were there despite their numerical superiority and our relative scarcity. For example, Kuwait, which is being targeted and attacked with malice these days, did not limit itself in 1967 to supporting the budgets of Arab confrontation states with 55 million pounds sterling annually and proposing an oil embargo against the West—which was halted because some oil-producing states could not sustain it—and paying its share of support, thereby stopping the embargo. In 1973, Kuwait actually sent two armies to the Egyptian and Syrian fronts, and we lost dozens of martyrs without requiring our presence to avoid direct confrontation with the enemy due to our small numbers. Kuwait also hosted hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees after that setback, providing them with a decent life—an action neither Saddam nor Iran has ever undertaken. Yet, sympathy is always directed toward the aggressor against us, not toward us. There is always a need for an excuse—any excuse—to stand against us. This is a complex issue with further developments to come.