Let’s go back to the starting point, before the declaration of the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, or the Nakba as the Arabs describe it. On February 14, 1945, the founding King Abdulaziz Al Saud met with US President Franklin D. Roosevelt aboard the American warship “USS Quincy” in the Red Sea.

 

A lot has been written about that historic meeting, but what concernd the Palestinian cause was significant. During that meeting, the great Arab leader, Abdulaziz, told the historic American leader, Roosevelt, about the migration of Jews to Palestine, which, according to Roosevelt, was meant to provide justice and help the impovrished, who had been oppressed and killed in Europe, especially by the German Nazis: "If the Germans are the ones who are persecuting the Jews, why don't you give them the homes of the Germans who oppressed them?"

 

Roosevelt replied: "But the Jews prefer to come to Palestine."

 

King Abdulaziz quickly responded: "It is the criminal, not the innocent, who should be asked to compensate and lift the oppression!"

 

Before that, in 1935, when Crown Prince Saud bin Abdulaziz visited Palestine and toured Jaffa, Nablus, Bethlehem, Ramallah, Jerusalem, and others in a historical visit, his words during that visit to the Palestinian people were: "The people of Palestine are our sons and our kin, and we have a duty that we will fulfill toward their cause."

 

What happened after that is written in history books and recorded in memory. The Saudis fought, both officially and publicly, in the land of Palestine, and their blood was shed in Gaza, the West Bank, and elsewhere. Anyone wishing to read some of that history should, for example, read the book “Record of Honor” by the late Saudi writer and historian, Fahd Al-Marek, who was the commander of the Saudi popular forces in the Palestine War and acted with support and guidance from his leader, King Abdulaziz.

 

Afterward, since the reigns of Kings Faisal, Khalid, Fahd, Abdullah, and up to the current reign of King Salman, Saudi Arabia's firm stance on Palestine has not changed.

 

Regarding Trump's recent statement in the presence of (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu in Washington about Palestine, the relocation of Gazans, and Saudi and Arab normalization, the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs' statement was decisive, emphasizing that the Kingdom’s stance on the establishment of a Palestinian state is firm and unwavering, and stressing that there will be no relations with Israel without the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

 

This position was made crystal clear by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in his speech before the Shura Council on September 18, 2024.

 

Going back to the roots of this Saudi approach to the Palestinian cause, a report by US Colonel William Eddy, who accompanied King Abdulaziz during his meeting with President Roosevelt and sent it to his government on January 5, 1945, stated that King Abdulaziz attended a meeting of representatives of Western countries in Jeddah, where he told them: "America and Britain must choose between an Arab land of security and peace and a Jewish land drowning in blood."