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Former Kuwaiti Minister Describes How Extremists Harmed the Palestinian Cause
(MEMRI) Former Kuwaiti information minister Sami Abdullatif Al-Nesf, former chairman and managing director of Kuwait Airways, said in an interview on Kuwaiti Diwan Al-Mulla Internet TV on July 11: "In 1937, the...Peel Commission gave the Palestinians 90% of the land - 25,000 square km. - whereas the Jews were given a mini-state of 2,500 square km....The loud and empty slogans by Mufti Amin Al-Husseini thwarted the two-state plan. Al-Husseini fled to Hitler, betting on the wrong horse. What I'm trying to show is that historically speaking, the Palestinian cause has lost time and again because of the extremists." Regarding what happened in Deir Yassin, Al-Husseini "blew it out of proportion because of his theory that the Palestinians should leave to make it easier for the Arab armies to move in....Al-Husseini's greatest crime of all was his insistence on keeping the Palestinians in refugee camps...and to this day, they are paying the price." "In 1917, just as there were extremists, there were also wise, reasonable people. One of them was [Lebanese politician] Shakib Arslan. He said: When I visited the [Jewish] settlements, I realized that they were like an advanced locomotive, which could pull us out of our ignorance, poverty, and so on." "There were Palestinians who said the same thing. Some Palestinians said: [The Jews] have been here since 1700-1800 and throughout history. The Israelites and the Land of Israel are mentioned in the Quran. Where was it? In Africa? No, it's the same land. Let's reach understandings." "It is important to understand - and this has been true throughout history - that if you lose a war, you pay the price. We are the only ones who refuse to pay the price even though we lost the 1948 war. We lost the 1956 and 1967 wars, but refuse to pay the price. It doesn't work like that. We chose to wage war and lost, so by logic, we should pay the price."