Some 53 years ago, in 1967, in Khartoum, Sudan, the Arab League met and adopted "The Three No's" — no peace, no recognition and no negotiation with Israel. But today, these moral principles are too costly to sustain for Sudan.
Sudan is in deep economic difficulties, where petrol queues run parallel to bread queues.
The years long United States sanctions against it have left the country near paralysed and unable to access loans from foreign lenders. It is, too, part of the US' terror-sponsoring countries' list.
So desperate is Sudan that its transitional government has abandoned the nation's moral principles to survive. It is the third country, after the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain, to normalise relations with Israel recently.
That Pan-Arabism is being eroded, chiselled away bit by bit by US President Donald Trump in the run-up to the presidential elections to please his pro-Israel Christian evangelical support, jeopardises the buffer that has sustained Palestine as a body politic.
Sudan is betraying Palestine at a huge cost. It will be paying more than US$330 million to US victims of terrorism, but this will be paid off by Saudi Arabia. It will be taken off the US list of countries sponsoring terrorism and the sanctions, too, will be lifted.
Yet, the people and political parties are not with the transitional government. Why then has Sudan's transitional government normalised relations with Israel if this move is not supported by the people?
Some believe that Sudan's economic problems will deliver to the Israelis another "peace" agreement.
The US is a deadly bully as its sanctions against Iraq proved.
Half a million dead Iraqi children due to US imposed sanctions are considered acceptable by its then secretary of state Madeline Albright as a strategy to decimate Iraq. Few countries are like Cuba, having been the victim of US sanctions since the 1960s and surviving the resulting economic harshness.
Now that Joseph Biden is the US president-elect, will he continue delivering more Arab countries to Israel? Indeed both he and vice-president-elect Kamala Harris are strongly pro-Israel.
Biden was president Barack Obama's vice-president, and if the "Iran Deal" is to be restored, joining the Sunni frontal assault might become an obstacle if the intention is to re-establish American leadership of the West, if not the world, now that China's strength has been irrevocably demonstrated.
There is a sense that the US under Trump thinks that Palestine is a non-issue, and that the geopolitics of West Asia can be resolved without direct Palestinian participation.
His "deal of the century" was arrived at without consultations with the Palestinians. But, signs are that Palestine will not capitulate without a fight.
The Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment, Sanction (BDS) movement is fast spreading worldwide.
That it has been challenged in Europe and the US is a sign of gathering strength.
Then there was the recently suspended, but easily resurrected, Great March of Return occurring every Friday for more than a year, a grassroots social movement involving diverse groups of Palestinian society.
And even while the UAE and Bahrain normalisation agreements were inked, Israel was bombing Gaza on the pretext that Hamas had fired rockets into Israel.
If true, then obviously Hamas' claims to be a militia are true. Israel is wary of militias as the Hizbollah in Lebanon has proven itself to be able to defend Lebanese territory and frustrate Israel's security scheme in the region.
Now that Sudan is a friend of Israel's, Palestine is no longer its cause in this respect. And, like Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, will Sudan Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok be a guest at a US "friendship" party?
Kenyatta was rewarded when Kenya abstained from voting for the United Nations General Assembly resolution to condemn Trump's embassy move from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Other Arab governments adamantly stood with Palestine, like Qatar. Despite being home to a US military base, it remains faithful to its Pan-Arab position.
Will Palestine crumble as Pan-Arabism disintegrates? Or can it survive and make the transition to a multi-polar world where Zionism can be challenged?
Zionism is a strange political beast. Some argue that it is anti-Semitic and white supremacist.
For others, it is Jewish supremacist. Then there is Christian Zionism. But many of the early leaders of Israel were atheists or agnostics. The certainty is that Zionist Tel Aviv practises apartheid having declared Israel a Jewish state.
Palestinians, the indigenous people, are second-class citizens to a people who claim ownership of biblical lands which they had long abandoned, and on which the Palestinians have built a 4,000-year-old history, once a thriving nation of Jews, Christians and Muslims.
Unfortunately, according to the publication Israel Hayom: "Biden is known for his affection for Israel and his pro-Zionist stances."
He has already indicated that the US embassy will remain in Jerusalem.
The writer is executive director, International Movement for a JUST World
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times