Global Agenda 2013: Water, Energy, and the Arab Awakening

Suffi ce it to say, a major factor that contributed to the so-called ‘Arab Spring’ is the inability of economies to develop the appropriate value chain, and create the jobs required to meet the demands of the increasing number of graduates. [...] We — all of us in the East and the West — must become more sensitive to the concept of consequences: the consequences of injustice, poverty, illiteracy, lack of opportunity, and despair, which can all lead to the contemplation of violence. [...] Th ey have the experience as heads of state, of government, and the advantage of no longer having to fi ght for re-election to make the kinds of proposals that rise above ideology and polemics, that bring transparency to the nature and scope of the real issues at hand and represent solutions that are relevant and cost-eff ective. [...] For the Palestinians and the surrounding countries of Jordan, Syria, Egypt, and Lebanon, it resulted in a feeling of mistrust between ruler and people that lead to, among other events, the assassination of King Abdullah I of Jordan in Jerusalem in 1951, and the July 1952 revolution in Egypt, not to mention the endless series of coups that Syria was subjected to in the 1950s and 1960s. [...] Th e conference marked a start of an intricate process of negotiations that lead to the Jordan-Israel Peace Treaty, and the signing of the Oslo Accords between the Palestinians and the Israelis.