Those who live in Western Europe and America are frightened that any association with the work of people who credibly challenge Zionism's version of history would invite Zionist retribution, which could result in their businesses being damaged and perhaps even destroyed.
Those who live in the Gulf States are frightened that assisting the truth-tellers could put their very comfortable positions and relationships with the rulers of those states at risk because the rulers would not take kindly to a blow-back hassle from Zionism.
Zionist heavyweights in America do sometimes call Gulf Arab rulers directly to tell them what they should not do or allow. One such call was made to tell a ruler that he should not support Alan Hart and Ilan Pappe. The call was made after Ilan and I had made a joint presentation in the particular state, at its invitation, and had been promised support for our work.
Another possible reason why some seriously wealthy diaspora Palestinians have not assisted the promotion of the truth of history could be that they don't understand (at all or well enough) that Western governments are not going to confront the Zionist monster unless the citizens of nations, the voters, are informed enough to demand that they do.
It's also not impossible that some seriously wealthy diaspora Palestinians have not contributed to the information war effort because they believe, but dare not say, that Palestine has long been a lost cause. The brutal truth about seriously wealthy non-Palestinian Arabs is that most of them don't care about the occupied and oppressed Palestinians and the many others, refugees still living in camps, who were dispossessed of their homes, their land and their rights. The Arab masses do care but their elites don't. (That statement is something of an exaggeration to make a point but it contains much truth).
Weighing Costs
Today I can quantify the cost of my own commitment to the war for truth. If I had written a pro-Zionist book, I would have had wealthy Jews throwing money at it and me for global promotion of all kinds. But with Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews, (which is a complete re-writing of the entire history of the conflict exposing Zionist propaganda for the nonsense it is and replacing it with the documented truth of history), I was on my own.
To fund the research and writing over nearly five years, then the printing and publication of the original, two-volume hardback edition, and then some promotion, I took out a loan against the security of the home that my wife and I owned outright and have lived in for a quarter of a century.
At the time I decided to do so (with my dear wife's complete understanding and support), I didn't think I was being stupid. My previous book (Arafat, Terrorist or Peacemaker?) had earned me significant income from the sale of the Arabic newspaper serialization rights, and I assumed that my latest book would do the same, enabling me to clear the re-mortgaged debt on my home.
I was, of course, aware that there were truths in Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews that would be more than uncomfortable for the Arab regimes and which they would not want their newspapers to publish. When I was writing the book, I had to be guided by the fact that you can't tell the truth about Zionism without telling the truth about why the Arab states were never a threat to Israel's existence.
But newspaper serialization of a two-volume book (which became three volumes in its updated American edition) would have taken only a relatively small amount of total content. Arab editors doing the serialization could have left out everything that offended their political masters and still had more than enough material to inform and entertain their readers.
But it was no go. My book was not only red-flagged by Zionism and therefore all the major Western publishing houses, this despite the fact that my extremely well-connected and respected literary agent had on file letters from the CEOs of some of them with rare praise for my manuscript. One of the letters, which I quoted in the Preface to the original hardback edition, described my manuscript as "awesome ... driven my passion, commitment and profound learning." It added, "There is no question it deserves to be published."
For their part, the Arab regimes were at one with Zionism in wanting the full truth of history to be suppressed to the maximum extent possible. They effectively endorsed Zionism's strategy for dealing with me and my work -- "Alan Hart and his book do not exist." (I think my dear friend Ilan Pappe may well have been right when he said that Zionism was more frightened of my book than any other because of its title, which he described as "the truth in seven words.")
Today I have to face the cost consequences of my commitment to the truth of history. To avoid being dispossessed of my home and land in the not-too-distant future because I don't have the money to pay the principal sum of the outstanding re-mortgaged debt (I have been paying only the interest on it), I now have to sell and downsize. Preparing to downsize will require, among other things, months of my full time to sort through and dispose of much of what has been accumulated over decades and could not be accommodated and stored in a much smaller property with little or no land.
And that in the proverbial nutshell is why I am withdrawing from the battlefield of the war for truth. The days when I could serve causes beyond self in order to feel that I was doing something useful with my life are gone. Like seriously wealthy diaspora Palestinians and other Arabs, I must now put my own interests, and above all those of my dear wife, first.
Love or Justice?
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