“The Palestinians…”

“Hey The Khan’s troops say he has been bold in…”

“Troops? That’s in the army? When you talk of The Khan you talk of team members and while playing cricket very successfully he may not have been the chief selector or was forced to work with a limited number of team members yet he is no longer constrained by either merit/quality or numbers in his selection of team members as the country’s prime minister…”

“What about the Tiger Force? That has no limit in numbers…”

“That hasn’t taken off because these dratted Pakistani people do not listen to them…”

“Yeah, but anyway talking of the Palestine issue and The Khan’s boldness need I remind you that the Palestinian people are divided into two – those managed by the PLO supported by Israel and US, have failed to get any concessions and have not held any elections for more than a decade and then there are the Hamas, outlawed by the US and the rest followed suit, and they rule Gaza and its Gaza that is under horrendous Israeli attack…”

“So?”

“So nothing but a bold move would have been to either call on the two Palestinians to merge and speak with one voice or support Hamas and need I add The Khan’s hero Erdogan has spoken to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh…”

“Haniyeh also spoke to Malaysian Prime Minister…”

“No, The Khan has not been that bold yet! By the way in 2009 the Pakistan government had announced a package of 3 million dollars to Hamas to meet its budget deficit at the time…anyway you know for the life of me I cannot understand US presidents support for Israel. I mean Netanyahu disrespected Obama so openly and yet the guy toed the Israeli line…I cannot understand…”

“OK, let me try to explain it to you. The first port of call after Zardari sahib became president was not China but was it the UK? And the Chinese were upset.”

“Yes but…”

“Wait, then along came Nawaz Sharif, and after the killing of two Chinese in Pakistan President Xi refused to meet with him on the side lines of the SCO meeting in 2017…”

“But…”

“Then came The Khan and you remember in the early days he said his administration would revisit the CPEC projects and when he went calling the Chinese showed their anger by sending a low level official to meet him at the airport…”

“Yes but…”

“And yet China has been helping us financially and has never abandoned Pakistan.”

“Hmmmm, but if a US president takes a bold decision he will go down in history as…”

“It’s not history that worries politicians its domestic politics.”

“Ah.”

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021