On February 14, 1945, President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) met King Abduaziz Al Saudi Arabia aboard the USS Quincy in Egypt's Great Bitter Lake
The meeting took place immediately after the Yalta Conference, while FDR was returning from a conference with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin.
In modern times, Yalta, along with the rest of Crimea, is internationally recognised as part of Ukraine and is considered part of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The 1930s in Arabia marked the birth of the modern Saudi state and the dawn of its oil age.
King Abdulaziz Al Saud unified the kingdom in 1932, bringing stability to the Hejaz [the mountainous region in western Saudi Arabia stretching along the Red Sea coast from Jordan to Asir, encompassing major cities like Jeddah, Mecca, and Medina] and the Najd region [the central area with Riyadh, the capital.]
In the early 1930s, the economy of the newly formed Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was extremely poor. It relied heavily on revenues from foreign pilgrims visiting the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
This "hajj economy" was the primary source of income for the government and residents, especially the trading community in the Hejaz region.
Following a 1933 concession deal with the California Arabian Standard Oil Company (later Aramco), geologists discovered significant commercial quantities of oil at Dhahran, with exports beginning in 1939.
The landmark discovery of oil in 1938 at Dhahran transformed the nation from a poor, pilgrimage-dependent economy into a potential global energy supplier, shifting reliance from Britain to the United States
The population of Saudi Arabia in 1930 was about 2.7 million
FDR, on 5 April 1945, two weeks before his death (1882-1945), wrote to King Abdulaziz:
"It gives me pleasure to renew to Your Majesty the assurances which you have previously received…with regard to the question of Palestine and to inform you that the policy of this government in this respect is unchanged," he said.
I worked in a Swedish company in Jeddah from 1989 to 1996
The origins of the Saudi state are widely recognised to begin in 1744 with a pact between Imam Muhammad bin Saud and scholar Muhammad bin Abdul Wahhab in Diriyah, establishing the First Saudi State.
This alliance united political authority with religious reform, marking the foundation of the Al Saud dynasty's rule, which eventually led to the modern kingdom proclaimed in 1932.
The name comes from the Arabic trilateral root س-ع-د (s-ʿ-d), associated with joy, good fortune, and happiness.
Ibn Saud (Abdulaziz bin Abdul Rahman Al Saud), the founder and first king of modern Saudi Arabia, was born on January 15, 1876 (some sources say 1880), in Riyadh, Najd. He died on November 9, 1953 (aged 76 or 77) from a heart attack in Al-Ṭāʾif, Saudi Arabia, and was buried in Al Oud cemetery, Riyadh.
Ibn Saud (Abdulaziz bin Abdul Rahman Al Saud), the founder and first king of modern Saudi Arabia, was born on January 15, 1876 (some sources say 1880), in Riyadh, Najd. He died on November 9, 1953 (aged 76 or 77) from a heart attack in Al-Ṭāʾif, Saudi Arabia, and was buried in Al Oud cemetery, Riyadh.
Harry Truman, 33rd U.S. president, and the 1948 election
The new president, Harry S. Truman (Truman told reporters the the S period should be left out, as it was not a name), authorised the use of atomic bombs in 1945 on Hiroshima (Aug 6) and Nagasaki (Aug 9) to force Japan’s surrender, aiming to end World War II quickly and avoid a costly invasion of the Japanese mainland.
Harry Truman (1884-1972) and Edward Jacobson (1891-1955) opened a men's clothing store in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1919, and it
Jacobson was a Jew from Poland and used his influence as a lifelong friend to persuade President Truman to meet with Zionist leaders, which played a key role in the U.S. recognition of the State of. Israel in 1948.
President Harry Truman supported the United Nations partition of Palestine in 1947 primarily due to a combination of deep humanitarian sympathy for Holocaust survivors, domestic political pressure ahead of the 1948 election, and a desire to see the UN succeed.
Truman played a pivotal role in the "split" of Palestine by providing the international legitimacy and American support necessary to transform the United Nations Partition Plan (Resolution 181) from a proposal into a political reality.
“The Land of Israel was the birthplace of the Jewish people. Here, their spiritual, religious and national identity was shaped. Here they first achieved statehood, created cultural values of national and universal significance and gave to the world the eternal Book of Books.
David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Ben Zvi (later Israel's first prime minister and second president, respectively), in their 1918 book (in Yiddish), 'Eretz Israel' in the Past and in the Present,' published an extensive guide for Jewish colonisation.
They wrote that 10 million Jews could be placed in historic Eretz Israel (Palestine) on both sides of the Jordan River.
In their calculations, Palestine was "a country without a people," and the land could be redeemed and populated by industrious Jews.
Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted in 2019, "The Palestinians’ connection to the Land of Israel is nothing compared to the 4,000-year connection that the Jewish people have with the land."
Scientific research suggests that Palestinians, along with other Levantine populations, are descended from ancient inhabitants of the region dating back at least 3,700 years.
At the exact moment of recognition, the scale of the Palestinian exodus (the Nakba: catastrophe) was not the central focus of White House deliberations.
Following the declaration on May 14 and the subsequent Arab-Israeli war, which began on May 15, over 750,000 Palestinians were forced from their homes or fled, joining those already displaced earlier in 1948.
The United Nations (UN) in 1949–50 concluded that the real figure for exclusions of Palestinians, called Al-Nakba (catastrophe), was just over 700,000.
The Israeli population was 717,000 and 156,000 non-Jews giving a total of 872,700.
The population of Jews in 1947 was 650,000, and 1,324,000 were mainly Palestinians — data.
Israel did not want to have a lot more Arabs than Jews in the poulation.
Approximately 150,000 Palestinians remained in what became the new state of Israel, though many were internally displaced, having lost their original homes.
However, Truman later expressed being "rather disgusted" by Israel's reluctance to accept Arab refugees after the 1948 war, indicating his awareness and disapproval of the situation grew as the conflict progressed.
Origin of the Palestinians
Israel is the West's last settler colony: The DNA of most Israelis in the world is European
While Truman was aware of the Arab population, his actions were driven by the urgent need for a Jewish refugee solution, and he frequently prioritised Zionist demands over the concerns of the indigenous Arab population.
President Harry Truman supported the United Nations partition of Palestine in 1947 primarily due to a combination of deep humanitarian sympathy for Holocaust survivors, domestic political pressure ahead of the 1948 election, and a desire to see the UN succeed.
While Truman was aware of the Arab population, his actions were driven by the urgent need for a Jewish refugee solution, and he frequently prioritised Zionist demands over the concerns of the indigenous Arab population.
Abraham Feinberg, a wealthy New York businessman, was critical in raising funds for both Zionist causes and the Democratic Party during the election.
He reportedly helped raise roughly $100,000 (equivalent to over $1.2 million today) to keep Truman’s famous "Whistle Stop" train tour running when the campaign was on the verge of running out of money.
Despite the funding from certain businessmen, Truman actually lost New York State. This was partly due to a significant portion of the Jewish vote shifting to a third-party candidate
In summary, Truman supported partition as a quick, necessary solution to a humanitarian and political problem, viewing the Arab population as a secondary factor to the immediate goal of creating a Jewish state.
In the 1948 U.S. presidential election, Jewish individuals with financial influence, particularly in New York, played a critical, complex, and highly scrutinised role, with a heavy focus on the nascent State of Israel and the US administration’s foreign policy.
While wealthy Jewish donors traditionally supported the Democratic Party, the 1948 election saw significant shifts due to dissatisfaction with Harry S. Truman’s policies regarding the partition of Palestine.
Following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, approximately 150,000 to 160,000 Palestinians remained within the borders of the newly established State of Israel, out of an original population of roughly 900,000 in those areas.
While Zionist leaders aimed for a Jewish-majority state and promoted "transfer" (expulsion) of the Arab population, several factors led to a small minority remaining.
According to some historical accounts, Plan Dalet — the master plan for military operations — dictated that if a village did not resist, its residents could stay under military rule.
While many who stayed were eventually subjected to internal displacement or relocation (such as the "ghettoization" in Haifa), they were not expelled across the border.
The Palestinians who remained were quickly reduced to a small minority, making up only about 10–15% of the new state's population.
They were placed under martial law (military rule) until 1966, were stripped of much of their property under the Absentee Property Law, and were largely cut off from the rest of the Palestinian population, becoming second-class citizens in their own homeland.
Foreign nationals dominate the populations of the Gulf Cooperation Council countries
Foreigners make up a significant majority of the workforce in most Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, with non-national workers often exceeding 80% in the private sectors of Qatar, Kuwait, and the UAE.
As of 2024–2026, the GCC region hosts over 35 million foreigners, with expatriate workers constituting approximately 85.1% of the total regional workforce.
Qatar: Expatriates constitute roughly 91%–94% of the total population and approximately 84.5% to 88% of the labour force.
United Arab Emirates (UAE): Approximately 87%–88% of the population are foreign nationals. The majority of the private sector labour force is composed of expatriates.
Kuwait: Around 84.7% of the employed population was non-national in late 2020, with foreign workers making up roughly 70% of the total population.
Bahrain: Roughly 77.8% of the employed population was non-national as of 2020.
Bahrain: Roughly 77.8% of the employed population was non-national as of 2020.
Oman: Approximately 76.8%–78% of the employed population was non-national (2020–2022 data).
Saudi Arabia: Approximately 77% of the total workforce in the kingdom consists of expatriates, representing roughly 14.1 million to 16.9 million workers. This is lower than other Gulf states due to aggressive "Saudization" policies that have increased the participation of citizens in the workforce, especially among women.
