ABSTRACT
This chapter examines political movement which affected the structure of Arab political systems and influenced the internal unity of Arab societies, and pro-Arab solidarity. The new Arab regimes which emerged after the Palestine war were characterised by the shift of political power and social influence from the hands of the old landowning-merchant classes to the middle classes, with a special and significant role for the army. The armed clashes between the Arabs of Palestine on the one hand, and the British authorities and Zionist settlers on the other, provoked a strong Arab sentiment among the peoples of the region. The Palestine cause as an issue in inter-Arab conflicts had little direct bearing on the development of the Arab political systems. A strong expectation after the withdrawal of Arafat and his men from Lebanon was that the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) would now be at the mercy of the Arab governments.
