ABSTRACT
This chapter presents three sets of propositions. They are the era of Afro-Arab solidarity, widely hailed by statesmen and scholars alike, turns out to have been relatively short-lived, having run its course in little over ten years, the principal factor in the deterioration of Afro-Arab relations has been a basic shift in the international status and mobility of the Arab states, and The Arab shift has left erstwhile African friends much worse off than they were before the new era dawned, turning them into clients and/or dependents where they once had been equals and leaving them doubly vulnerable to political and economic changes in the international environment. African displeasure with the Arabs now also includes, as was noted earlier, the fact of barely concealed Arab trade, investment, and contact with South Africa. Iraq, Syria, and the PLO gave the Somalis open diplomatic and material support, mainly because of what they contended was pan-Arab and ideological solidarity with Somalia's socialist regime.
