ABSTRACT
The oil crisis is rooted in the broader issue of the Arab-Israeli conflict. This conflict is in turn an outgrowth of the more fundamental Palestinian question. Any attempt to resolve the oil crisis in isolation from the Palestinian question is doomed to failure because these two issues are inseparable. Resolution of the oil crisis is possible only as a byproduct of an end to the Palestinian problem. The Palestinian question is the fundamental cause of oil being used as a political instrument. The roots of the Palestinian question go back to 1897, when the Zionist movement took political shape during the First World Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland. Oil interests were predominant among the factors moving Western countries to vote for the creation of Israel in 1948. The right of the Palestinian people to their homeland was sacrificed to the West’s oil needs.
