MOHAMMED ALSUDAIRI: China and the Question of Palestine [Research Talk]

On popular Arabic-language Shi’ite websites, one can find an amusing apocryphal narration about the first meeting between Ahmad al-Shuqayiri, the first Chairman of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, and Mao Zedong, sometime in the mid-1960s. To the former’s plea asking “to be taught revolution,” the latter deflectively retorted “how could I teach you revolution, when you have the revolution of Imam Hussein [to emulate]?” Though undoubtedly a myth (and part of a fascinitng hagiographic tradition in its own right), this short story inadvertently captures an enduring theme in the optics surrounding Sino-Palestinian relations: of high-hopes combined with limited (or even non-) delivery. The lecture explores the twists and turns of China’s official relationship with various Palestinian actors and its evolving approach towards the Palestine Question from the mid-twentieth century to the present. It also highlights the forces that feed into expectations of a larger Chinese role, and the realities (internal or regional) that circumscribe China's ability (and desire) to exert substantive influence in relation to the conflict.

is a Lecturer in Politics and International Relations of the Arabic Speaking World at the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies (CAIS), Australian National University. He holds a PhD in Comparative Politics from the University of Hong Kong (HKU), an MA in International Relations and International History from the London School of Economics and Peking University, and a BSc in International Politics from Georgetown University.

Prior to his appointment at CAIS, he was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences at HKU, working on a project examining the intersections between religion and infrastructure in the context of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Since 2015, he oversaw the development of the Asian Studies Program at the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. More recently in 2022, he was awarded a research fellowship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation to work on his upcoming book manuscript.

Informed by a multidisciplinary and multilingual approach, Alsudairi’s research focuses on the historical and contemporary connections between the Middle East and East Asia; the histories of transnational revolutionary and counter-revolutionary networks in the Arab world; ideological security bureaucracies and state-led cultural engineering practices across Asia; and Muslim religiosities and sectarian identities in the Middle East, China, among others. His academic work has appeared in multiple academic journals including The Middle East Journal, Third World Quarterly, Journal of Arabian Studies, Journal of Contemporary China, Global Policy, and Oxford University’s Journal of Islamic Studies.

promotes multidisciplinary research, teaching and programming with impact beyond academia, seeking to remedy class, racial, gender, and other inequalities, and to improve mutual understanding in UK-China relations. The MCI is based at the University of Manchester.

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