Here it is in it's entirety:

Ali: "[H]ow do you explain the Soviet Union’s support for the Zionists, supplying them with Czech weapons in order to carry on fighting?

Khalidi: Stalin turned on a dime, as you know. From being a staunch anti-nationalist and anti-Zionist power, the Soviet Union suddenly became an advocate of a Jewish state. This came as a huge shock to the Communist parties of the Arab world. There were several motivations, I think. It was certainly an effort to outbid the United States, and there was a sense that this might be a socialist country that would align with the Soviet Union. Stalin also wanted to undermine the British in the Middle East. Remember, he had spent his youth fighting in the south of what became the Soviet Union during the Russian Civil War, when the British were the primary supporters of the Whites—funding, arming and training them. They supported them with troops and fleets from the Baltic to the Caspian to the Black Sea. Early on, Stalin developed a great animosity towards Britain, and an obsession about the threat posed by British power to the south of the USSR. And he now saw this as a moment in which the Soviet Union could undermine Britain’s Arab puppet regimes in the region.

Ali: It was a disastrous political intervention. But it didn’t last too long.

A couple of years. But yes, absolutely. If you look at the vote in the un General Assembly, without the Soviet Union and their Belarusian and Ukrainian attachments, as well as the countries they influenced, the Americans would have had difficulty pushing through the Partition resolution. They might have done it, but it could have led to a different outcome. And the Czech arms deal was crucial to Israel’s victories against the Arab armies on the battlefield."

Ali says USSR support "didn't last too long". Bunkum! As Khalidi points out it was all about the vote and "it could have led to a different outcome". That's the point. Stalin's role was both massive and monstrous. And then for him to arrange the "crucial" Czech arms deal..! Unforgivable.

If you want to know more about the Soviet role read "From Haven to Conquest" by Rashid's cousin, Walid Khalidi. Walid knew how important it was - he devotes entire chapters to the issue.

Stalin's role in this is up there with what what he did in destroying the Spanish Revolution a decade earlier!