17 - 23 January 2002
Issue No.569
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 17 - 23 January 2002 Issue No.569 |
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Dictates of the victor
Israel is demanding what it perceives as the fruits of victory from the Palestinian Authority. It is an ordeal the Palestinians must withstand, writes Mohamed Khaled Al-Azaar*
Of the oppressive methods employed so far by Ariel Sharon's government against the Palestinians most have been in use since the time of Edud Barak. Sharon's predecessor used an impressive range of state terror tactics against Palestinian protesters in the West Bank, Gaza, and Jerusalem, and even against Arab citizens of Israel who occasionally voiced support for their erstwhile compatriots.
So what is the difference between the two men? The main difference is the way they have approached the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its leader, Yasser Arafat. While Barak sought to defame the PA and Arafat, put economic and military pressure upon them, and tried to turn the US against them, he stopped short of shunning them or writing them off completely. Up to its last moments in power, Barak's government held talks with the PA. The Taba talks, in January 2001, were hailed, at the time, as serious and promising. Some still believe, had Barak stayed in office, these talks could have been fruitful.
Israeli governments, without exception, have never relinquished their ambition to seize all of Palestine. Through war, and subsequent peace talks, this has been their sole aim. Since Sharon came to power, however, Israel has placed unprecedented pressure on the PA, Israel's partner in the peace process, to give Israel what it had always set its heart upon.
It is under Sharon that any taboos concerning the PA and its leadership have been set aside. Israel has waged almost routine attacks against Arafat's symbols of power and means of protection and transport (airport, planes, Force 17), totally disregarding the dignity, status, and very survival of the PA and Arafat. To explain this change in style, we have to look closely at the way both Barak and Sharon viewed Arafat's role.
Barak made a point of pressuring, even blackmailing, Arafat in secret and in public talks. But he never thought of discontinuing or abandoning communications with the Palestinians. Sharon, by contrast, has no stomach for political finesse. As prime minister Sharon has never deigned to meet Arafat, even by way of courtesy. The Israeli prime minister exhibits no wish to hold serious, or even not-so-serious, dialogue with Arafat.
Sharon advised his American and European friends to boycott the Palestinian president, whom he accused of sponsoring terror, so as to undermine Arafat's stature and sabotage his international efforts to rally support for the Palestinian cause. It was only a matter of time before Sharon abandoned all inhibitions and initiated an all-out attack against Arafat's PA, demolishing its offices, threatening its officials, and hampering their movement. In doing so Sharon is apparently treating the Palestinian territories as part of Israel proper. He is, thus, punishing the PA for failing to police these territories to his liking.
This is a marked departure from the approach of Barak who, while trying to make the Palestinians more pliant, dealt with them as negotiating partners, and mostly acknowledged their domestic difficulties -- an attitude still taken by Shimon Peres.
Sharon, for his part, is convinced that Arafat will not bow voluntarily to Israel's view of a final settlement, and is unwilling -- even if he could -- to make things easy for Israel. But what is this task that Arafat is supposed to carry out, and that his standing is so hinged upon?
The architects of Madrid and Oslo had cast the PA in a curious role, envisioning it as a key instrument for implementing the Israeli and US view of a final settlement. The Israelis and the Americans, therefore, measure the legitimacy of the PA by its success in bringing this view of a final settlement to fruition. For some time, the Israelis and the Americans were patient with the Palestinians, for they recognised the immense task that the Oslo accords had placed upon them -- that of reshaping the Palestinian and Arab attitude to the struggle against Zionism. This is why Palestinian outbursts of "revolutionary" rhetoric had been tolerated, up to a point.
The Camp David summit changed all that. When the Palestinians resisted total compliance to Israel's concept of a final settlement things got ugly. The Israelis lost their patience with Palestinian references to liberation and independence, and the two sides went down a collision course. Since Sharon came to power, Israel has acted with no concern for the PA's predicament. Israel, in fact, has convinced itself that it is taking revenge against Palestinian perfidy.
For Sharon, things are simple. Arafat, and his Arab supporters, should stop speaking of the peace of the brave and of legitimate rights and focus instead on giving Israel the fruits of its victory. The Middle East peace process, for Israel, is a simple process of acknowledging the existing balance of power, of recognising who is victor and who is vanquished. Sharon is convinced that the time is right, internationally and regionally, for this to happen.
Sharon's attacks against the PA are perhaps inspired by the US policy of "he who is not with us is against us." They are also a sign of Israel's conviction that the PA depends on it for its very survival. This is the bottom line. And this is where Sharon is most mistaken.
The Palestinians and the Arabs should never let Sharon get away with this falsification of facts. The existence and survival of the Palestinian leadership is not up to Israel, nor is it hinged on its approval. Long before there was Oslo, long before there was a PA, the Palestinians had a leadership. And they will continue to have one, even if the whole Oslo affair falls on its face, even if Israel were to continue its clamp down on the PA and its leaders.
Those who defend the PA and Arafat have, unfortunately, begun to argue that the alternative to the current Palestinian leadership is either chaos or the rise of Islamist militancy. This argument is lame, for what if Sharon's or another Israeli government decides that it has something definite to gain by removing Arafat and his PA? The one Arab argument that is valid, legally and politically, is that Israel has no mandate on the Palestinians. Israel is an occupation force and, as such, has no right to interfere in matters concerning Palestinian leadership, whether this leadership is the PA, the PLO, or any other. The existence of a Palestinian leadership and its survival is not Israel's affair. It is linked with the legitimate, internationally recognised right of self- determination. Any airs that Israel may put to the contrary, any policies it wishes to pursue, are beside the point.
To make this absolutely clear, the PA should free itself from the impression that it is a product of Israel and the Oslo accords. The PA and its leaders should base their legitimacy on the firm ground of the inalienable right of the Palestinians to self- determination, on their status as the elected representatives of people who live under occupation, and on Arab and international recognition of this status. They should never forget that the only international body with a mandate to rule on whether a nation is entitled to self-determination is the UN General Assembly (resolution 1514 for 1960). The General Assembly has, by the way, long recognised this right of the Palestinians and consistently dealt with the PLO and the PA on that basis.
To confront Sharon's dismissive approach, the PA should stop acting as a hostage, as someone beholden to Israel for its survival. Otherwise, Israel will continue to blackmail it and place it on a collision course with the Palestinian people. And what future would the PA have if it were to win Israel's approval and lose that of its own people?
* The writer is a Cairo-based Palestinian political analyst.
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