Mohamed Shabir: Profile of a moderate man

By Khaled Amayreh

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Mohamed Shabir

Bright lights and promises

It is nearly certain by now that the former Gaza Islamic University Rector, Professor Mohamed Eid Shabir, will be the chief candidate for the post of prime minister of the emerging Palestinian "national unity government".

Fatah and Hamas last week agreed to form a government of "experts" or "technocrats" to replace the current Hamas-led government, in the hope that it will help extricate the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian people from the present multifaceted crisis, resulting from harsh and sweeping western sanctions, aimed at forcing Hamas to recognise Israel and give up historical Palestinian rights.

Sources within both Hamas and Fatah intimated to Al-Ahram Weekly that the latest Israeli massacre in Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza was a very "pressing factor" in getting the two sides to find a compromise. "It left us no choice, but to solve our differences. We simply couldn't keep bickering while our children and babies and women were being slaughtered as sheep," said one Fatah official in Gaza.

Shabir was born in Khan Younis in Southern Gaza in 1946, two years before the creation of Israel and the occurrence of the Palestinian Nakba, or catastrophe. Born into a religious Islamic family (his father was a prominent member of the Muslim Brotherhood society), the young Mohamed observed a religious lifestyle from his early childhood. He attended the local mosque with his father and maintained religious duties, including the five regular daily prayers.

After finishing high school in 1964, he travelled to Egypt where he studied microbiology at Alexandria University in 1968 and later at Cairo University where he received a Masters degree in the same field.

In 1990, Shabir received a PhD in microbiology from West Virginia University. His advisor, Dr Bryan Larsen, was quoted as describing him as "diligent, serious and talented".

He added, "I believe he had a bit of a lighter side. He was very much involved with his community, involved in the Muslim community in West Virginia and very observant religiously. It was very clear that he held to his beliefs very diligently and in doing so, there were certain things he was not participating in because of his religious beliefs, like mixers, and social events because of the mixing of genders and the alcohol."

"But it wasn't an uncomfortable thing among the other students; he was still very friendly and got along with people."

Upon returning to Gaza, Shabir joined the Islamic University of Gaza, founded by Hamas founder and spiritual leader, the late Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. There he became a lecturer at the Department of Science, and two years later, was promoted to an assistant professor, then dean of the Department of Science.

In 1993, Shabir was appointed rector of the Islamic University. He remained in his position until he retired in August, 2005.

According to his friends, Shabir ran the Islamic University "wisely, tactfully and with a lot of balancing acts" during one of the most tumultuous episodes of recent Palestinian history.

"He wouldn't seek to alienate people, he would maintain friendly relations even with those with whom he differed politically and ideologically," said a former colleague.

Indeed, during the so-called Oslo years (1994- 2000), Shabir maintained good and stable relations with the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority regime despite occasional provocations by security forces like, for example, when Palestinian police, headed by the now-disgraced Col Ghazi Al-Jabali, raided and vandalised the chemistry labs at the university in the mid-1990s.

And while Arafat was alive, Shabir met with him frequently, assuring him that the university was a Palestinian national institution and not a fanatical Islamist stronghold as the Israelis sought to portray.

Shabir also maintained good relations with Arafat's successor, Mahmoud Abbas, who reportedly supported his candidacy for the post of prime minister. According to Gaza sources, "good recommendations" from Fatah leaders in Gaza contributed to Abbas's decision to back Shabir's candidacy.

A calm, modest and non-confrontational figure, Shabir is known for his Islamic religiosity, but not for fanaticism. "He is not the kind of gung-ho speaker who would give resounding extemporaneous homilies and tirades, threatening his enemies with extinction and destruction," said Saleh Na'ami, a Gaza journalist. "But at the same time he is not aloof and wouldn't neglect the smallest details. He is a scientist, after all."

Shabir is not formally a member of Hamas, as indeed is the case with up to 95 per cent of the Islamic movement's followers and supporters. This means that he is not likely to support the movement's ideological and political policies completely. Politically, he has described himself as "realistic, but within the barometers of justice and honesty".

It is really difficult how he would relate the treacherous minefield known euphemistically as the "peace process" whose modus operandi has come to consist mainly of lies, deception, tactical manoeuvering and spin.

It is very likely though, that as prime minister, Shabir would reiterate and reassert the same old Palestinian constants, including at least a de facto willingness to recognise Israel, in return for full Israeli withdrawal from all the Occupied Territories, including East Jerusalem, as well as a settlement of the Palestinian refugee question pursuant to UN Resolution 194.

There is a nearly total Palestinian consensus on these constants. In fact, even Hamas itself is likely to accede to such a settlement the moment Israel voices willingness in this direction.

The problem, however, is that Israel, backed by its guardian-ally, the United States, rejects the notion of going back to the pre-1967 borders.

The Shabir government is unlikely to last for more than a year or a year and a half at the very most, given the fact that it is first and foremost a compromise government whose raison d'être is to bring about stability to the domestic Palestinian arena and help lift crippling Western sanctions which have nearly imploded the Palestinian society.

Indeed, if the government succeeds in achieving these tasks, it will be judged a resounding success, even without achieving anything with regard to peace with Israel.

If it doesn't, however, then the PA president will most likely opt to dissolve the legislative council and call for new general elections in the Occupied Territories.