Christmas for Israel

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The Arabic press is now coining a new phrase -- reporting the establishment of "Gazakhstan" in allusion to Hamas's de facto rule over the Gaza Strip. Stories abound of the "destruction" and looting of Yasser Arafat's erstwhile home and the burning of his photographs by Hamas militants. In reality, what is burning is the ideology that rallied Palestinians and Arabs around the Palestinian cause: the pan-Arab nationalism from which Fatah was born.

A new division is emerging: a caricatured confrontation between "radical" and "Islamist fundamentalist" forces on the one side (Hamas), and "moderate" and "Western-backed" forces on the other (Fatah). The foreign ministers of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Lebanon have denounced the "challenge" to the "Palestinian Authority's legitimacy" that supposedly has been posited by Hamas's defeat of Fatah in Gaza. The four major Arab states currently mediating the Palestinian-Israeli conflict have expressed their support for the emergency cabinet appointed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and headed by former finance minister Salam Fayad. Meanwhile, Hamas has denied that it intends to secede with Gaza. But Hamas's increasing ostracism by the international community as a result of the current situation is bound to sharpen even further what have become its irreconcilable differences with Fatah.

As the spectre of a division of Palestinian territories between Hamas and Fatah looms large, so does that of an even sharper divisiveness in the visions entertained by each as to what the way out of the Palestinian predicament will be; that is, presuming that either side will now have the presence of mind to address the matter. Nor is it expected that the current tide of factional strife will be reversed any time soon. The Palestinians, like others, have fallen prey to the power politics of the region pursued by protagonists Iran, Syria and the United States. The Palestinians -- who have thus far been tenacious, solid and united in their confrontation with occupation -- cannot afford to yield now, or ever, to the vagaries of regional and international machinations.

A petition signed by 81 Arab citizens, intellectuals and public figures was directed this week to the warring factions, admonishing them to halt their nihilistic actions that are threatening to "kill" the Palestinian cause and bring new and unwarranted suffering to the Palestinian people.

Never in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict has disintegration reached such an apogee, or polarisation such an extreme. The confrontation is not between Palestinians and Israelis, but among Palestinians themselves. A more ingenious solution to defeat the just Palestinian cause from within could not have been devised by Israel's hawks. Nothing could make Israel happier than the scenes we are seeing.