The following article appeared in many publications as part of project syndicate. I am enclosing below its publication in the Guardian and I have added the comments made on their web site. It is interesting reading.

Civility or weakness?
Daoud Kuttab

With Gaza poised on the brink of civil war, pity poor Mahmoud Abbas, who took over as president of the Palestinian Authority two and a half years ago, after the death of Yasser Arafat. An academic by profession, Abbas has tried mightily to lead the Palestinian people with civility, adherence to democratic principles, and public disdain for violence.

He never had a chance. Palestinian rivals, both from his own Fatah party and from the Islamists of Hamas, as well as the Israelis, perceived Abbas’s civility as weakness.

Abbas introduced a totally different style of management from that of Arafat. Dressed in his military suit until his last day, Abu Ammar (Arafat’s revolutionary nom de guerre) did not believe that it was time to become a civilian president while the Israeli occupation continued. Dressed in a suit and tie, Abbas introduced professional western-style management to the presidency, but had no idea what to do with grassroots militants.

One of the first comments I heard from journalists was that Abbas, a family man, went home at lunchtime and worked regular business hours. His other name, Abu Mazen, is not a revolutionary name but reflects the practice of naming a person as the father of his eldest son. Abbas’s son, Mazen, runs a local advertising agency.

In his attempt to counter Arafat’s political corruption and micromanagement, Abbas lost whatever chance he had to maintain the loyalty of the Fatah leadership, newly appointed PA officials, security personnel, and, most importantly, local militants. Calling for national elections, while politically correct, was political suicide, for he lacked any idea of the possible outcome and did very little to ensure the discipline of Fatah. An attempt at a primary to choose Fatah candidates backfired, owing to fraud and the losers’ refusal to honor the results. Rival Fatah candidates then split the party’s vote, allowing Hamas an easy victory.

Negotiations with the Israelis was one area where Abbas, who led the Oslo process that saw the creation of the Palestinian Authority, thought he could do well. But, unlike Oslo, when Abbas was working under Arafat and able to project power from that base, as Palestinian president he was both negotiator and supposedly the centre of power. The Israelis discerned Abbas’s weakness early on, and once Hamas was elected in a landslide, had little incentive to help him despite the prodding of the United States.

Not only was Abbas politically weak, with few friends among Fatah militants, but he also failed to show much interest in what was happening in Gaza. He spent as little time as he could there, preferring his Ramallah office on the West Bank and spending time with visiting politicians and meeting world leaders there or abroad. And, while he was technically the commander-in-chief of the Palestinian forces, these forces lacked the will to stand up to Hamas’s growing power.

The economic siege on Palestine after the Hamas victory further weakened Abbas. With no salaries to pay teachers (or even the security services), his ability to influence even his own presidential guard was severely limited. During a meeting, which I attended, with a delegation from the International Press Institute to obtain the release of the BBC journalist Alan Johnston, abducted in Gaza in March, Abbas explained the PA’s inability and weakness. Soldiers march on their stomachs, he said, and complained that his own forces have not been able to renew their equipment or obtain badly needed ammunition for seven years.

Ironically, the Israelis and the world community, which had basically frozen Palestinian finances, wanted Abbas to continue to control the security forces, despite Fatah’s loss in the parliamentary elections. Israel and the US led a virtual blockade on Palestine, with Israel refusing to return collected taxes and the US pressing world banks not to recognise the signature of the Palestinian finance minister. The nominal reason is Hamas’s refusal to recognise Israel. But most Arab countries also don’t recognise Israel, and yet the banking world deals with them normally.

A compromise power-sharing agreement brokered by the Saudis initially seemed to be a solution. According to the Mecca agreement signed last February, Hamas would give up important ministries such as finance, interior, and foreign affairs, while Abbas would ensure the end of the economic siege. Four months later, however, the siege has not been lifted, and the Hamas ministers (such as former foreign minister Mahmoud Zahhar and interior minster Said Siyam) who were forced out, now feel betrayed and are demanding their jobs back.

If the Israelis and the international community want Abbas to remain in power, they must change their approach dramatically, by lifting the economic siege and providing his presidency with military and political support. And, if the Israelis are convinced that Abbas is too weak to do anything, they can help the Palestinians by releasing the Fatah strongman, Marwan Barghouti, from an Israeli jail.

Otherwise, Abbas will be left with no alternative but to follow the advice of a leading Palestinian professor, Ali Jirbawi, who suggested simply that Abbas should dissolve the Palestinian Authority and return power to the Israelis, who remain legally and practically responsible for the areas they occupied in 1967.

In cooperation with Project Syndicate, 2007.

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This entry was tagged with the following keywords: mahmoudabbas palestine civilwar violence hamas fatah
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partgirl

Comment No. 637901

June 14 13:18
GBR

for 40 years now, palestinians have watched their options dwindle. it is no wonder that they have become divided. they desire their land and their liberty, an end the occupation that israel deems neccesary for it’s own security.

their choices:

to maintain the course of diplomacy, to give up the armed struggle and recognise the rights of israel. or to fight.

this is the internal conflict that palestinians are now facing, that is manifesting in the civil war between hamas and fatah.

diplomacy has become locked by the internation community’s outright bias toward the rights of israel; so after 40 years of non progress, we have finally broken their resolve. the palestinian dream of statehood has never seemed more unlikely than now, for where there should be unity, we have helped turn them against themselves. this treatment has been nothing short of scandalous.
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GreedIsGood

Comment No. 637909

June 14 13:24

This is just another turf war between rival gangsters. If the fatah nutters can cancel out the hamas neanderthals without any innocent bystanders getting hurt then good. Brilliant. Pass the cashew bowl and the jug of Pimms.

Sadly it never works out that way. You only have to look at the Easter uprising of 1916 and the civil war that followed to see that in any situation like this the goods guys like Connolly will get mown down and the cynical bastards who will fight until the last drop of everyone elses blood carve up the future society.
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aquilla

Comment No. 637921

June 14 13:28

C’mon now are you not being a little disigenuous? Hamas won fair and square in a democratic election, Fatah took the dollar to destabilise Hamas and Abbas was a willing partner in that. Now Fatah are on their knees running scared like the backhanding takers they turned out to be, and we are to feel for them.

No sorry, you mess with the rights of the people you deserve what saddam gets, and if Abbas ends up swinging who’s to blame.

The occidentalists in europe and the US!
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aquilla

Comment No. 637928

June 14 13:32

And in no way am I applauding this sorry state of affairs. I feel sorry for all those who will suffer, both arab and jew.

For again it will be the f###ing children and the men with guns can pat themselves on the back for being such big brave men!!!!!

Yeah I am annoyed, I’m a taxpayer who expected more from these slavish dogs we have in power.
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Assasin

Comment No. 637937

June 14 13:35

Mr Kuttab,

As you explain; Gaza is dying. The people are on the edge of starvation. A whole society is being destroyed. There are 1.5 million human beings imprisoned in the most heavily populated area in the world. There is no trade, and countless people are being killed by Israeli incursions that occur every day by land and air. There are signs of desperation everywhere. Crime is increasing. Two thirds of the people are unemployed and the remaining third who mostly work for the state are not being paid.
On top of all this devestation and plight; the governing authority is in the mids of an all out civil war?!

The mind boggles!

Mr Kuttab, What is needed is a collective re-awakening, because the Israeli siege and the European boycott are a collective punishment that they are in no hurry to ease anytime soon!
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pishi

Comment No. 637987

June 14 13:51
GBR

It’s very sad and such a shame with what’s going on in Palestine today. Please STOP fighting each other and instead get rid of your common and ruthless enemies.

Mahmoud Abbas needs to stop being American & Israeli poodle if he needs the full support of his people. Abbas has forgotten how Hamas was born! With GREAT help from his darling friend Israel to fight against Arafat (Fatah). What a vicious circle?
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truesocialist

Comment No. 638000

June 14 13:55

Yes I agree with most of this. I also think that Abbas as president, and Barghouti as PM (in a fresh election) would be the only way to save Palestine from total civil war. Hamas are proving to be the poodle of the most extremist war mongers from Tehran, they need to be sunk by a true palestinian movement led by someone of Barghouti’s stature.
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KelvinYearwood

Comment No. 638019

June 14 14:00
GBR

Good points made by Aquilla.

The mistake the Palestinians made was voting for a goverment that was not enslaved to US and Israeli elite interests.

This is, as usual, all part of a class war.

Palestinians are portrayed as gangsters, especially those elected by popular vote. Iraqis who resist the US/UK occupation are ‘insurgents’. The popular Iraqi anger against US looting of Iraqi oil revenues does not figure in political or media discourse. Iraqi anger is irrational and/or threatening to peace (read US interests).

Even in the US, as Michael Moore registered, African-Americans are portrayed on US TV news as a threat. This is to keep ordinary white Americans in line, with an image of a threatening and violent black horde, and thus cower ordinary whites beneath the elite corporate interest line, and turn them into nervous little corporate cogs.

The economic seige of the Gaza Strip after Hamas were legitimately elected (a fair election was internationally recorded) is the economic terrorist counterpart of the US-armed, Israeli terrorist military seige on what has been reduced to a violently run Israeli open prison – the Gaza Strip of today.

Everywhere, we are treated to the other as threat, usually along race and racist lines.

Everywhere in our media we have careerist journos, lackeys who know where their interests lie, and are keen not to go down as a wrong-un, likely to present perspectives that challenge power. This process is, of course, repeated, ad infinitum, among our spineless politicians.
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trickle

Comment No. 638025

June 14 14:02
USA

Thanks you, Daoud, for an incisive commentary. I happy to see israel was not, this time at least, behind Abbas’s weakness. In Israel, the equivalent was the Prime Minister Eshkol, who actually got dragged to the 1967 war reluctantly, and was ousted by Ben Gurion, now in his 70’s, to “bring Israel the victory.” By all acounts, if Eshkol was still at the helm after the war, there may have been a different outcome to the occupation of the territories.
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AWAyyad

Comment No. 638033

June 14 14:06
KWT

As a Palestinian, I have to say this is one of the best pieces of political reporting I’ve read on the current situation in a long time. Too much of the rest seems to be too biased one way or the other, and everybody wants to find a reason to hate Mahmoud Abbas, who is actually not so bad of a president.

Thank you Daoud Kuttab.
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Suusi

Comment No. 638034

June 14 14:06
GBR

This is what you get when idiots like Bush and Blair demand democratic elections and then arm and back the gangsters who lost the election, over the elected government.

Neither the UK nor the USA has paid lip service to being honest brokers in the Arab Israeli conflict.

Israel should be set equally onerous conditions, like having to agree to hand back all the lands captured in the 1967 war, including East Jerusalem and the Golan heights. It should also have to agree to take in all the Palestinians that it ethnically cleansed. No country should be exempt from the war crimes conventions.

Just maybe, when Hamas have defeated Fatah militarily, and all the other militias, like the Al Axa Martyrs Brigade that provide plausible deniability for Fatah then Hamas can form a Palestinian National Army and National Police force under the control of the ELECTED government.

Could that be a bad thing? Or is this just what Israel is worried about?

I think not because for the first time Israel will have someone to negotiate with who can actually strong enough deliver. Yes this will mean that Israel will have to face the painful choices that it has been putting off for the last 40 years. It is only when the painful decisions are made that a real and lasting peace can be had.

Unless of course the object of the current road map, and quartet is to only appear to have peace talks for the sake of the cameras.
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Finite187

Comment No. 638040

June 14 14:08
GBR

What a mess this is.. But while it’s true that conditions in Gaza and other palestinian areas have at least in part been created by Israel, I find it difficult to sympathise with the Palestinians at the moment. Seems like a kind of reverse-racism to say ‘oh those poor dears, they’ve been FORCED into this situation by Israel/Zionists/the USA’.

Also it should be pointed out when the US and the EU withdrew funding for the Palestinian authority when Hamas won the election (which I think they had every right to do), ultra-wealthy arab nations were suddenly very unwilling to provide funds in order to keep the PA going. People like the Saudis and the Iranians seem very keen on espousing the Palestinian cause and furtively funding militant groups, but didn’t lift a finger to help the peacemakers.
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BOGOF

Comment No. 638063

June 14 14:14
GBR

Aquilla in your first post you appear to be taking sides in an internecine war in which after all nobody can win. Do you think that it earns you brownie points to support Hamas, a terrorist organisation which as Ive just seen on the lunchtime news has captured Fatah members taken them outside and shot them in cold blood? Fatah is no better, throwing people off roofs.

At the end of the day the Palestinian people are the losers and they see their dream of a viable State going up in flames before their eyes.
As for Abbas, hes as useless as can be, as is Heniyeh. It really makes me sick that both of them say they are in contact with the abductors of Alan Johnston but they cannot free him. Are they men or mice?

Asasin stop being melodramatic. Israeli attacks only happen when terrorists bomb Israeli towns. The last Israeli incursion was only a matter of metres into Gaza, in response to the devastating wave of Kassams on the town of Sderot. The Palestinian people chose a government which is committed to violence and terror. Why should it not take the responsibility for its choice? Other countries do for their choices. Hamas has shown how little it cares about its people by using what little money it has to smuggle arms in from Egypt. Its fighters do not care who is in the way of its bullets, even those wounded because of this madness and who are in hospital. The Palestinian people most of whom I believe want peace in their lives should tell their excuse for a government to change its ways, denounce violence, and start talking to Israel. Then they will see a difference.

Partgirl, youre stuck in your ways, too. Why do you insist on believing that what is happening to the Palestinians leaves them devoid of choices? They chose a terrorist organisation to govern them, they are choosing to kill each other as we write. Why absolve them of the responsibility for their actions? Cant you see that there is absolutely no international bias towards Israel? Do you read the British press? Are you aware of what goes on in the UN? Israel has every right to defend herself against threats from Hamas, who refuses to renounce its aim to destroy her. Just think, if Hamas renounced violence tomorrow it would have the moral high ground in the eyes of the world, and would gain world support.
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Gershala

Comment No. 638070

June 14 14:17
GBR

“Mahmoud Abbas needs to stop being American & Israeli poodle if he needs the full support of his people.” [pishi]

Abbas is also, let me remind you, the democratically elected President of the Palestinian people.

Just see this for what it is. A struggle between two groups of gangsters, both lusting after power. Decades of corruption, the preaching of hatred, rejection of peace, and the glorification of violence and ‘martyrdom’ have finally backfired. The blame lies with those in the West who contiunally excused Palestinian terrorism.
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GavP

Comment No. 638106

June 14 14:33
GBR

Nobody seems to mention this, but surely a political system in which the President and the Governemnt are elected separately and can come from two diffrerent political parties is inevitably going to cause problems for the Palestinains when the two main parties are openly hostile to one another. When the fighting dies down surely there needs to be a drastic rethink as to how the PA is elected?
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shockawe

Comment No. 638113

June 14 14:34
GBR

What a terribly insincere article.
Mahmoud Abbas is one of the criminals who siphoned off millions of aid money that was aimed at easing Palestinian suffering. A multi-millionaire freedom-fighter turned president?! hmmm
The author attempts to portray him as a victim of insidious people who took advantage of his civility and adherence to democratic principles. Mr Kuttab, don’t take advantage of some of the readers’ ignorance of the issues at hand!
1) After winning fair and square in the elections, Hamas officials took up their new posts only to find that Fatah members had emptied out the offices, taken all of the equipment and drained bank accounts.
2) After winning the democratic elections, Hamas found that Mahmoud Abbas was in a quandry and did not want to deal with them at all. The provided concessions to Mr Abbas many times over…but to no avail.
3)Disdain for violence is a misnomer for Mr Abbas’ approach to local politics. Anyone who has been intimidated by Fatah forces can tell you that. (not to say that Hamas or other groups do not intimidate).
4) In general, it should be known that PLO people have always been involved in financial misdemeanours. That was one of the main motives for people to vote for Hamas.It is incredibly rare to find a high-ranking PLO/Fatah leader who is not loaded and with questions surrounding the origins of his finances.
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DavidTHarryblog

Comment No. 638132

June 14 14:38
GBR

You’ll be hearing more over the next few days from those aligned with the revolutionary “Left” and from those commentators who are supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood/Hamas.

The Socialist Worker line is (a) to back Hamas (b) to declare Fatah/PLO “traitors”.

The position of this section of the far “Left” is unsurprising.

(a) They regard peace and settlement in the Middle East as treachery, and therefore all Palestinians who are prepared to negotiate rather than fight are regarded as traitors.

(b) The SWP is in alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood, in RESPECT.

The only question is:

Will people who are genuinely interested in peace and a just settlement confront the SWP-Islamist alliance, or will the aquiesce to it?
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Berchmans

Comment No. 638133

June 14 14:38
GBR

Gershala
## The blame lies with those in the West who continually excused Palestinian terrorism. ##

Certainly the hatred is directed at anyone who even vaguely supported these poor people.

Yesterday I was compared by ANICEGUY to a cross between Hiter and a sack of donkey droppings.

Or was it a donkey and Hitler droppings?

🙂

No blame.

No recrimination .

Peace Now!

B
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EamonnMc

Comment No. 638150

June 14 14:43
ARG

“With Gaza poised on the brink of civil war,”

Far from being on the brink of civil war, it looks like it’s nearly over and that Hamas have won. Call me absurdly
optimistic but this might not be an entirely bad thing if it brings law and order on the streets and a single voice capable of negotiating with Israel and making agreements stick.

Hezbullah has its limitations as a national liberation organisation (oh you know, rampant racism and subservience to a foreign power for starters ) but at least it effectively controls its territory and it’s capable of maintaining a ceasefire. There’s no one in south Lebanon who gets up in the morning and launches rockets at Israel just because they feel like it.

http://eamonnmcdonagh.wordpress.com/
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timetomoveon

Comment No. 638157

June 14 14:45
GBR

Abbas is as Daoud Kuttab says an academic and appears not to be able to exercise much if any control of the PLO/Fatah groups and certainly not on the one(s) linked to the current attack on Hamas. Hamas were elected in part because of the rife corruption in PLO/Fatah.

Israel and the USA do seem to have provided incentives and armed this Fatah faction(s) against a democratically elected Government with attempts to assassinate of its Prime Minister. Perhaps Mr Putin might question Bush on ‘Democracy’ again.

Perhaps the UN should propose that a UN force be dispatched to Gaza and the West Bank and Israel relieved of duties as an occupier as it has failed miserably in Gaza; it should be pleased to relinquish these onerous and dangerous duties including the collection and retention of tax due to the Palestinian Authority.

Wonder who’d oppose that?
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jihadisbad

Comment No. 638162

June 14 14:48
USA

You’ve got to admit, there’s something incredibly ironic about this (and perhaps a lesson for the left as well):

Among yesterday’s dead was a 14-year-old boy and three women, all killed in a Hamas attack on a Fatah security officer’s home.

“They’re firing at us, firing RPGs, firing mortars. We’re not Jews,” the brother of Jamal Abu Jediyan, a Fatah commander, pleaded during a live telephone conversation with a Palestinian radio station.

Minutes later both men were dragged into the streets and riddled with bullets.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/13/wgaza113.xml
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stillfedup

Comment No. 638201

June 14 15:00
GBR

Palestine’s best leader, Marwan Barghouti, is in an Israeli gaol.

There’s your answer
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Assasin

Comment No. 638206

June 14 15:02

BOGOF:- You say;

“Israeli attacks only happen when terrorists bomb Israeli towns.”

You want us to believe that the cycle of Cause and effect is Palestinian attacks and Israeli reprisals?!

But what you blatantly fail to suggest or state is that it might be the military occupation and the daily despairing and degrading consequences of living under such a regime that engenders armed resistance, or that Israeli actions may be such as to provoke Palestinian violence.

What do you want us to believe next? that the Palestinians are the settlers and it is they who occupy Israel?

BOGOF!
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TrueLeft

Comment No. 638210

June 14 15:03
ISR

To posters like Aquila and KelvinYearwood- all I can say is that I am at a loss to understand why you think Hamas is in any way better than Fatah. Frankly, there isn’t much difference btween the two at all, not with regards to terrorism and not with regards to corruption.

As has been pointed out, Abbas is the democratically elected President of the Palestinian Authority. The President, not the Prime Minister, is the Head of State (or what would be a State if one were declared). The President is also lawfully the head of the security forces- against which illegal armed gangs of Hamas’ are fighting. It is disingenuous in the extreme to choose any side at all in this conflict- but to choose Hamas on the basis of it being democratically elected is absurd, when, if any of the sides has decided to undo the Palestinian democracy, it is they. Hamas was not elected to supplant the equally democratically elected President and stage armed coups against the Palestinian Authority.

More generally, this fragmentation of Palestinian society (which, I entirely agree with the author, was largely the result of Israeli and Western policy) may force everyone to rethink the proper approach to Palestine. Firstly, there is a growing fear that Hamas will establish itself as the government of Gaza- and Fatah will take control of the West Bank, where it is much stronger. This will in turn mean that instead of dealing with one Palestinian Authority, Israel will have to deal separately with two different authorities.

What might be even worse is if this disintegration continues. If it does it will be disastrous for Israel and the Palestinians both. It will mean that Israel will be able to play one clan against another, come to terms with every large family in Gaza and the West Bank separately, and completely destroy all hope for a prosperous and unified Palestinian State in the future. Instead of a State there will be a collection of mutually hostile clans and splinter organizations- precluding any possibility of peace for Israel and liberty for Palestine.
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ZCFREE

Comment No. 638219

June 14 15:05
GBR

Looks like the US/Israel backed Fatah is backfiring on them. Now Israel ends up with an even more virulent Islamic territory on their doorstep. Soon Israel will be surrounded by these. As usual the US and Israel meddling, and failure to recognise democratics elections, unless their guy wins, has unintended conseqences and blowback. Israel had better attempt to start honest negotiations soon.
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BatYam

Comment No. 638228

June 14 15:08
ISR

An article with substance — as can be expected from Project Syndicate.

Timetomoveon, since you suggest Putin should question Bush on his democracy agenda, may I draw your attention to this passage in Daoud Kuttab’s article:
“Calling for national elections, while politically correct, was political suicide, for he [Abbas] lacked any idea of the possible outcome and did very little to ensure the discipline of Fatah. An attempt at a primary to choose Fatah candidates backfired, owing to fraud and the losers’ refusal to honor the results. Rival Fatah candidates then split the party’s vote, allowing Hamas an easy victory.”

You can’t say any more clearly that the Palestinians were not ready for “democracy”… — and I would definitely not contradict Kuttab on this one. Moreover, it’s also a telling comment that he notes that Abbas’ civility was interpreted as weakness — again, you get a glimpse of the real Middle East, not the one of CIF’s imaginination.

Kuttab suggests that Fatah would be helped if Israel released its “stongman” Barghouti from prison — the fact is, however, that Palestinian polls show clearly enough that Barghouti has no “street creed”, i.e. his popularity ranks actually far behind Abbas’ own (Abbas around 17 percent, Barghouti around 3, Haniyeh around 18 — from a poll a few months ago). The same is probably true for Fatah’s long-time real strongman, Mohammed Dahlan, who, it was long speculated, was being built up as Abbas’ successor — however, in recent months, he seems to have suffered setbacks and/or be incapacitated by illness.

And, timetomoveon, your idea of a UN force, at least for Gaza, has already been rejected by Hamas in no uncertain terms… Do you really think they took over the Gaza strip in an appalling bloodbath in order to be supervised by the UN? Sure, they would take the UN’s money to replenish their arsenal…
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partgirl

Comment No. 638235

June 14 15:09
GBR

dear BOGOF, thankyou for holding me to account. i will answer your points one by one.

“They chose a terrorist organisation to govern them.”

You can’t call for elections and then not recognise the result, only to fund and arm the losing party. Are Hamas self proclaimed terrorists? Or is this the category that foreign institutions have put them in? I am not condoning what they do, I’m just not categorising it either. If anything, Hamas are closer to a guerrilla group, in that they have political objectives, and solicit with politics openly. Until it displeases them, evidently.

“Cant you see that there is absolutely no international bias towards Israel?”

LOL. ok. Sure. List all those UN resolutions condemning Israeli war crimes, calling for a return to the 1967 borders- and see how many times the US has vetoed them. Furthermore, Britain is a huge arms dealer with Israel, and we are staunch ‘allies’. This, I would consider bias.

“Do you read the British press?”

Yes, but it’s such a bubble that I don’t see how reading British press gets me closer to ascertaining the ‘truth’ of whats happening in the region.

And yes, if Hamas renoucned violence they would have the moral high ground- but would it get them very far? I doubt it.
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DavidTHarryblog

Comment No. 638239

June 14 15:10
GBR

TrueLeft:

“To posters like Aquila and KelvinYearwood- all I can say is that I am at a loss to understand why you think Hamas is in any way better than Fatah. Frankly, there isn’t much difference btween the two at all, not with regards to terrorism and not with regards to corruption.”

The Socialist Workers Party line has gone out. This is what you’ll be reading here for some time.

The reason they’re running it is:

– Since the Cairo Conference, the SWP had gone into alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood

– The Socialist Workers Party is more attracted by conflict than by peace.

– Hamas has a millenialist fantasy about killing every last jew written into its Covenant. That makes it MUCH more attractive than Fatah.

Expect, therefore, Fatah to be painted increasingly as traitors and Hamas as the vanguard of the liberation struggle.

Expect also to be denounced as a “Zionist” for making the points you’ve just made.
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BOGOF

Comment No. 638273

June 14 15:24
GBR

Asasin you write *You want us to believe that the cycle of Cause and effect is Palestinian attacks and Israeli reprisals?*
Exactly. If you read the last part of what I posted to you, youll get an idea of how to stop the cycle.

The present Israeli incursion into Gaza is in response against terrorists who continue to fire rockets into Israel, which illustrates the cause and effect action perfectly.
What a shame you have to resort to a personal attack when I dont accept your views and agree with them. Asasin. Please dont bother posting to me until you can debate without an emotional tag and behave respectfully.

Stillfedup, Bhargouti is a criminal who is in jail for terrorist activities and murder. Theres your answer.

ZCFREE, or….?

DavidTHarryblog of course theyll acquiesce to it.
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JMoresby

Comment No. 638308

June 14 15:33
FRA

Fratricide is only the first phase
With brudder fightin’ brudder stabbin’ brudder
Dem just killin’ often one another
But when you see your brudder blood just flow
Futile fighting then you know
That the first phase must come to an end
And time for the second phase to show

Linton Kwesi Johnson
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omri23

Comment No. 638332

June 14 15:39
ESP

arghh.. these old arguments again, “devastating rocket attacks”, etc.. just get the f out of palestine already, and the palestinians will probly be ok.

anyway, that’s not why I’m here –

just wanted to stop by to say “Hi Berchams !” good to see you again, seems like bumping into an old friend
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Assasin

Comment No. 638345

June 14 15:43

BOGOF:-

“…resort to a personal attack”

Are you having a laugh?,..Define a personal attack?

I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction really, given your views and historical bias.

Now, would you please define your understanding of the concept of cause and effect and where exactly you think an occupation fits into that definition?

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Craigoh

Comment No. 638367

June 14 15:49
GBR

Have to largely agree with BOGOF and Finite 187’s postings.

The Palestinians seem totally incapable of doing anything constructive to change their plight.

Have they never heard of Gandhi or Nelson Mandela or Martin Luther King? Or even bleedin’ Gerry Adams and Martin McGuiness (who of course have at long last stood down the IRA)?

For gawd’s sake.
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TheNuclearOption

Comment No. 638368

June 14 15:50
GBR

It seems strange that Britain states that it wants to avoid civil war in Iraq yet goes along with American and European diplomacy that makes civil war in the Palestinian territories almost inevitable. It seems when it comes to the Palestinian territories there never is room for pragmatism.

However, ultimately the fault must lie with those Palestinians who believe that armed struggle is the way to win a nation. If Palestinians abandoned the armed struggle and offered Israel peaceful coexistence then the rest of the world would have little choice but to support their right to a capital in East Jerusalem. After all, if they are no threat to Israel then on what grounds could Israel refuse the creation of an independent Palestinian State with East Jerusalem as its capital?

If their can be peace in Northern Ireland, there can be peace in Israel/Palestine but it must start with the putting away of the gun.
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GrandOldMan

Comment No. 638384

June 14 15:53
GBR

@DavidTHarryBlog: Thanks for your clear summary of the SWP/Respect agenda on Palestine. KelvinYearwood is a classic example, with the standard marxist phrases about class war, colonialism and racism thrown in.

The naivite of the SWP in allying with a racist Islamic party is sad to see, given that it other circumstances they would be bitterly denouncing them as reactionaries. But then the SWP has been predicting imminent Class war and revolution and allying itself to some very strange partners ever since I can remember.

The SWP/Hamas alliance is a classic case where both sides think they are using the other for their political ends. It will all end in tears.

meanwhile, thanks for an interesting and perceptive article on internal palestinian politics, free of the usual rhetoric.
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Hermine

Comment No. 638420

June 14 16:07
FRA

**Israel and the US led a virtual blockade on Palestine, with Israel refusing to return collected taxes and the US pressing world banks not to recognise the signature of the Palestinian finance minister. The nominal reason is Hamas’s refusal to recognise Israel**

And the whole world stands by…. watching Palestine destroying itself!

Shame!
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Hermine

Comment No. 638422

June 14 16:07
FRA

**Israel and the US led a virtual blockade on Palestine, with Israel refusing to return collected taxes and the US pressing world banks not to recognise the signature of the Palestinian finance minister. The nominal reason is Hamas’s refusal to recognise Israel**

And the whole world stands by…. watching Palestine destroying itself!

Shame!
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fuzzytruthseeker

Comment No. 638450

June 14 16:14
CAN

I am too impatient to read the whole article before commenting, but I often read Dr Kuttab’s WashPost columns, and know his views in and out. I am therefore plesantly releieved to read his argument that Hams’s civility was perceived as weakness. In the past, and even the very recent past, Dr Kuttab towed the official Jordanian line that Hamas (and Hizb’Allah in Lebanon), enjoying the support of Iran, no doubt, is to be treated with caution because they might wnat to push the agenda of Iranian hegemony in the region (after all did not the Iranians cause a revolution in their then-flourishing country? — well, vever mind that the Revolution was won with clamours of Allahu Akbar rising to the heavens from every rooftop during long balckouts to initimidate the oppressed people, deprived of the fruits of the ‘flourishing economy”).
But, yes, now Dr Kuttab knows and clamours out (although not on every rooftop and not adding the chant Allahu-Akbar!) what every lucid person has long known — Hamas (and Hizb’Allah on the eve of the ceasefire during the second Lebanon war when they could have sent Qassam rocket to strike Tel Aviv but instead hit a small village some distance out side Tel Aviv) has been very civil, hoping that the Quartet would understand and appreciate.
Let us now hope that Israel also understands, and the nincompoop who consulted with his ‘higher father’ last week on his way back from the G8 Summit, will not be swayed by idiots like Dick Cheney and Richard Perle to launch an attack on Iran.
The consequences would be one million times more catastrophic than it has been for Fatah (and for Israel during the Second Lebanon War) for mistaking civility for weakness.
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SqueakyCat

Comment No. 638462

June 14 16:17
USA

TrueLeft wrote:
“Instead of a State there will be a collection of mutually hostile clans and splinter organizations- precluding any possibility of peace for Israel and liberty for Palestine.”

There are 47 different militia groups operating in Gaza already. Are you suggesting that somehow Israel created these groups or will make things worse in the future?

Assasin wrote:
“But what you blatantly fail to suggest or state is that it might be the military occupation and the daily despairing and degrading consequences of living under such a regime that engenders armed resistance, or that Israeli actions may be such as to provoke Palestinian violence.”

Well this certainly accounts for all the violence going on in Gaza.

The Israeli’s should take your advice and withdraw the settlers and soldiers from Gaza. No doubt, that will spur rapid economic development.
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RScully

Comment No. 638464

June 14 16:17
CAN

“Otherwise, Abbas will be left with no alternative but to follow the advice of a leading Palestinian professor, Ali Jirbawi, who suggested simply that Abbas should dissolve the Palestinian Authority and return power to the Israelis, who remain legally and practically responsible for the areas they occupied in 1967.”

That’s precisely what he should do, instead of trying to build a state that’s been fatally undermined by its ostensible foreign backers.

Ehud Olmert said in an interview with “Yedioth Ahronoth” in 2003:
“We are approaching the point where more and more Palestinians will say: ‘We have been won over. We agree with (extreme right-wing Israeli politician Avigdor) Lieberman. There is no room for two states between Jordan and the sea. All that we want is the right to vote.'”

“The day they do that,” continued Olmert, “is the day we lose everything.”
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ZCFREE

Comment No. 638481

June 14 16:23
GBR

Olmert :”There is no room for two states between Jordan and the sea”

Well then he had better wake up and have one integrated state . One person one vote, instead of this apartheid non-solution. The alternative is perpetual war that Israel will only eventually lose. Ie it is a non-choice. Better get to the negotiating table soon.
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DonnaSaggia

Comment No. 638502

June 14 16:29
USA

The US and Israel are jumping for joy over the civil war in Gaza because it now gives them yet another excuse for not entering a peace agreement, and for Israel to hang onto the land it has stolen, and continues to steal. After Arafat’s death, the world waited and watched as Israel scrambled for excuses to not deal with Abbas (after all, he was, unfortunately, not a terrorist so it was harder to justify ignoring him). Finally, when the Palestinian people had enough of Israeli and US intransigence and foot-dragging, they elected Hamas in–what a shocker–a free and fair election (more than the US can say for its 2004 debacle). The election was immediately condemned by Israel and the US–seems they can’t take democracy for an answer–and followed by an economic boycott of the Palestinian Authority by Israel, the US, and Europe. Take note–it’s OK to boycott the Palestinians, but who screams bloody anti-semitism when UK institutions want to boycott Israel? So now, the US and Israel must reap what they’ve sown. Every time they refuse to deal with a democratic Palestinian faction, a more radical faction will take their place. Sooner or later Israel will have to give back the stolen land and face the World Court for its war crimes.
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aquilla

Comment No. 638545

June 14 16:42

To those who wish to put words into my mouth:

DO NOT!

I merely stated Hamas were voted in and undermined, construe it anyway you like and you will only seek to show your true colours and the glee at those innocents being harmed.

Oh relativity!
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Alcuin

Comment No. 638568

June 14 16:50
GBR

If you are asking, on behalf of the Palestinian people, for sympathy, then most of us would give it – much good may it do them. But you also blame Israel (no surprise there), and seem to have no answer (indeed you do not even ask the question) to the obvious conundrum of why teachers and security services cannot be paid when the militias have no problem getting whatever they want. The answer to your unanswered question (how can we stop this): get those supplying arms to pay the teachers (provided they stop teaching hate), doctors, engineers and security people.

Pity butters no parsnips though. Blaming others, rightly or wrongly, will not get the Gazans out of this mess, nor will dreaming of dead Jews not put bread on the table. Only their own efforts will do that. You have to put away your fatalism. Wait for Allah to save you, and you are lost.
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DenisMatyjaszek

Comment No. 638572

June 14 16:51
USA

Whenever talk of Palestine and Israel come up, we always hear this talk about how you have to be tough or no one will respect you.

This author reinforces that idea by titling this article “Civility or Weakness”, then going on to suggest that the reason Abbas has trouble is because he is civil.

Hogwash.

Abbas works for the USA and Israel. Why would any palestinian listen to Abbas unless Abbas was acting as an intermediary for the paychecks coming from Israel and the USA?

Now that the Fatah people have been accepting USA and Israeli paychecks for what? A year now? Now that Fatah itself is working for the USA and Israel by accepting weapons from the USA and Israel and then using those weapons to kill fellow palestinians on orders from the USA and Israel, now that Fatah has shown who they really work for, the rest of the Palestinians have had enough and are working to get rid of them.

Abbas is nothing but a puppet of Israel and the USA, and never has been anything but a puppet of Israel and the USA.
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ANNAQED

Comment No. 638810

June 14 18:18
GBR

Just as the Palestinian people voted in Hamas democratically they can democratically vote them out. What stops them Mr Kuttab?

Solution-focused theory advises “If it isn’t working then stop doing it and try something else.”

This patently is not working so why are they still doing it? We are talking of solutions, though, whereas the idiot protagonists in this lunacy can think only of their stupid pride and face.

Little of this is Israel’s fault either. Hamas would have got its money long ago if it could be trusted not to spend it on weaponry with which to attack Israel and if it would make honest moves towards peace, the start of which would be to renounce its Charter. By now it might have been well on the way to having a Palestinian state, but no, its leaders persist in cutting off their noses to spite their faces and the people who elected them into power continue to suffer.

But there HAVE to be peace-wanting Palestinians. I reserve my sympathy for them and for the children who don’t deserve to be caught up in this craziness. The others who don’t have the sense to see the harm they are causing don’t deserve any.
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Damo70

Comment No. 638823

June 14 18:28
USA

@ANNAQED

“Just as the Palestinian people voted in Hamas democratically they can democratically vote them out. What stops them Mr Kuttab?”

Wouldn’t you need an election?

I’m quite sure that if there were an election and an electable third party, they would be elected overwhelmingly…. Can’t see this happening in the short-term. Maybe a few of the reasonable players need to split off and form a new party…
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kritter

Comment No. 638836

June 14 18:33
GBR

I feel sorry for the people of Gaza – things are going to keep getting worse for them. A seperate Islamist state in Gaza will mean loss of social freedom as well as continuing economic decline. Once Hamas are in charge there is not much hope of removing them from power.
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SAVLANUT

Comment No. 638840

June 14 18:35
GBR

Hermine: Yes, the world stands by and the Palestinians choose to destroy themselves. Note that I have pointed up that they do have a choice NOT to do this, although you wouldn’t think so.

And I hope that you include among the more active bystanders the various Arab nations, including those which are arming the factions.

DenisM: Abbas is a puppet, merely that. Any leader whose people kidnaps a journalist who is sympathetic to them and puts their case to the world and who cannot get him released has to be at least that.

Alcuin, I agree with your post, particularly the last sentence.
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SarahLeah

Comment No. 638848

June 14 18:39
GBR

When my son at age three used to have tantrums and throw his books around we would put him on the naughty step.

It’d take a naughty step the size of Gaza to sort this lot out.

Wait a minute… now, that’s an idea.
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TrueLeft

Comment No. 638982

June 14 19:52
ISR

SqueakyCat-
How do you figure I said that? What I am sure of is that the policy of Israel and the West towards the Palestinian Authority since Hamas’ election has been nothing short of a sanctions regime. It has taken an already delicate social situation in Gaza and made it completely impossible. Hence Israel and the West have been playing a large role in bringing us to this state.

So no, Israel did not create the many militias in Gaza. But Israel created the “infrastructure” for them, even as it destroyed the real infrastructure of the Strip. The institutions of government in Gaza have been effectively strangled to death by Israel and the West. How can anyone feign surprise that when the government is thus destroyed anarchy and civil war take its place?

I am not saying Israel did this on purpose. I have too little faith in the competence of Israel’s government(s) to think they could pull of such a thing by design. I think Israel has made many mistakes in dealing with the Palestinians, and the sanctions against the Palestinian Authority were one of them. The results, I fear, will be very bad for Israel, as well, though they may be even more devastating for the Palestinian cause.

Aquila-
I’ve no argument with that. But it is only fair to say, in the interest of balance, that Hamas has done its own share of undermining. Not least by taking the initiative in bringing the tensions to outright war in the past week.

Every bullet fired by Hamas at Fatah and by Fatah at Hamas is yet another bullet into the heart of the Palestinian struggle. Neither side deserves the support of outside cheerleaders (which I am not saying you are). The people of Gaza, of the West Bank and the refugees deserve better than that.
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BOGOF

Comment No. 639113

June 14 21:16
GBR

Assassin I dont like tit for tat posts so Ill simply answer your question how I see where cause and effect fits in with Israel being on the West Bank. As for personal attacks, your last post to me told me to BOGOF. Who else were you speaking to? Youre right however, I gain absolutely no satisfaction at all from your style of debate, so dont post to me again, I wont answer.

CAUSE: In 1967 Israel’s Arab neighbours lined up belligerently against her.
EFFECT: Israel beat them resoundingly and took charge of the West Bank,Gaza, Sinai and the Golan Heights
CAUSE: Brave Anwar Sadat of Egypt offered peace to Israel
EFFECT: Israel returned Sinai to Egypt
CAUSE: The late King Hussein of Jordan offered peace to Israel
EFFECT: Israel now has peaceful relations with Jordan
CAUSE: Israel met with Arafat at Camp David, Oslo etc and offered him 97% of what he wanted. Arafat refused
EFFECT (1): The Intifada with thousands of Israelis killed and maimed by suicide bombers and acts of terrorism.
EFFECT (2): Israel is still on the West Bank
CAUSE: Israel withdraws completely from Gaza in 2005
EFFECT: Constant barrage of Kassam rockets on Sderot and other Israeli towns, and Israel once more in Gaza to protect her citizens.

I hope this suffices. Its a thumb nail sketch only. For further and better particulars I suggest you do some research of your own.
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BOGOF

Comment No. 639116

June 14 21:17
GBR

Assassin I dont like tit for tat posts so Ill simply answer your question how I see where cause and effect fits in with Israel being on the West Bank. As for personal attacks, your last post to me told me to BOGOF. Who else were you speaking to? Youre right however, I gain absolutely no satisfaction at all from your style of debate, so dont post to me again, I wont answer.

CAUSE: In 1967 Israel’s Arab neighbours lined up belligerently against her.
EFFECT: Israel beat them resoundingly and took charge of the West Bank,Gaza, Sinai and the Golan Heights
CAUSE: Brave Anwar Sadat of Egypt offered peace to Israel
EFFECT: Israel returned Sinai to Egypt
CAUSE: The late King Hussein of Jordan offered peace to Israel
EFFECT: Israel now has peaceful relations with Jordan
CAUSE: Israel met with Arafat at Camp David, Oslo etc and offered him 97% of what he wanted. Arafat refused
EFFECT (1): The Intifada with thousands of Israelis killed and maimed by suicide bombers and acts of terrorism.
EFFECT (2): Israel is still on the West Bank
CAUSE: Israel withdraws completely from Gaza in 2005
EFFECT: Constant barrage of Kassam rockets on Sderot and other Israeli towns, and Israel once more in Gaza to protect her citizens.

I hope this suffices. Its a thumb nail sketch only. For further and better particulars I suggest you do some research of your own.
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trickle

Comment No. 639172

June 14 21:55
USA

For the record: Israel and the U.S. had blockaded the occupied territories because the newly elected hamas government has refused to abide by agreements made by the previous one- pretty straight forward, no? If Hamas is a political party, it should expect political consequences for its official actions.
President Abbas had, in a message earlier today, officially disolved the government, firing Ismail Hania as prime minister, as is his right by law. Hamas had rejected this out of hand. Not so much of a political party after all, it seems.
Hamas, from its inception, has employed a cynical policy of baiting Israeli military attacks. In 1996, A week before a deadlocked election between Shimon peres and Benyamin Netanyahu- the former an ardant advocate of the Oslo accords, the other a right wing demagogue, Hamas had succesfuly excetuted a string of bombings of buses in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem- a fact that granted Netanyahu victory by a tiny margin. They have since successfully prevented any attempts at negotiation, finally landing a landslide victory to Ariel Sharon- the father of the settlements, and the anti-negotiation guru of Israeli politics. “The disengagement” from Gaza, with all of its misery for both sides, is, indeed a Hamas victory.
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SqueakyCat

Comment No. 639530

June 15 3:16
USA

TrueLeft:
We agree on the issue of the competence of the government(s) of Israel. I would go further and say the competence of all representative democracies, including the one I live in.

But implicit in your arguments seems to be the notion that the situation the Palestinians find themselves in is solely the fault of: Israel, the U.S., the West or some combination of them.

The actions of the Palestinian leadership in encouraging years of violence against Israel has nothing to do with their situation, nor does it in any way explain the actions of Israel toward the Palestinians.

The poverty of the Palestinian people is not their fault, although many of their leaders seem to have fared well financially and they seem to have unlimited funds for weapons.

And then, given this perspective, you seem to have the view that the government of Israel and the US and other Western countries ought to support Hamas financially and that not doing so explains the current situation.

I personally would find it very hard to provide support for someone who openly states their goal is my elimination. Is it your view that Israel should provide Hamas with the funds it needs to eliminate Israel? Or that Israel’s allies should do this?

To me, doing that borders on insanity.
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