By Daoud Kuttab

The Palestinians’ insistence on regarding late Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, even after his death, as nothing more than a war criminal responsible for the massacre in Sabra and Shatila and the construction of the settlements is overly simplistic and anachronistic. More than anything else, this approach misses the complexity of the man and the central leadership role he had in Israeli history. Yes, Sharon did build settlements, but on two occasions he also removed Jews from their homes: once, when serving as defense minister, when he evacuated the Sinai settlements in 1982, as part of the peace agreement with Egypt; and again, as prime minister, when he developed and implemented the plan to disengage from the Gaza Strip and the north of the West Bank in 2005.

When senior Fatah member Jibril Rajoub bemoans the fact that he never got to see Sharon tried as a war criminal by the International Criminal Court and accuses him of assassinating PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat — and he does this on the very day that Sharon died — he is giving voice to a very narrow and selective worldview. When my colleague Daoud Kuttab turns to the younger generation of Palestinians and only attributes the massacre in the refugee camps to Sharon, without mentioning the evacuation of Yamit (from the Sinai), the Disengagement and the establishment of the Kadima Party — which Sharon thought of as a platform to consolidate an agreement with the Palestinians — he is distorting the image and person of Sharon as a bold and pragmatic leader. Continue Reading »

By Daoud Kuttab

If you were to ask a 20-year-old Palestinian today about Ariel Sharon, you might be surprised how little this generation knows about him. The past eight years, in which Sharon became incapacitated, and the few years before that in which he had softened his radical stance, appear to have chipped away at the warmonger image that is still etched in the consciousness of almost every Palestinian over 25 years old.

More than any other Israeli military figure, Sharon seems to be present in every violent mark since the Nakba and creation of Israel.

He joined the Israeli army in 1948 and one of his first assignments by David Ben Gurion was in 1953 to establish Unit 101, which focused on retaliation to cross-border attacks by the Palestinian fedayeen (militants). After one such attack, Sharon’s men crossed into the Palestinian town of Qibya, then under Jordan’s rule, and killed 69 Palestinian villagers, two-thirds of whom were women and children. The Qibya massacre showed Sharon’s ruthlessness and would become a symbol of the brutal Israeli retaliations to any Palestinian resistance attacks. Continue Reading »

By Daoud Kuttab

Multiple reports two weeks before US Secretary of State John Kerry’s 21st visit to Palestine and Israel focused on a new Israeli concern: unorganized and uncoordinated acts of violence. The conclusion was that Israel’s main problem was impromptu and independent acts by frustrated Palestinians. One of the implications of this Israeli security assessment was that the Palestinian government had been successful in helping stem organized violence against Israel.

However, when Kerry arrived with his newly formulated bridging proposal for a framework agreement, the Israeli leadership made a sudden U-turn. Standing next to the top US diplomat, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched a strange and unwarranted attack against Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas over embracing the released Palestinian prisoners. Netanyahu also went out of his way to repeat the Israeli broken record criticizing the incitement of violence and the embracing of terrorists.

“I know that I am committed to peace, but unfortunately, given the actions and words of Palestinian leaders, there’s growing doubt in Israel that the Palestinians are committed to peace,” said Netanyahu in the presence of Kerry. Continue Reading »

By Daoud Kuttab

When the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) agreed to recognize Israel and sign a memorandum of understanding in 1993, the organization was experiencing an all-time low. The PLO had been routed from Beirut, and later from Tripoli. An internal struggle within the Fatah movement had erupted under the name Fatah al-Intifada, and the Berlin Wall had fallen, leaving Palestinians without their major international ally.

The agreement reached as a result of secret talks in the Norwegian capital, Oslo, allowed for the return of tens of thousands of Palestinian fighters, leaders and their families, but it failed to produce peace, independence or even a suspension of Jewish settlements. The West Bank was divided into areas A, B and C. In justifying their acceptance of this inadequate deal, Palestinians expected that the five-year interim agreement would soon translate into an independent state.

Now, 20 years later, Palestinian officials are finding themselves in a somewhat similar situation. The Arab world is deeply divided along sectarian lines. Egypt, the largest and strongest Arab country, is no longer involved in any Palestinian-related issue. On the contrary, Egyptians are extremely upset with the Hamas leadership in Gaza and have closed the Rafah crossing point after having demolished the tunnels. Even the United Kingdom, which was the colonial power just prior to the Nakba, is now publicly stating that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is not one of its foreign policy priorities. Meanwhile, settlers have doubled since 1993, and the Gaza split has left Palestinian leaders even more vulnerable to pressure, similar to that which Arafat faced prior to the Oslo signing.  Continue Reading »

By Daoud Kuttab

Following appeared in today’s Jordan Times

By Daoud Kuttab

At face value, the slap in the face senior Fatah leader Jibril Rajoub received from a member of the Palestinian parliament does not constitute material for a news analysis. The strike by parliament member Fateh Abu Rub that occurred Dec. 18 in the Grand Park Hotel’s lobby in Ramallah was resolved relatively quickly, as the two Fatah leaders issued simultaneous statements saying that they have agreed to forgive and forget.

What makes this altercation different is that it might be an early warning to the leadership tug-of-war that is expected in the aftermath of the reign of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. On Jan. 1, 2014, Fatah celebrated its 49th anniversary with mixed expectations as to its future.

The danger behind what occurred in the hotel lobby, as Palestinians were preparing to meet the Chinese foreign minister, is that it reflects geographic and tribal sensitivities as well as political ones. Supporters of Rajoub, who comes from the Hebron area town of Dura, and Abu Rub, who comes from the Jenin area, were ready to defend their respective leaders. Continue Reading »

A Prisoner in Ramallah.pdf

Daoud Kuttab

The comment was off the cuff, but the result was angry and violent. The commentator was Jordanian oud player Tareq Jundi; the remark was about the coldness at the Al Hussein Cultural Centre.

“It seems that the diesel hasn’t arrived at the theatre from the government,” he said complaining about the fact that the theatre hall was extremely cold.

The concert was a charity show for the rising Jordanian artist Ghiya Rushidat. Some staff at the centre came screaming at Jundi for “cursing” the government and chairs were thrown at the artists who were saved by some of their loyal fans.

Ghai and the musicians decided to file a complaint at the police station, only to discover that the centre had filed a complaint accusing the musicians of having insulted the government and defamed the national flag. In the end both sides dropped their charges.

What happened on the last days of 2013 at the Al Hussein Cultural Centre was not new. In many cases artists and public figures complained that the centre, which belongs to the Greater Amman Municipality, has become a place for bullying and political partisanship.

The centre’s director denied permission to a local organisation to hold a debate on the nuclear programme because the centre “doesn’t do politics”.

In the past, and under a different management, the centre used to be the venue fornumerous debates by that same organisation. Continue Reading »

By Daoud Kuttab

The Israeli Foreign Ministry was quick to reply to the Christmas message of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. They were angry that Abbas, who attended Christmas Mass in the Church of Nativity with High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Catherine Ashton, laid claim to the birth of Jesus.

Abbas followed many other Palestinians in saying that Jesus, born in Bethlehem, was Palestinian. Israelis, who refused a request by a Palestinian Israeli parliamentarian to have a Christmas tree at the entrance of the Knesset, angrily refuted the Palestinian claim. The spokesman of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, Yigal Palmor, called Abbas’ claim “rewriting Christian history,” petitioning the Palestinian president to read the Gospels.

Figuring out who Jesus was depends on how you categorize identity. For Palestinians, anyone who was born (or whose ancestors were born) on the geographic areas between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea is Palestinian. While many nationalities have lived in historic Palestine, including Canaanites, Jabusites, Romans, Israelites, Ummayads and others, the term Palestinian is used in an all-encompassing way.

While Israeli officials mocked Abbas and said he “needs a hug from Santa,” they didn’t lay “Jewish” claim, even though Jesus was historically and Biblically known to have been born to a Jewish family. Continue Reading »