Tag Archives: peace process

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UN Trusteeship not membership

Sami Jamil Jadallah

Sami Jamil Jadallah

Sami Jamil Jadallah

This “Palestinian leadership” sitting in Ramallah is desperate, desperate to reinvent itself, desperate to keep its self in business of managing the Jewish Occupation. This Palestinian leadership that aborted the First Intifada, which was the closet thing the Palestinians, came to an “Arab Spring” in favor of Oslo Accord and managing the Jewish Occupation.

Yitzhak Rabin was desperate to see the Intifada end and not be on the headline news every day. Yasser Arafat, Mahmoud Abbas and their cohorts in the PLO were desperate for new legitimacy and new mission, having lost it all with siding with Saddam Hussein. In Oslo both leaders found what they were looking for with Israel being the only true winner. Israel kept is Jewish Occupation and found in Arafat and the PLO, the willing partner to pay for it. Continue reading →

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Palestinian leadership behind bars; why not?

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, left; Hamas leader, Khaled Meshaal, right
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, left; Hamas leader, Khaled Meshaal, right

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, left; Hamas leader, Khaled Meshaal, right

Sami Jamil Jadallah

Other than Israel and the US, no group or organizations or countries did more damage to the Palestinian cause of liberation and freedom than the incompetent, corrupt and reckless Palestinian leadership past and present.  This leadership should be behind bars not sitting at the UN or at negotiating table representing the more than 8 million Diaspora Palestinians and those under Jewish Occupation.

Since taking over Fatah in 1959 and the PLO in 1969 Arafat and the PLO leadership ran the longest political and liberation fraud in history, toped that with Oslo Accord which stand on its own as longest fraudulent “peace process” in modern history. A process that not only legitimized the Jewish Occupation but enticed this leadership for a “fist full of dollars” to manage the Jewish Occupation, saving Israel tens of billions while taking on the unimaginable and shameful responsibility of begging the fund to run such an occupation.

 

Over the years, this leadership not only looted the people treasury of tens of billions but corrupted the entire Palestinian society, corrupting the political process within this community, failing at every thing and at every turn, putting Palestinians at great risk every where, not to mentions the hundreds of thousands of lives lost in the process and over the years.

 

Fatah and the PLO ran the most sophisticated criminal and political enterprise ever, not even matched by the former Soviet Union. Not only it failed at liberation, it failed at building governing institutions. It snuffed and failed to create a viable dynamic political process allowing the best and the brightest to lead, rather it brought nothing but incompetent thugs and crooks to leads. The only claimed success was to build a security forces that provide effective support and protection to the IDF, to the armed Jewish Terrorists and of course to the Occupation.

 

Since Fatah leadership (Arafat & Company) took over the PLO, there has never been any accounting of the many failings in Jordan, in Lebanon, in Kuwait, in Tunisia and now in Occupied Palestine. There was never any true and transparent accounting of many of the financial, political and human rights systematic abuse engaged by the Palestinians leadership.

 

Arafat ran Fatah and the PLO as his own private company, surrounding himself with clowns and “yes” people, corrupting every one around him with financial rewards and bribes to gain their loyalties. Arafat corrupted political discourse, corrupted free and open debates and in certain cases engaging in facilitating political assassination snuffing out any opposition to his leadership. He rendered the Palestine National Congress (PNC) helpless and useless, marginalized the PNC and its role as “representative of the people” with no say so, leaving all political, financial and military decisions in his own hands and the few clowns around him.

 

That process continued today under the leadership of his successor Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies within the PLO Executive Committee. A PLO and a committee that has no legitimacy whatsoever since the people, the citizens never voted for the PLO, its Executive Committee let alone Fatah and all of various organizations and subgroups.

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians died in vain, in Jordan, in Lebanon, in Tunis as a result of a reckless and criminal behavior of the PLO and Fatah leadership resulting, in the case of Kuwait the exile of some 350,000 from Kuwait as direct result of the Palestinian leadership total and unconditional support of Saddam criminal dictator Saddam Hussain. There was never a public hearing or an open accounting of the crimes committed by the leadership against the Palestinian community in Kuwait.  And there was never any compensation for the billions lost.

 

In Jordan and in Lebanon, there was never an accounting of what went wrong and why? More troublesome is the total absence of a formal board of inquiry into the massacres at Sabra and Shatilla, Tel-Zaater and the thousands killed in factional fighting between the various militias within the PLO, nor was there any accounting of the assassinations of key leaders.

 

On the financial front, tens of billions squandered, looted and remains unaccounted for from the heydays of the PLO in Lebanon and in Tunis and since Oslo hundreds of millions where looted by professional thieves within the Palestinian Authority (PA), within Fatah and the PLO.

 

According to (Al-Ahram Weekly of 20-26 January 2011) “

The PA Justice Department has forwarded some 80 corruption files to Rafiq Natshe, head of the Anti-Corruption Agency (ACA). Natshe said the files contained serious charges of fraud, embezzlement and bribery, adding that intensive investigation would start soon. Natshe said he would pursue and hound suspects “wherever they may be”.  Al-Ahram continued to quote Natshe “ At the moment, we have all the cases, which include some related to cabinet ministers and former ministers.” Transparency International Perception Index ranked the Palestinian Authority 108 out of 195.  Transparency Corruption Index measures malfeasance among government officials.

 

However the Palestinian leadership of the late Arafat and now Abbas never took corruption chargers and looting the treasury seriously, arresting and later releasing scores of small times thieve within Fatah and the PLO.

 

Mahmoud Abbas like Hosni Mubarak never made any efforts to go after serious cases of fraud and larceny especially those committed by senior members of Fatah and the PLO and key officers within the PA and in some cases evidence destroyed with no public inquiry.

 

No one ever explained what happened to the billions of SAMED Industries run by non-other than Ahmed Qurai? No one ever explained whatever happened to Arafat billions and why he was able to transfer tens of millions of the “people money” to his wife to enjoy her luxurious life style in Paris while thousands of people in Dier Albalah were living under open skies waiting for tents after Israel destroyed their homes, tents that never came, because Arafat had other personal and family priorities? No one explained the compensation deal reached between Fatah leadership and Suha Arafat for the loss of her husband and why? No one ever explained how Fatah and the PLO leadership allowed Arafat to receive “tax revenue” collected by Israel in his own private accounts and how and why senior members of the Israeli MOSSAD were in charge of Arafat private financial portfolio? No one dare explain how and why Fatah is funded and financed by the people’s money, since its operating budget is not generated from membership fee or contributions by membership? Unless Israel and the US secretly funding Fatah and the PLO Executive budget.

 

If Hosni Mubarak ran a clepo-regime then Arafat and Abbas were and are doing just that, with many senior PLO and Fatah leadership, ministers, director-generals, mayors and grassroots activist are part of the criminal enterprise presided over by Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayyad.

 

According to same Al-Ahran Weekly, the PA security agencies warned the Palestinian leadership that “ an all out campaign against corruption would seriously destabilize the “ the Palestinian national enterprise” and hurt the image of Fatah.

 

If Mubarak National Democratic Party, Ben Ali’s Democratic Constitutional Rally and Saddam and Bashar Assad corrupted and hijacked the political and economic system in the country and ran a clepto-regime, then Fatah and the PLO leadership did the same, with many senior officials owning together with a close circle of Palestinian Oligarchs many of the key businesses and enterprises in the Palestinian Occupied Territories.

 

Perhaps Mahmoud Abbas can explain to the people and the public at large why there are so many ‘millionaires and multi-millionaires” within Fatah and PLO senior leadership and how these leaders earned these millions? It is common knowledge that many senior officials became direct beneficiaries of the continued Jewish Occupation and key business partners of the many key business enterprises.

 

The Palestinian leadership went beyond its inability to put an end to financial corruption it became and active partner in nurturing corruption. It even made efforts to prevent any public information and blocked the website Donia-Alwatan website that reported on corruption (Electronic Intifada 18 November 2008).

 

On the political front the negotiations and signing of Oslo stands alone as sufficient reason to put the Palestinian leadership of Arafat, Abbas and Qurai to stand trial for crimes committed against the people and the nation. And put the PLO and Fatah leadership on trial for it role and partnership with the Jewish Occupation.

 

Ahmed Qurai was no match to Uri Savir and Mahmoud Abbas was no match for Dr. Yair Hirschfield, Dr. Ron Pundak, and Yosel Singer. The Palestinian Trio of Arafat, Abbas and Qurai were no match to the savvies, intelligence, competence, and strategic thinking let alone loyalty to the cause and their constituent as that of Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres.

 

While Rabin and Peres mustered from around the world the best and brightest Israeli with the different needed expertise to negotiate Oslo, the Palestinian leadership with the kind of arrogance and contempt it have for the people did not bother to call on the thousands of Palestinian experts to help with the negotiations ending up with a document that stand as not only shameful, disgraceful, but enough to constitute malfeasance and enough to bring the leadership to trial and put them behind bars for life.  More troublesome was the lack of any provisions or course of actions or recourse if things failed as now, and there was never an agreed to framework of reference by Abbas owned admission. And this man thinks he is competent to continue to lead after he made a mess in Oslo.

 

Arafat should stand trial “posthumously” together with Abbas, Qurai for the reckless crimes they committed against the people and the cause, not only on managing and running a criminal enterprise called PLO, Fatah and PA but for the crimes they committed in Oslo.

 

Oslo afforded Israel full recognition with open borders, legally transferring to Israel 58% of the prime land and territory to do with it what it want and to have total sovereignty over such areas referred to as Area C.

 

This incompetent reckless and criminal leadership left Jerusalem out of Oslo, left the key issues of the refugees out of Oslo and it was happy to exchange all of that for the ability to loot and fleece, for the few thousand VIP passes for its senior officials and members of their families, while millions have to endure long hours if not days in hot, cold and rainy weathers to cross few hundred meters. All holders of VIP passes have no sense of shame and keeping these VIP passes shows the arrogant contempt they all have for the millions of Palestinians, totally blind to the suffering of millions, and this is crime of itself. Tell that the families who lost their mothers and children at these check points.

 

No need to mention the tens of thousands of Palestinians exiled and ethnically cleansed from their homes inside Jerusalem or the tens of thousands who lost their farms and lands to Jewish settlements and Jewish Roads only and to the Apartheid Wall under the blind eyes of a leadership that continued to negotiate for 20 years while Israel was committing one crime after another, with the lead Palestinian negotiator disgraceful and shamelessly offering Israel its “biggest Yurishaleym in history”.

 

The question that should come to every one’s mind, how can such a leadership that failed at every thing and at every tern, for the last 45 years can be trusted to continue to lead? How can a leadership that failed to incorporate a framework of reference in Oslo be trusted to continue to negotiate under Oslo? How can a leadership that is corrupt and incompetent to the core to be trusted to take to take the case to the UN when it should have done this back in 1988.

 

How can the people trust of have any confidence in the lead negotiators after he promised Israel its “ biggest Yerushalayim in history” and who gave up everything but the kitchen sink, and who failed at every thing be trusted to formulate and develop strategies leading to taking the case before the UN this September?

 

The insistence of the Palestinian leadership to rely on a closed circle of cronies as advisors is nothing but contempt for the people and their sensibilities and is part of the ongoing crimes committed against the Palestinians and their cause of liberation and freedom.

 

Another fraud and lies committed by the Palestinian leadership is the claims of building “state institutions” in anticipations of a “sovereign state” on whatever left after the total give away by the negotiating team. Such claims by Salam Fayyad and Mahmoud Abbas are false and wrapped in the full “security cooperation’s” blanket with the IDF and armed Jewish Settlers.

 

All Palestinians institutions talked about by Abbas and Fayyad are part of and in fulfillment of the security agreement between the PLO/PA and the Israeli Occupation and are part of a pacification projects that serve the Jewish Occupation and goes beyond the fulfillment of security commitments under Oslo. That is why senior Palestinian and Israeli security officers have been meeting on regular basis to coordinate efforts to snuff out any public outrage that may result if the UN bid fails.  Even Mahmoud Abbas made the promise and commitments to Israel to make sure that all of the public demonstration will remain at distance from contact points with the Israelis.

 

Arafat built his security forces around securing his management contract and commitments to the Jewish Occupation and as part of his efforts to build and run a police state. Mahmoud Abbas continued on the same bath with no material reforms in the security agencies, which are no different in training and in mentality of that of Mubarak infamous Mokhabarat and Public Security or of Bashar Assad Mokhabarat and Security Forces.

 

Torture, corruption, human and civil rights abuse, arbitrary and political arrests are the trades mark of the Palestinian Security Forces specially those of the Preventive Security Forces. There are no reasons for not having both Mohamed Dahlan and Jibril Rajoub stand trail for their abusive and management role as heads of the Preventive Security Forces.

 

The announcement in Cairo on Sunday of the agreement between Fatah and Hamas to release all political prisoners is a confirmation of what I am talking about. Keep in mind that many key security officers also became very successful business leaders.

 

Of course Hamas should not escape the need to have its leadership too stand trial for crimes committed and for the wanton and reckless death of many innocent people in Gaza. A case in point is the death of some 40 persons as a result of Hamas reckless disregards of public safety by having a truck loaded with explosives, a time bomb in the middle of a large crowd as part of its ceremonies.  No investigations ever took place into what happened and no responsible person was ever brought to trial for the wrongful death of these by-standers.

 

Another case that will always remain, as testimony to such reckless and wanton behavior is the scattered bodies of scores of recent graduates at the police academy, killed by Israel in the first hours of the War on Gaza. Who is ever responsible for the decision to have and proceed with a public ceremony knowing that Israel will attack imminently should stand trail for the reckless decisions taken and must be held responsible the wrongful death of so many policemen.  The Gaza leadership should answer for all those who died as a result of its reckless management of its armed militias.

 

Hamas shameful and criminal behavior during the take over of Gaza also stand as a black mark in the history of Hamas with its militia destroying public and private properties, hurling bodies from the roof of buildings, stomping and walking on the desk of Abbas office in Gaza.

 

Both Hamas and Fatah share the same criminal mentality and behavior when it comes to citizen’s rights, public and free speech, the rights of journalists to cover and report the news without hindrance and risk of jails.

 

If Hosni Mubarak and his regime deserve to stand trial for political, financial corruptions and presiding over a police state then both Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies and Ismail Hanyeh and his lieutenants should stand trail too. Fatah, Hamas and the PLO should all disband as first step toward ending the Occupation and freedom.

 

 

Sami Jamil Jadallah

Sami Jamil Jadallah

Sami Jamil Jadallah is an international legal and business consultant and is the founder and director of Palestine Agency and Palestine Documentation Center www.palestineagency.com and founder and owner of several business in technology and services. Sami also runs an online website (Jefferson Corner). His articles are also featured on PalestineNote and Veterans Today.

Articles on RamallahOnline by Sami Jamil Jadallah

Born in the Palestinian city of El-Bireh ( presently under Israeli Military Occupation, Armed Jewish thugs and settlers). Immigrated to the US in 62. After graduating from high school in Gary, Indiana was drafted into the US Army ( 66-68) received the Leadership Award from the US 6th Army NCO Academy in Ft. Lewis, Washington. Five of us brothers where in US military service about the same time. Graduated from Indiana University with BA-72, Master of Public Affairs-74 and Juris Doctor-77, and in senior year at IU,was elected Chairman of the Indiana Student Association.

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Dead as Monty Python’s parrot

Monty Python

Monty Python

“This peace process is no more… This is an EX-PEACE PROCESS!”


Stuart Littlewood, 21 April 2011

Jeff Halper now focuses on Palestine’s Big Chance: its application for statehood

In an article Mobilizing for September? Jeff Halper, Director of The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), shares his thoughts on the collective action that must be taken between now and when the window of opportunity for applying for statehood opens in September.

As he rightly says, the Palestinian Authority over the years “has failed to mobilize its greatest resource and ally, grassroots activists the world over”. It also needs to provide them with guidance and leadership. “We have no idea where the PA is heading.”

So it has been left to the likes of Halper to explain the Palestinians’ options in September and inject some semblance of debate into the situation facing supporters, activists and that shabby excuse for a government in Ramallah that’s more of a hindrance than a help.

To start with… no more pointless talk of negotiations. “The interminable peace process, says Halper, “serves one purpose only: prolonging the Israeli Occupation.”

Many would go further and say that the US, Britain and the EU have connived with Israel to prolong the Occupation to the point where they hope it will become irreversible. Washington and London won’t take kindly to a declaration of statehood unless it’s made clear to them by a coming-together of civil society across the world that there’ll be trouble, with a capital T, if they don’t do the right thing by the Palestinians and curb the twisted ambition of their Zionist bosom-pals.

Although Clinton and Hague still chirp about “re-starting talks”, the idea is as dead as the parrot in the famous Monty Python sketch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vuW6tQ0218, which might have been written specially for the Quartet ‘peace boutique’ and its gormless salesman…

Palestinian Authority: I wish to complain about this peace process what I purchased not half an hour ago from this very boutique.

Quartet’s Gormless Salesman: What’s wrong with it?

PA: I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it, my lad. ‘E’s dead, that’s what’s wrong with it!

QGS: No, no, it’s resting.

PA: Look, matey, I know a dead peace process when I see one, and I’m looking at one right now…

And so on… If you’re a ‘Python’ fan you’ll know the ending says it all.

PA: ‘E’s passed on! This peace process is no more! He has ceased to be! ‘E’s

expired and gone to meet ‘is maker!

‘E’s a stiff! Bereft of life, ‘e rests in peace! If you hadn’t nailed ‘im to

the perch ‘e’d be pushing up the daisies!

‘Is metabolic processes are now ‘istory! ‘E’s kicked the bucket, ‘e’s shuffled off ‘is mortal coil!!

THIS IS AN EX-PEACE PROCESS!!

(pause)

QGS: Well, I’d better replace it, then…

No, please don’t. This is where we finally close the chapter on ‘Pointless Talks’ and fast-forward to ‘Law and Justice’. Whatever Mr Obama, Mrs Clinton, Mr Cameron, Mr Hague, et al may think, applying for statehood is now the only game in town.

“Ideally,” says Jeff Halper, “the response of the other three Quartet members [referring to the United Nations, the European Union and Russia] would be to formally declare the ‘peace process’ ended, opening the way to the only other alternative, the acceptance in September of Palestine as a member state of the UN within recognized borders…  it is crucial that the Palestinians declare it, making it clear that it was Israel that led to the collapse of negotiations. Only in that way can they prepare the ground for an independent state in September.”

In his analysis Halper paints two scenarios. The first has a Palestinian state within already-recognised borders – the 1949 armistice lines – accepted as a full member of the UN. There would be no need to negotiate territorial swaps, ‘adjust’ borders to accommodate Israeli settlements or accept exaggerated Israeli security demands.

Admission to the UN, says Halper, “would also end all ambiguity over occupation itself,

which has allowed Israel to avoid accountability under international law…  East Jerusalem is Palestinian. Period. The Israeli presence in sovereign Palestinian territory

is illegal. Period. Continued occupation by Israel, which would now clearly violate the most fundamental principle of sovereignty upon which the entire international system is based, would become intolerable. This would activate international sanctions on Israel that could not be prevented by the US and Europe.”

And the settlements? “Easy. All settlements built on private Palestinian land must be removed. As to the others, including the large settlement blocs, the Palestinian government could simply say: you, the settlers, are welcome to stay in your homes, but you will be living in Palestine, subject to Palestinian laws, with Palestinians free to purchase homes in your communities.”

Furthermore, by taking its place formally among the member states of the UN, Palestine would have full-ranking ambassadors in the capitals of the world and enjoy unmediated

access to all the instruments of the international community: the right to introduce UN resolutions, to participate fully in international conferences and to pursue the application of international law against the Israelis, including access to the International Court of Justice.

You can imagine the steam coming out of AIPAC’s ears at the very thought of the international community actually doing the right thing…

And how would all this come about? The Palestinian ‘leadership’, assuming that anything worthy of the name and remotely credible can be brought into being by September, submits an application to the Secretary-General, confirming its obligations to the UN Charter. The application then goes to the Security Council. If it gains support from nine of the 15 Security Council members and all the five permanent members, a recommendation for admission goes to the General Assembly, which must approve it by a two-thirds majority.

Assuming the US vote in the Security Council is a “yes” or an abstention, the Palestinian application would receive near unanimous approval, according to Halper, But he adds: “The chances of the US actually allowing a Palestinian state to emerge in September is minimal, if only because Congress would not allow it.”

The second scenario sees Palestine’s application failing. It does not become a member state of the UN – at least, not straightaway. If the Security Council declines to recommend Palestine for membership, the General Assembly may send the application back to the Council asking it to reconsider. The American veto might then become an abstention, but all this would take time and the Palestinians would be unlikely to get a result in September. After that we’re into the tedious run-up to the 2012 US election.

Halper seems to feel the Palestinian Authority might then crumble and collapse, forcing Israel to re-occupy, which it could not afford to do even with all its US subsidies. “Merely the threat of that would inflame the entire Muslim world – and beyond. Even the threat of such a thing happening would force the hand of the international community. Whether the US would be pulled into joining international efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict once and for all or whether the rest of the world would simply pass it by is an open question, but the status quo would become intolerable.”

The present deadlock, if not resolved by the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state with recognized borders, “will lead to collapse and chaos”. Halper expects the demise of the exhausted ‘peace process’ to provide new openings and possibilities, a new logic and strategy, and even introduce new players.

Members of the pro-Palestine movement, inside and outside the Occupied Territories, owe thanks to this courageous Jewish friend, Jeff Halper, for his clear thinking. Meanwhile much needs to be done to prepare the ground for the Palestinians’ Big Chance in September, little more than 100 days away.

There are many pea-brains eager to block the Palestinians’ bid for freedom. And they don’t all reside in the White House. Just a few weeks ago the British prime minister, David Cameron, was saying: “I want to be clear, we will always support Israel. For example, when Iran flouts its international obligations Britain is and will remain at the forefront of the international community in ratcheting up the pressure with tough sanctions. We will not stand by and allow Iran to cast a nuclear shadow over Israel or the wider region.” http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/46044/david-camerons-speech-cst

It’s perfectly OK, apparently, for Israel to flout its international obligations and cast a nuclear shadow over the region and even Europe. People who are capable of such daft and dangerous pronouncements may stop at nothing to make Israel’s enemy Britain’s enemy. They’ve already done it with the Hamas government and with Hezbollah, as well as Iran, although none is a threat to Britain. That’s the mentality we’re up against.

So when can we expect to see Palestinian unity, leadership, integrity and promotional strategy all geared up to seize September’s Big Chance? When do we get mobilized? Has the PA got what it takes to secure a rightful future for its long-suffering people?

 

 

Stuart Littlewood

Stuart Littlewood

 

Stuart Littlewood is an industrial marketing specialist turned writer-photographer. In 2005 he was invited to write and shoot pictures for a book about the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. ‘Radio Free Palestine’ was published in 2007. For details please see www.radiofreepalestine.co.uk.

  • The Author is a regular contributor to RamallahOnline.com. Find more Articles by Stuart Littlewood on RamallahOnline.

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Justice first, Mr Hague. Then peace.

Stuart Littlewood
Het Plein - meaning just 'the square' in the center of the Hague, the Netherlands (Wikipedia Commons)

Het Plein - meaning just 'the square' in the center of the Hague, the Netherlands (Wikipedia Commons)

Stuart Littlewood, 11 Feb 2011

The word “justice” is conspicuously absent from the mouthings of Western politicians on the Middle East. It has vanished from their vocabulary and from their purpose. Instead “peace process” is endlessly trumpeted, and the lopsided dead-end “negotiations” that go with it.

“It was disappointing that they continued the building of settlements, that they wouldn’t renew the settlement freeze over the last few months. So yes it does require bold leadership from Israel and of course from Palestinians…” That’s what the UK’s foreign secretary, William Hague, said on 9 February to a BBC reporter.

Israel’s continuing crime spree “disappointing”? And “bold leadership” is now required from the Palestinians? We’re talking about crimes against international law and crimes against the United Nations Charter and crimes against humanity. What is disappointing – no, shocking – is the lack of leadership from Hague and that bunch of misfits in the White House who are obligated under the terms of various solemn treaties and international undertakings to step in and end Israel’s lawlessness.

Yes, this is the same William Hague who hangs out a welcome sign to Israeli and other war criminals by watering down the UK’s universal jurisdiction laws.

He’s well and truly stuck in the peace process time-warp and trailing a long way behind the curve. “There is a legitimate fear that the Middle East peace process will lose further momentum… Part of the fear is that uncertainty and change [sparked by Tunisia and Egypt] will complicate the process still further… Within a few years, peace may become impossible.”

He speaks as if the process is alive and kicking. Peace has been impossible for decades. It remains impossible first because Israel doesn’t want it and, second, because peace cannot be achieved without justice. And justice cannot be delivered without enforcing the law. Nevertheless, Hague prefers to bypass justice and flog the dead horse called “peace process”, which he must know won’t even leave the starting line.

The UK government is good at saying whatever is correct in international law. For example: “Although we accept de facto Israeli control of West Jerusalem, we consider East Jerusalem to be occupied territory. It is crucial that the parties involved come to an agreement whereby Jerusalem can be a shared capital of the Israeli and Palestinian States.

“Attempts by Israel to alter the character or demography of East Jerusalem are unacceptable and extremely provocative. Settlements, as well as the evictions and demolitions of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem, are illegal and deeply unhelpful to efforts to bring a lasting peace to the Middle East conflict.”

Saying it is easy. The thought of actually doing something to enforce the law and rectify the situation paralyses Westminster. Instead we get: “The UK will continue to add to international calls for restraint and the avoidance of provocative actions from both sides in and around Jerusalem.” As if that’ll solve anything.

And “the government is committed to upholding accountability for breaches of international humanitarian law”. Britain has made no move over the years to bring Israel to book for its hideous crimes.

The Foreign Office preaches about how the rule of law, freedom of speech and free and fair elections are inalienable rights, and how the UK “stands ready” to support those who aspire to these things, but none of it applies to the Palestinians. Otherwise the UK would be talking to and forging trade links with their democratically elected Gaza administration.
“Due to the actions that Hamas has taken, we are not yet prepared to engage with them,” says the Foreign Office in true Dickensian Circumlocution style. “Hamas remains committed to terrorism in order to achieve its aims.”

Israel remains committed to killing and maiming with impunity, often targeting Palestinian children. It carries out air-strikes on a daily basis. Before Hague utters the word terrorism again he should look it up and understand who the terrorists are. Has he asked Hamas what its aims actually are? Isn’t resistance to illegal armed occupation perfectly permissible under international law?

Westminster’s mind is shut. “We do not have any direct contact with Hamas. The Quartet have set out clearly that Hamas must renounce violence, recognize Israel and accept previously signed agreements. Hamas must make concrete and immediate movement towards these conditions…” Do the same conditions apply to Israel? And who outside the Israel lobby recognizes Israel with undefined, ever-expanding borders, or expects Palestinians to renounce violence when repeatedly thrown out of their homes and subjected to other atrocities?

However uncomfortable some Westerners may feel about Hamas, it has the authority to speak for Palestinians. Until it is brought in from the cold there’ll be no progress.

But no progress is the real aim of this dirty game, is it not?

UN resolutions are not à la carte

Meanwhile, Mr Hague, how do you like the Likud Party’s policy that “the Palestinians can run their lives freely in the framework of self-rule, but not as an independent and sovereign state”, and that “Jerusalem is the eternal, united capital of the State of Israel and only of Israel”?

And what do you make of the Kadima Party’s claim to a national and historic right to the Land of Israel “in its entirety” and its pledge to keep Jerusalem and the settlements?

UN Resolution 181 of 1947, dealing with the partition that Israel accepted, declared that Jerusalem “shall be established as a ‘corpus separatum’ … administered by the United Nations”, and include surrounding villages and towns such as Abu Dis and Bethlehem.

Resolution 242 (1967) by the Security Council, and therefore fully binding, required withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict; freedom of navigation through international waterways in the area and a just settlement of the refugee problem.

Security Council Resolution 338 (1973) called on the parties concerned to get stuck in and immediate implement 242.

Security Council Resolution 446 (1979), besides declaring Israel’s settlements in territories occupied since 1967 illegal, called on Israel to “desist from taking any action which would result in changing the legal status and geographical nature and materially affecting the demographic composition of the Arab territories occupied since 1967, including Jerusalem, and, in particular, not to transfer parts of its own civilian population into the occupied Arab territories”.

The UN has laid it down. Israel takes no notice. These are not resolutions on an à la carte menu to be cherry-picked by the Western powers and their friend Israel as the mood takes them. The world is waiting for the senior representative of the country that created the mess in the first place to show leadership, set an example and make sure these binding requirements are implemented.

And just to keep everyone’s thoughts properly focused, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights states that all peoples have the right of self-determination, and by virtue of that right they may freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. The 136 states that are party to the covenant have a duty to promote the realization of these rights and respect them.

A people may not be deprived of their natural wealth and resources or their means of subsistence. Remember this, Mr Hague, when Israel interferes with Gaza’s off-shore gas resources and the West Bank’s water. And states are also bound to recognize the right of everyone to the opportunity to earn a living by work which he freely chooses, and to take appropriate steps to safeguard this right. “Take steps” is what it says, Mr Hague. Please remember that when talking glibly about the need to lift the siege on Gaza and restore unfettered access to the outside world. Can you look Gaza’s 3,000 fishermen in the eye? Or the hard-pressed doctors desperately short of medical supplies? Or the countless thousands still homeless after the Israeli blitz two years ago?

Then there’s the threat of Israel’s weapons of mass destruction, Israel being the only state in the region not to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It has not signed the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention either. It has signed but not ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty, similarly the Chemical Weapons Convention.

And it’s all in the hands of psychopaths whom the our government claims as friends and allies.

Stuart Littlewood

Stuart Littlewood

Stuart Littlewood is an industrial marketing specialist turned writer-photographer. In 2005 he was invited to write and shoot pictures for a book about the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. ‘Radio Free Palestine’ was published in 2007. For details please see www.radiofreepalestine.co.uk.

  • The Author is a regular contributor to RamallahOnline.com. Find more Articles by Stuart Littlewood on RamallahOnline.

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Barak and Netanyahu kill off Israel’s Labor party

Jonathan Cook
Benjamin NEtanyahu, Israeli politician (Wikimedia Commons)

Benjamin NEtanyahu, Israeli politician (Wikimedia Commons)

Zionist left writes its own obituary

Jonathan Cook in Nazareth, 19 Jan 2011

Ehud Barak, Israel’s defence minister, appears to have driven the final nail in the coffin of the Zionist left with his decision to split from the Labor party and create a new “centrist, Zionist” faction in the Israeli parliament. So far four MPs, out of a total of 12, have announced they are following him.

Moments after Barak’s press conference on Monday, the Israeli media suggested that the true architect of the Labor party’s split was the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who, according to one of his aides, had planned it like “an elite general staff [military] operation”.

Netanyahu has pressing reasons for wanting Barak to stay in the most rightwing government in Israel’s history. He has provided useful diplomatic cover as Netanyahu has stymied progress in a US-sponsored peace process.

Barak had been happy to oblige as the government’s fig-leaf, so long as he was allowed to hold on to his post overseeing the occupation of the Palestinians. But as Labor became little more than a one-man show, it was racked with revolts, its MPs and handful of cabinet ministers regularly threatening to pull out of the coalition.

Netanyahu, however, has a larger purpose in seeking to draft the Labor party’s obituary — one related to the cementing of a domestic consensus behind the right’s vision of a Greater Israel. The prime minister is hoping to unpick the last strands of the Israel created by the founders of Labor Zionism.

Labor’s impact on Zionism was truly formative. During the 1948 war, the party’s leaders established Israel as a socialist state — even if it was of a strange variety that worried almost exclusively about the welfare of its Jewish majority and carefully engineered systematic discrimination against the fifth of the citizenry who were Palestinian.

For the next three decades Labor ran Israel virtually as a one-party state, centrally directing the economy and its major industries through the party’s affiliated trade union federation known as the Histadrut.

Labor’s political power rested on its economic power. Most of Israel’s middle and working classes relied for their employment on state corporations, the security industries, the civil service and government firms — and that ensured votes for Labor.

But as Israel’s economy began to wane, so did Labor’s electoral fortunes. The rightwing Likud party — home to Netanyahu — won power for the first time in 1977, championing both the settlements and economic privatisation. These moves further weakened Labor.

The party recovered only in the early 1990s, under former general Yitzhak Rabin, who reinvented it as a “peace party”. Rabin adopted the Oslo accords that, it was widely assumed, would eventually lead to Palestinian statehood.

The Oslo process had its own economic, as well as political, logic. The Labor party, which had lost its chief rationale following economic privatisation, now promised that regional peace would open up lucrative new global markets, especially in China and India. The ultra-nationalism of Likud was presented as a barrier to trade and growth.

But peace failed to materialise, and the settlements’ continuing expansion steadily eroded the Palestinians’ belief in Israel’s good faith. Labor’s last shot at peace-making was the Camp David summit of 2000. When Barak, as prime minister, failed to reach a final-status agreement with the Palestinians, claiming there was “no partner”, he killed off Israel’s fickle peace camp and made his party politically irrelevant again.

In the following years, Barak continued to undermine Labor. In joining Netanyahu’s government, he visibly abandoned Labor’s two official missions: to protect the poor and defend the peace process.

With Netanyahu’s help, he now appears to have finished off Labor for good. His centrist party known as Atzmaut or Independence — working inside the government — will replicate the platform of Israel’s large opposition party, Kadima.

Atzmaut’s ideology, Barak has already made clear, will depart from Labor’s. At his press conference he denounced his former colleagues as representing “the left and post-Zionism”.

Avishai Braverman, a dovish and disgruntled Labor minister until Barak’s split, responded bitterly that the new party would be “Likud A at best and Lieberman B at worst” — a reference to Avigdor Lieberman, the ultra-nationalist foreign minister.

Labor’s breakup highlights both the continuing shift rightwards in Israel and Barak’s obssessive placing of his personal ambitions above all else. The defence ministry has become his personal fiefdom.

What will now become of the Zionist left in Israel? The few remaining Labor MPs will probably either knock on Kadima’s door, a natural home for a growing number of them, or unite with the tiny other left party, Meretz. Together, the surviving left will struggle to match the paltry number of Arab MPs. At the next election, the Zionist left may all but disappear from the parliamentary stage.

Its demise, however, should not be lamented. It has been in terminal decline for decades.

What its disappearance may do is free up the political landscape for a real left to emerge in Israel, one less tied to the onerous legacy of Labor Zionism and prepared to collaborate creatively with the Palestinian national movements. That is an outcome not considered in Netanyahu’s scheming.

Labor’s failure offers a potent lesson for this new left. The old party’s success was dependent on offering the Israeli public not just a political vision but an economic one too. Israelis will not welcome the compromises needed for peace unless they believe there are material incentives to make such sacrifices worthwhile.

The new left already understands the power of the stick of international sanctions looming over Israel. But it must also offer a carrot to the Israeli public: a vision in which an Israel at peace with its neighbours will bring about a better quality of life.

That will be the first, formidable task facing the post-Barak left.

Jonathan Cook

Jonathan Cook

Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel’s Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His website is www.jkcook.net.

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Obama’s Indecisiveness Defines His Presidency

Obama_relaxing-2-37618

Ramzy Baroud, 23 Dec 2010

He may still possess the poise of a confident leader and an eloquent intellectual, but the presidency of Barack Obama is now suffering its most difficult phase to date.

Certainly, Obama cannot solely be blamed for all the factors that have stifled his country’s chances of recovery from the failures of the Bush era. But the man who promised the moon has now extended the abhorrent and morally unjustifiable tax cuts for America’s wealthiest class. The “sweeping” $858 billion tax bill was signed into law on December 17. It includes an $801 billion package of tax cuts, extending Bush’s tax break for the rich for two more years – at a time when the majority of Americans are reeling under the weight of a failing economy and persistently high unemployment.

Still, the tax bill was presented by the self-assured president as “real money that’s going to make a real difference in people’s lives.” The cuts will help stimulate an ailing economy, he claims, despite it being the rich who gambled with American wealth to increase their own, stimulating a market crash that led to millions losing their small investments and savings. All we know for sure is that the cuts will add a gigantic chunk to an already impossible deficit of $1.3 trillion, another Obama battle that is likely to be lost to the Republicans early next year.

But this concession, and its presentation as a victory for America’s middle classes says more about Obama’s style than the weakening of the Democrats since the midterm elections. Even in his foreign policy management, Obama’s approach seems to teeter between giving face-lifts to ugly realities and postponing urgently needed action. The agent of change has become the quintessential American politician, who is more consumed with his chances of reelection than with bringing about the kind of long-term change that can really benefit his country, and the world at large.

Obama’s handling of the shortly-lived peace talks between the Palestinian Authority and Israel’s rightwing government is another example of a striking failure followed by whitewash. Although he adamantly demanded a halt to Israel’s construction of illegal settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, Obama soon began capitulating before an obstinate Benjamin Netanyahu. The Israeli leader, supported by much of the US Congress and backed by a strong Israel lobby in Washington, finally forced Obama into a humiliating retreat. Even a generous bribe to win a limited Israeli moratorium on settlement construction failed. Obama administration officials finally declared that the US would abandon its efforts to halt Israeli settlement expansion, effectively signaling an American exit from the ‘peace process.’

Instead of laying the blame squarely on Israel, the Obama administration delved into the same long-discredited rhetoric that only Palestinians and Israelis are capable of accomplishing peace without any outside intervention. That was the core message of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who argued that it was up to Israel and the Palestinian leadership to “settle their conflict”. It signaled a complete shift in US foreign policy, which Israel has naturally welcomed, for the US-financed military occupier prefers to be left to its own devices in this very unbalanced conflict.

Afghanistan is another example. The eagerly anticipated strategy assessment of the war in Afghanistan was released on December 16, with illusory talk of “gains” and warnings of al-Qaeda threats. It suggests that the US will continue to fight a pointless war for years to come, with no clear goals or end in sight.

“The unclassified version of the secret review said U.S. military operations have disrupted the Pakistan-based al-Qaida terrorist network over the last year and halted the momentum of the Taliban insurgency in southern Afghanistan,” reported the Kansas City Star.

What the review and much of the media fail to report is that the war on Afghanistan hardly concerns al-Qaeda, which is more widespread and mobile than ever. Its future operation does not hinge on the ongoing battles in Afghanistan either. One must also remain skeptical of the “gains” reportedly made in the south. Taliban is known for avoiding open warfare, a style they have mastered after nine years of practice. The recoil – if that is even the case – of the Taliban is probably temporary, and a spring resurgence is assured by past experiences. But what is most important to note is that the action of NATO and US soldiers, government corruption and the brutality of local militias have allowed the Taliban to extend its presence to northern provinces, including Kunduz and Takhar, which were, until recently, uncharted territories for the strong and resourceful Pashtun fighters.

According to an editorial in the Lebanese Daily Star, “Obama’s long-awaited Afghanistan strategy review amounts to little more than a whitewash of the seemingly intractable problems that have trapped the mighty American military in a quagmire.” Worse, this crisis is likely to be compounded. “The failures of General Stanley McChrystal, who resigned in June, and Richard Holbrooke, who died suddenly this week, are symbolic of the crumbling of the twin pillars, both military and civilian, of Barack Obama’s counterinsurgency strategy. The US has now…entered a violent stalemate,” wrote James Denselow in the British Guardian.

Obama’s response was yet another attempt to distance himself from the looming, if not ongoing failure. US priority, he said, is “not to defeat every last threat to the security of Afghanistan, because, ultimately, it is Afghans who must secure their country. And it’s not nation-building, because it is Afghans who must build their nation.”

One would agree with the president were it not for the fact that the US invasion was what has impeded the security of Afghanistan, destroyed any chance of nation-building and installed a corrupt government. But Obama will not accept responsibility. His cautious assessments are emblematic of his overall political style: avoiding or perpetuating the problem, and distancing himself from it once failure is assured. This is as true of his domestic policy as of his foreign policy.

It is easy to see why Obama’s popularity has plummeted among those who once believed in his ability to bring change to a scarred and traumatized country. And his irresolute leadership has also empowered his political opponents, who will not cease to demand more from a feeble and ever-willing president.

- Ramzy Baroud (www.ramzybaroud.net) is an internationally-syndicated columnist and the editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His latest book is My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story (Pluto Press, London), now available on Amazon.com.

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Hillary Clinton’s Empty Words Inspire Pessimism

From left, National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones, Tony Blair, the international Middle East envoy, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, talk in the Blue Room of the White House, Sept. 1, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

Palestine Monitor, 11 December 2010

Yesterday found Hillary Clinton clutching at straws in her talk on the Israeli/Palestinian peace process at the Brooking Institute, Washington D.C. Following the US’s failure to secure a settlement freeze Clinton’s superficial positivity about the peace process demonstrated a lack of understanding and sincerity. Clive Granger explains.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke yesterday to the Brooking Institution’s Saban Center for Middle East Policy. Her speech comes just days after the Obama Administration admitted that it had failed to secure a second moratorium on settlement construction in the West Bank. Much of the talk was an attempt to gloss over the recent diplomatic failings of the US as Hillary urged the parties to continue on the path to peace.

Much of her speech was directed at the Israeli and Palestinian leadership, encouraging them to continue to strive for peace and focus on the core issues. “In the days ahead, our discussions with both sides will be substantive, two-way conversations, with an eye toward making real progress in the next few months”, she told the audience. In light of recent events however, her words rang hollow. The US with all its international clout was unable to stop Israel from expanding its settlements, let alone abandoning some of them, a step which will be necessary for the brokering of any future peace deal. Urging the Palestinians to continue down the road to peace with no moratorium screamed of hypocrisy.

A worrying new development from a Palestinian perspective was the announcement by Clinton that the Obama Administration is to incorporate the settlement issue as part of the wider border dispute. This strongly suggests that certain settlements, and thus large swathes of Palestinian land, will be incorporated into Israel following any future peace deal.

More concerning however was Clinton’s comment, “we will deepen our support of the Palestinians’ state-building efforts, because we recognize that a Palestinian state, achieved through negotiations, is inevitable”. If the past 43 years have taught us anything it is that a Palestinian state through negotiations is anything but inevitable. This was the mistake Arafat made at Oslo. Believing that to protect the Jewish nature of Israel he would simply be given a state he became complacent. Instead Israel tightened their control of the West Bank and increased settlement construction.

The Secretary of State also made reference to Barak Obama’s recent comment that Israel recognises that a two-state solution is the only option for Zionism. A two state solution however would signal the end of Zionism. As SOAS lecturer Mushtaq Khan recently said “as a Zionist the last thing I would want would be a solid border”. Zionism is an expansionist ideology, it requires undetermined borders to enable it to absorb more Jewish immigrants, it is also unlikely ever to give up Judea and Samaria, considered the core of Eretz Israel.

The chief Palestinian negotiator was understandably dismayed by the talk, “The Israeli government had a choice between settlements and peace” he told reporters “and they chose settlements”.

See how far US ambition has plummeted by comparing their current position with Obama’s seminal speech in Cairo last year http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/04/u…

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Brazil and Argentina Support Dr. Barghouthi’s Demands for Recognition of Palestinian Independence

Palestine Flag
Palestine Monitor 8 December 2010
Two months ago Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi, Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative (PNI) called for an independent declaration of Palestinian statehood. This week Argentina and Brazil, South America’s two greatest powers, threw their support behind the proposal.

On Sunday, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva declared his support for a Palestinian state on 1967 borders. In a letter to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Silva wrote his announcement intended to help facilitate the “legitimate aspiration of Palestinian people for a secure, united, democratic and economically viable state coexisting peacefully with Israel.”

A day later his position was echoed by Argentine President Cristina Fernandez. Their announcements have helped bid momentum toward Dr. Barghouthi’s goal that “all states, governments and international institutions recognise the Palestinian state and its borders immediately.”

The South American leaders have adopted the position independently, in accordance with Dr. Barghouthi’s rejction of the “insulting argument that every step should first be verified with the Israeli government”.

Predictably, the announcements have proved controversial. The Israeli government released a statement expressing “sadness and disappointment” at Brazil’s decision, claiming it harms the prospect of long –term peace in the region.

Their argument is unconvincing given Israel’s continued expansion and demonstrable lack of commitment to the peace process. Dr. Barghouthi described a declaration of statehood as a ‘last chance’ for the two-state solution. “If the world community turns its back on such a declaration of independence, then the message will be clear: Peace based on two states is no longer an option”, he said.

The PNI are now calling for all heads of states and international institutions to follow Brazil and Argentina’s example.

Read Dr. Barghouthi’s original demand for an independent declaration of statehood http://www.palestinemonitor.org/spi…

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Israelis Jettison Peace Talks in Favor of Massive Land Theft;Brazil, Argentina Recognize Palestinian State

Palestine Israel Flag

Juan Cole, 8 Dec 2010

The victory of the Republican right wing in the November elections for the House of Representatives has allowed the Israeli government to simply refuse to cooperate with a weakened President Barack Obama on a renewed peace process with the Palestinian leadership. The message of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to Obama? Translated from the Hebrew, it amounts to “jump in a lake!”

Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestine Authority again on Monday broadly hinted that he may declare a Palestinian state unilaterally if the Israelis undermine direct negotiations by refusing to halt their colonization of the West Bank. The Palestine Authority feels as though it is negotiating for what is left of a slurpy with Israelis who have long straws in it and are sucking down the very thing over which they are pretending to negotiate. Abbas thinks that at the end of the talks, if they are conducted in this way, he’ll just be handed an empty paper cup with other people’s spit at the bottom of it.

In Ankara, Turkey, for talks, Abbas said, “We cannot maintain peace negotiations if settlement building is not stopped. We have other options, and we have informed Turkey and the Arab countries that if the talks cannot be restarted, then we will pass on to implementing those options…”

So he said he can’t keep the negotiations going if the Israelis won’t stop colonizing Palestinian land.

Then today the Obama White House announced that it had given up trying to get the Israelis to agree to an extension of the freeze on the initiation of new colonies on the West Bank and around Jerusalem.

Netanyahu, who is essentially a righwing Republican in American terms, took advantage of the victory of the Republicans in the House of Representatives to simply defy Obama. He has refused even to present a proposal for a freeze on further colonization to his cabinet! This notwithstanding an offer by Obama to give Israel advance fighter jets in return. The Guardian revealed that the Obama administration had pressed the Israelis to come up with a map with clearly defined borders of what they claimed as Israeli territory. The US hoped that such a clearly drawn border would discourage further Israeli settlement in what would surely be Palestinian territory. Netanyahu blew Obama off and refused to consider starting with the shape of the borders.

On the other hand, Washington doesn’t want the Palestinians to go it alone in declaring a state. The USG Open Source Center translated this report from Voice of Israel radio:

Israel: US To Fight PA Moves To Circumvent Direct Talks, F-35′s Still on Agenda
Voice of Israel Network B
Tuesday, December 7, 2010 …
Document Type: OSC Translated Text…

The United States has abandoned its efforts to reach an understanding on freezing construction in the territories. It will instead seek other ways to promote the diplomatic process.

Senior US Administration sources said that the United States will hold separate discussions with Israel and the Palestinians. Our political correspondent Shmu’el Tal reports that Yitzhaq Molkho, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s special emissary, will meet with US officials over the coming days.

Israeli sources said that the United States will oppose any Palestinian attempt to circumvent the direct negotiations track with Israel. The sources asserted that Israel’s request for additional F-35 jets from the United States was still on the agenda.

(Description of Source: Jerusalem Voice of Israel Network B in Hebrew — State-funded radio, independent in content)

Likely, bad things will now happen, despite Obama’s perpetual optimism.. If the Likud-led government won’t negotiate into being a two-state solution, granting a Palestinian state in 22% of the League-of-Nations-defined Palestine, then only three possibilities remain.

1. Israeli colonization could proceed apace, reinforcing an Apartheid in which stateless Palestinians without rights precariously eke out a life under foreign military occupation, while being actively stolen from by a horde of Israeli squatters. While such an Apartheid situation is not stable, it could go on for decades before producing a real blow-up.

2. There could be, willy-nilly, a one-state solution. Apartheid could place so many boycotts and so much opprobrium on Israel that ultimately the welfare and livelihoods of ordinary Israelis would be badly affected. They could react by emigrating, or by voting citizenship for the Palestinians as a means of ending a growing international boycott (something that may only develop gradually over the next two decades).

3. The Palestinians could unilaterally declare a state. This step is being toyed with by Mahmoud Abbas. The plan was probably helped by the declarations during the past week on the part of Brazil and Argentina that they recognized the Palestinian state.

AP reports: “Argentina announced Monday that it recognizes the Palestinian territories as a free and independent state within their 1967 borders, a step it said reflects frustration at the slow progress of peace talks with Israel.” Brazil took the same step only a few days before, and much of the rest of South America is expected to follow suit. These recognitions are not earth-shattering, since dozens of countries had already done the same thing, with no discernible effect. They did anger the Israelis, who see the few remnants of the legitimacy of their policies in the international community slipping away.

One problem with a unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state is that Israel and the United States reject any such move, and it is hard to see how such a state can come into existence if the Israelis don’t want it to. The second problem is that the final collapse of the peace process could provoke another round of Palestinian uprisings. Stay tuned.

Juan Cole

Juan R. I. Cole is Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. For three decades, he has sought to put the relationship of the West and the Muslim world in historical context. His most recent book is Engaging the Muslim World (Palgrave Macmillan, March, 2009) and he also recently authored Napoleon’s Egypt: Invading the Middle East (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007). You can visit his site at http://www.juancole.com/

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There Could Never Be Peace Without a Minimum of Justice

Mustafa Barghouthi

Editor Palestine Monitor, 18 November 2010

Mustafa Barghouthi, Palestine, PNI, thanked the Socialist International for its constant efforts to support the cause of peace in Palestine and in the Middle East, and he apologised for questioning whether the current discussion could be called a debate when the representative of the Israeli Labour Party had left immediately after giving his speech.

He urged participants to face the reality that there was a deadlock in the so-called peace process. It was not hard to imagine what would happen to the proximity talks, and the very big risk of failure due to the continuation of the same policy of settlement expansion, ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem, and oppressive measures in the West Bank and Gaza. Israel was negotiating via bulldozers. He mentioned Aualage, a small village in Bethlehem in the heart of the West Bank which was losing all its land to Israeli bulldozers and a wall that was three times the length and twice the height of the Berlin Wall. Time was of the essence because we were about to lose the opportunity for peace based on the two-state solution. It was clear that Israel was trying to gain time through the peace process, imposing its own solutions through settlements and wall-building.

He feared that Israel was not considering an independent Palestinian state, but rather a cluster of bantustans and ghettos, each separated from the other. What was being consolidated on the ground was a system of apartheid, he asserted. How else, he asked, could the situation be described when Israel controlled 80% of the water resources in the occupied West Bank, when Israeli settlers were allowed to use 48 times more water than Palestinian citizens who had to buy Israeli products at Israeli prices and pay for the water Israel had taken from them. No other word could be used for the segregation of roads and street, or the situation where a husband and wife living in Jerusalem could not live together if one had an ID for the West Bank. He himself had been a physician in Jerusalem for 15 years but now for five years had not been allowed to enter Jerusalem.

The big question was whether the peace process itself had become a substitute for peace, and for how long would that continue. What law of humanity, he asked, gave Israel the right to impunity from international law. Anyone who dared to criticise Israel was immediately labelled anti-semitic, even such a highly respected Jewish person as Judge Goldstone who had dared to speak about the war crimes in Gaza.

There could never be peace without a minimum of justice, he continued. Palestinians had extended their hand in peace but all they had received in the last 18 years was more war, more settlements and an apartheid wall.

Concerning the siege and blockade in Gaza, he said that the ILP had denied the humanitarian crisis there. There was nowhere in Gaza where you could get water that was drinkable by international standards because the Israeli government was blocking the construction material needed to rebuild the destroyed sewer system. More than two hundred and twenty Palestinians had died because they could not leave Gaza for medical treatment. Twenty-five thousand houses that were practically destroyed during the war on Gaza were still not repaired because Israel would not allow cement or glass into Gaza. Eighty percent of the population of Gaza today were living below the poverty line. This was a humanitarian crisis, recognised by the United Nations, by Amnesty International, and by the Red Cross. He urged the Israeli Labour Party to listen to the civilised world. The siege and blockade, he continued, were not against Hamas: they were a collective punishment of the million and a half people who lived in Gaza.

If Israel would release just a few hundred of the ten thousand Palestinians in its jails, which included over two hundred children, Gilad Shalit and others could go home.

He saw no justification for Israel’s attack on the flotilla. It was a gross violation of international law and he hoped that the world would realise that the Palestinian people had been suffering this type of aggression for the last forty-three years.

He asked why Israel had refused an international investigation and why someone like Mairead McGuire, who had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work in Ireland, had suddenly been labelled a terrorist since joining the flotilla in solidarity with the Palestinian people.

Israel claimed that it was not occupying Gaza, Barghouthi pointed out. It had no right to subject the one-and-a-half million people of Gaza to a blockade without going to the United Nations and putting its case before the international community. Israel was putting itself above international law while claiming to be the victim, a victim that had probably the fifth largest army in the world, more than 300 nuclear warheads, and was the third largest military exporter surpassing both France and Britain. He thought Israel should feel ashamed of a blockade that was preventing students from going to university, doctors from working properly, patients from getting their dialysis, rather than affecting Hamas. He therefore supported the European proposition to allow ships into Gaza under whatever control could be established, as long as this blockade was stopped.

The Palestinian struggle today, he said, was a struggle of non-violence and he was proud that a recent poll by a Norwegian institution had indicated that in the last six or seven months the number of Palestinians who supported non-violence had risen from more than 40% to more than 75%. Every political movement should respect non-violence in the best tradition of Gandhi and Martin Luther King. He pleaded for pressure to be put on Israel to stop the destructive violence against peaceful demonstrations in which peace activists from around the world, including Israel, had been injured or even killed. He was proud of this strategy of non-violence, international solidarity and Palestinian unity which would finally achieve their dream of freedom, independence, dignity and democracy. This was the only basis for good governance since lasting peace was found only between democracies, as one could see in Europe.

He regretted the recent decision in Palestine to cancel local municipality elections in the West Bank, which made a mockery of people’s right to choose who would govern them. The people of Palestine needed to regain their unity so as to freely and democratically elect their president, parliament and local councils, as was their right. Israel could not choose for them, nor decide who should negotiate on their behalf. There had been excuses such as the Soviet Union, then Syria, then Iraq, and now Iran, all in order to avoid the main issue which was how to reach a solution with the Palestinian people, the key to stability in the Middle East. Palestinian non-violent resistance could not succeed without international support and solidarity, he continued. Throughout the world there was rising solidarity with the Palestinian people, including calls for divestments and sanctions. Israel was putting herself in the same position South Africa had been in with the apartheid system. This served neither the interest of the Palestinians nor the Israelis in the long run. He called on the Socialist International, with its great tradition of solidarity with oppressed people, to take an effective role in this case number one, as Nelson Mandela had called it, the case of the Palestinian people. A true friend was one who told the truth to his friends, he said, and it was time to tell the truth to Israel, and to ask whether the Palestinian people, after being deprived of their freedom for more than sixty years, were not entitled to the same rights as everyone else.

The struggle for freedom was not just for Palestinian children but for Israeli children too, to save even them from the short-sighted, violent and arrogant policies of their governments that had prevented peace. Referring to the Israeli Labour Party’s representative having mentioned courage, he said that real courage would be to take the decision to stop colonialism, occupation and apartheid, and finally accept Palestinians as equal human beings. In closing he quoted one great leader who had inspired their struggle, Martin Luther King, who had said that in the end we would remember not the acts of our enemies but the silence of our friends. He urged participants not to be silent.