Palestinian
Boiling Pot
By Dr. Elias Akleh
21 December, 2006
Countercurrents.org
The
Palestinian pot started to boil as soon as the political wing of Hamas
(resistance group fighting against Israeli occupation) formed a Palestinian
government after its victory in a free and democratic election as certified
by all international observers. Hamas’ victory came as a surprise
to all. Hamas expected to gain some votes that would allow it to put
a foot in the Palestinian government so it can express its wishes and
participate in the political decision making. Fatah (the ruling party)
on the other hand was hoping that Hamas would win few votes to make
it an ineffective and powerless minority so that Fatah could claim that
its political decisions were shared by Hamas. Yet people gathered around
Hamas. Lately this boiling pot started to spew violence when Presidential
Security Guards failed in their attempt to assassinate the Palestinian
Hamas Prime Minister “Ismail Haneyya”, and when Palestinian
President “Mahmoud Abbas” called for early presidential
and parliamentary election.
The Fatah leaders did not
accept Hamas victory, which threatened their political positions, their
economical monopolies, and their corruption in the public treasury,
especially because Hamas pledged to open investigations into all corruption
allegations. Israel did not accept a Hamas government, which does not
recognize the Israel, to replace the minority Fatah corrupt leaders,
who hijacked the whole Fatah movement in order to give Israel one political
concession after the other for their own special gains. The American
administration (the self-proclaimed democracy spreader) had also rejected
this Palestinian democratic choice that exposes American false allegation
of global war against terrorism since Hamas, designated by the US as
a terrorist group, had participated into and won a democratic election.
So they all agreed to topple the newly democratic Hamas government regardless
of the cost.
Plans were drawn to financially
bankrupt Hamas government, to isolate it politically, and to impede
its functions, which would severely burden the Palestinians economically,
to show that this government brought only disasters to the people. They
were hoping that hunger would change the people’s choice and drives
them to abandon Hamas government and adopt Fatah’s leadership
again once Abbas declares the government’s failure and calls for
new elections to save the hungry people.
After its victory Hamas had
called for a national unity government opening the door for all the
Palestinian factions, including Fatah, to participate in the political
decision making. This call was, unfortunately, met with a vehement Fatah
rejection. The other factions rejected the offer especially after Israel
and the American administration expressed their rejections to the results
of the election. All had abandoned Hamas government to fail miserably.
Through the international
quartet the American administration demanded Hamas recognize Israel’s
right to exist on the occupied Palestinian land (despite Israel had
never recognized any of the Palestinian rights to exist as a people),
to disarm and to abandon “violence” (quit resisting Israeli
occupation and abandon Palestinian rights although Israel is still armed
with the deadliest weapons), to accept all previous Palestinian/Israeli
agreements (that had never served even one Palestinian interest and
had all been broken by the Israeli government), to accept the “Roadmap”
(that had been rejected and annulled by numerous Israeli conditions),
and to adopt the Arab Peace Initiative (that had met by the then Israeli
Prime Minister “Sharon” sending his military tanks into
all the major Palestinian cities). These impossible to accept demands
came intentional to provoke a “negative” response the American
administration could use to justify a political embargo and financial
and economical siege against the Palestinian people in order to “crush”
Hamas government, the way Abbas threatened the government in his December
16th speech. The American administration was successful in coercing
European and Arabic countries to adopt this financial and economical
siege through its manipulation and control over the international financial
transactions that have to go through American financial institutions
since they deal with the Dollar. These countries were faced with the
threats of financial embargo and accusation of financing a terrorist
organization (Hamas). The administration had, though, supported the
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas politically, and provided him with
the necessary money to buy the loyalties lf Presidential Security Guards,
who were trained by American military “advisors” on home
raids and crowd control, and were armed by the Israeli government.
On its part Israel had done
everything it could to multiply and intensify the suffering of the Palestinian
people. Israel had confiscated million of tax Dollars it collects on
behalf of the Palestinian government. It raided and robbed many Palestinian
banks and financial institutions under the justification of money laundering
to a terrorist group. The Israeli army had tripled its road blocks preventing
Palestinian from traveling to their neighboring cities for work or health
treatment. Palestinian citizens have been completely imprisoned and
isolated in their own towns. Border crossings have been sealed to enforce
economical siege and all humanitarian, trade, and economical transactions
had been prevented from going in or out of the occupied Palestine. Israeli
terrorist army intensified its extrajudicial assassinations of resistance
leaders. They routinely raided civilian homes after midnight kidnapping
men, old and young. They shelled civilian homes with their artilleries,
their tanks, and their fighter airplanes. They demolished many homes,
razed farm lands, and built more Israeli colonies on usurped Palestinian
land. To further weaken the Hamas government and to render it ineffective
the Israeli army kidnapped scores of its parliamentary members and its
ministers.
What was worse than all these
crimes, expected from an enemy, is when a minority of previous Fatah
leaders, had abused their political and security positions to enforce,
rather than ease, these crimes against the people in order to further
their own personal gains. This corrupt minority, whose financial resources
had dried up when the Arab Gulf countries had stopped their financial
support after the first Gulf War in 1991 leading them to welcome the
Oslo Accord, needed to replenish their monies and to strengthen their
political positions after entering the Palestinian occupied territories
in 1994. So they abused the money of the donor countries to build their
own luxurious homes, to control the local economical resources, to build
their own private militias calling them security forces, and to spread
drug abuse and whore houses within the people to weaken their social
fabric for ease of controlling them.
Some of those corrupt leaders
betrayed their people when they cooperated with the Israeli government
giving it many political concessions for financial and political personal
gains. It has been long known by many Palestinians that “Mohammad
Dahlan”, the previous head of security forces, is the worst traitor.
He came from a very poor family, but after supervising some of the border
crossings (e.g. Rafah Crossing) and managing their monetary fees and
tax revenues, he became one of the richest persons in the territories
owning big hotels, luxurious homes, and fat accounts in Israeli banks.
According to statements by “Hani Hasan”, a former official
in the Palestinian intelligence, “Dahlan” had planned to
overthrow former President “Arafat” but failed in his attempt.
Hamas members had lately
exposed “Dahlan’s” corruption openly and accused him
of sending his own “Death Squads” to spread chaos in the
streets, of assassinating some Palestinian officials, and of the recent
failed assassination attempts of the Prime Minister “Ismael Haneyya”
Friday 15th and the failed attempt on the life of Palestinian Foreign
Minister “Mahmoud Al-Zahhar” Sunday 17th. Preparing himself
for the position of the Prime Minister “Dahlan” now himself
is pushing his militias and followers in the streets demanding early
parliamentary election.
The Palestinian President
“Mahmoud Abbas” (who won presidential election by only 40%
of the votes despite all the Israeli and American support and money),
and his company of some corrupt Fatah leaders, inside occupied Palestine,
had intentionally declined to offer any help to Hamas government, who
initially invited them to form a national unity government. They did
not also hesitate to throw one obstacle after the other under the feet
of the government, and to direct fiery accusations against its members.
After Hamas electoral victory the previous Fatah parliament hastened
unsuccessfully to grant President “Abbas” more jurisdictions
than what the constitution grants. They accused the new Hamas parliamentary
member of lacking political experience and knowledge of the laws. “Abbas”
himself hastened to employ three thousand more cadres in his own Security
Guards to strengthen himself and to further burden the already burdened
public budget. When Hamas government took over the public debt was $1.792
Billion according the Foreign Minister “Al-Zahhar”, yet
after nine months administration the government was able to pay back
$100 million.
Corrupt “Abbas”
and company attempted continuously to engage Hamas government into endless
non-ending and futile political negotiations in an attempt to render
it politically fruitless. After vehemently rejecting Hamas initial offer
to form a national unity government they agreed to enter into negotiations
to do so. After long useless negotiations, and after meeting with the
American Secretary of State “Rice”, “Abbas”
declared that negotiations came to an impasse due to Hamas intransigence.
Facts show that Hamas had exhibited great efforts, flexibility, and
concessions, among which Prime Minister “Haneyya” had offered
to give up his position in order to form the national unity government.
It was “Abbas” who since the start had sabotaged the negotiations
with pre-conditions demanding Hamas to recognize Israel’s right
to exist on the occupied Palestinian land since this is a status quo
and to adopt all the conditions of the Quartet. These are well-known
impossible to accept demands and are rejected by Hamas.
“Abbas” and company
borrowed the American/Israeli tactic of accusing the victims and defending
the perpetrators. They accused Hamas government of causing the financial
and economical siege against the Palestinians, thus defending the real
perpetrators (American administration and Israel), who imposed the siege
by threatening the donor countries, who really sympathize with the Palestinians.
The Palestinian suffering reached a point to force 12 UN agencies and
14 NGOs operating in occupied territories to launch on December 7th
an emergency humanitarian appeal for some $453 million to just ease
Palestinian poverty and living situations during 2007. This should be
the obligation of the occupying power according to Geneva Convention,
yet the international community is asked to pay it.
Neither the Palestinian President
“Abbas” nor any of his Fatah ministers had approached any
of the Arab countries with a plea to break the siege or to pay their
dues to the Arab League fund dedicated for Palestinian support. When
some Hamas ministers were able to bring in some money, and delivered
it to the Ministry of Finance to pay the salaries of government employees,
“Abbas” withheld the money for a long time.
When Prime Minister “Haneyya”
toured the Arab countries, who offered to pay the salaries of government
employees for the next six months President “Abbas” accused
“Haneyya” of smuggling money across borders. What “Abbas”
forgot to mention is that this money was coming into the country to
be paid to employees, and not going out of the country like what some
of his company had done by smuggling and depositing embezzled public
money into Egyptian, Jordanian and British banks. “Abbas”
had also accused “Haneyya” of being an Iranian agent when
he accepted Iranian funds, yet he forgot to mention that “Haneyya”
had also accepted funds from Arab countries such as Qatar. Does that
make him a Qatari agent?
“Abbas” and company
had pushed Presidential Guards in the West Bank and “Dahlan’s”
militias in Gaza into the streets to spread chaos, to attack government
buildings and set them on fire, to conduct armed marshes in the streets
discharging their weapons, and to forcefully close shops, governmental
institutions and public schools under the justification of demanding
their unpaid salaries. This “creative chaos” was used to
accuse the government of inability to keep peace and prevent security
chaos. It is well known that the security apparatuses are still under
the command of “Abbas” himself, who have not yet surrendered
them to the Interior Ministry according to the law. One could not but
wonder how could there be security chaos with the presence of 80 thousand
security guards under “Abbas” leadership within a small
geographical area that could be easily controlled?
After “Abbas”
and company, Israeli and American attempts to topple Hamas government
failed, despite all the economical siege, the murders, the kidnappings,
the imprisonments, the shelling, the destructions, and the political
games, “Abbas” dropped his bomb and called for early presidential
and parliamentary election as per the recommendations of the appointed
(not elected) PLO Executive Committee, that had lost its legal status
due to the absence of one third of its members. With such calling “Abbas”
had exceeded his presidential and constitutional jurisdictions that
do not give him the power to dissolve the parliament. He called for
the “return to the people’s will” forgetting that
the people had already expressed their will in a democratic election
nine months ago. “Abbas” has the right to call for presidential
election only.
It is cynical to notice that
external powers, (Israel, US, and UK, the enemy of Palestinians, who
rejected their democratic election, and who imposed economical siege
against them) had rushed to support “Abbas” call for early
election, while most of the Palestinian factions (including within Fatah
itself) inside and outside occupied Palestine had rejected it because
they believe that the previous election, recognized by international
observers as free and democratic, is legal. The leaders of ten Palestinian
factions had announced, in a Damascus press release, their rejection
to early election. They also called for re-building of the PLO (to get
rid of traitors like “Abbas” and “Dahlan”),
and for the formation of a national unity government to allow all factions
to participate in political decision makings. The participation of Mr.
“Farouq Qadoumi”, Secretary General for Fatah, in this press
release points to the fact that there is no real conflict between Hamas
and “real Fatah” movements. The conflict in occupied Palestine
is caused by the introduction of a defeatist political agenda offered
by a corrupted minority Fatah leadership, who hijacked the whole movement
to acquire personal gains on the expense of the Palestinian people.
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