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High Noon for the Palestinians?
by Allan Topol, [IMAGE]2005

ARTICLE ORIGINALLY APPEARED AT MILITARY.COM, September 21, 2005

Photo Courtesy: Julie Zitin
[Allan Topol / AllanTopol.Com] Optimists, if there are still any, who think about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, were hopeful that Israel’s disengagement from Gaza would signal the beginning of Palestinian economic development and peaceful movement toward statehood. Once again, these hopes have been sorely dashed by the barrels of guns and rockets.

The militant Palestinians, led by Hamas have taken away the wrong message from Prime Minister Sharon’s bold decision to withdraw from Gaza. Rather than treating this as an olive branch, as a step toward the development of a Palestinian nation and as a giant step toward peace, they have taken a contrary view. They insist that Israel’s action was a victory for violence, terrorism and the armed struggle.

Rather than helping to improve the lives of the Palestinian people in Gaza and elsewhere, they have now signaled a determination to take their armed battle to the West Bank. In the words of Hamas leader, Mahmud al-Zahhar, “the resistance must move to the West Bank.”

The critical question is whether the Palestinian authority under the leadership of Mahmud Abbas will be able to control these armed thugs from Hamas and other militant groups. So far, the indications do not suggest success.

For several months, ever since Abbas assumed the leadership of the PA, Israel, the United States and even some of the European countries have been urging Abbas to reign in and disarm the militants in the Palestinian community. Abbas has taken absolutely no steps to do this. He has begged off with excuses such as “the time is not yet right,” or “I’m co-opting them into the process,” and other variations of the same theme to justify inaction. What these disclose is a fundamental inability to exert leadership and to deal with the hardliners.

Prime Minister Sharon faced a near rebellion in the Israeli populous when he announced and implemented the Gaza withdrawal He took charge effectively with his military making it clear that this is the course that Israel is following on a single unified basis. Abbas could have learned from Sharon, but he didn’t.

The difficulty is that the longer Abbas waits to act, the less chance there is that he will be able to succeed. For example, in the days immediately following Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza, crowds stormed the evacuated settlements and destroyed not only synagogues left behind, but greenhouses, which could have been used as a source of revenue in the Palestinian economy. At the same time, Moussa Arafat, a security advisor to Abbas, was assassinated by dozens of gunmen. This act, along with burning of greenhouses, symbolizes that lawlessness is likely to prevail in Gaza.

Rather than nation building, this same lawlessness manifested at the border point jointly controlled by Egypt and the Palestinians. After two days of near rioting, that situation may now be under control.

The sad part is that the vast majority of the Palestinian people had some hope that their lives might be improved once Israel withdrew from Gaza. Some saw a chance that education, public service and the economy could all be strengthened with the infusion of capital from the Untied States and Western Europe. Given the state of affairs since the withdrawal, the United States and Western Europeans would be insane to send even a single dollar or euro to the Palestinians where it would at best end up in the pocket of some corrupt official and at worst be used to finance the next wave of terror which Hamas is planning to implement on the West Bank.

The United States budget is stretched too thin with the need to rebuild New Orleans and other gulf areas hit hard by Katrina. It makes no sense for us to spend dollars that could be used to rebuild these hard hit American areas and ship them to Palestinians who aren’t even prepared to take a tiny step in the direction of peace in response to the Israeli withdrawal.

Hamas and the Palestinians many find that transporting their intifada to the West Bank is not as easy as it sounds. To start with, Israel has constructed a great deal of the security barrier, which makes armed infiltration or transport of suicide bombers more difficult. Then the Israelis have a strong security infrastructure throughout the West Bank and have dealt powerful blows against the Palestinian terrorists in those cities.

Finally, the Israeli public, its government and Prime Minister Sharon, having just come through the difficult Gaza withdrawal, are in no mood to tolerate another round of violence. If Hamas should act to renew the arms struggle as they put it, a potent Israeli response is likely.

The international efforts being made by the United States and Western Europe should be directed at Abbas. Urging him to reform corruption within his government and to gain control finally of the militants. They must be disarmed as an initial condition of building the Palestinian society, leading to statehood. Money that’s invested in these areas, if Abbas gains control of the militants must be carefully supervised to stamp out corruption.

The next move now, is up to Abbas and the PA leadership. They must have the wisdom and encourage to act decisively against the militants. Thus far, nothing they have done suggests that they will take this critical step.