Left: Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas, and Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal. –
The lame-duck Obama administration is moving to force Israel into accepting a Palestinian terrorist state. Indeed, Obama has taken no actions to stop the Palestinian Authority’s and the Hamas’s leadership from glorifying and rewarding terrorist attacks against Israel. Moreover, the U.S., like others, continue to ignore the existence of two Palestinian states; one in the West Bank, the other in Gaza.
The French initiative for an international peace conference has won the support of the Palestinian Authority, which also wants to prod the permanent members of the Security Council to approve a proposed binding resolution for a full Israeli withdrawal from territories captured in 1967. The resolution would also stipulate providing the Palestinian people with protection against Israel and paving the way for official recognition of the state of Palestine.
The Palestinian foreign ministry (March 1, 2016) has again accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of “continuing the campaign of fraud, deception, and incitement against the Palestinian people in an attempt to wriggle out of pursuing peace and putting an end to the occupation of the land of the state of Palestine.”1
The Palestinian foreign ministry also asserted that: “The lack of determined international activity to bring an end to the occupation and settlement, and the lack of deterrent international responses to the Israeli positions, policy, and measures, enables the Netanyahu government to complete its plans and measures of Judaizing al-Quds [Jerusalem] and Area C [West Bank territories that are under Israeli security and civilian control] and thwarting all international efforts to salvage the peace process in keeping with the two-state solution.”
In addition, the Palestinian foreign ministry called on the international community “to take responsibility and convene an international peace conference that will bring an end to the Israeli occupation and the removal of the historic injustice that has been the lot of the Palestinian people.”
The Two Palestinian States
The Palestinian Authority favors the “two-state solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But the fundamental obstacle to achieving that solution is precisely the existence of “two (Palestinian) states.” One is led by Fatah, the PLO, the Palestinian Authority, and the president of Palestine, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), and the other by the Hamas movement, which is led in Gaza by Ismail Haniyeh, the deputy of Hamas chief Khaled Mashal.
Gaza’s subordination to PA rule exists only on paper. In actuality, two separate political authorities exist, which not only operate independently but see each other as bitter enemies and aspire to conquer each other’s territory.
Because of the animosity between the two leading organizations in the Palestinian arena, the series of “reconciliation” agreements signed by Fatah and Hamas have come nowhere near the implementation stage; each side suspects the other of working to gain exclusive control of the representative institutions of the Palestinian people.
The Fatah-Hamas rivalry has escalated anew in recent months, with Hamas accusing the Palestinian Authority of “treason” against the Palestinian people because of its ongoing security cooperation with Israel and assistance to Israel in maintaining the blockade on Gaza.
Fatah Opposes a Hamas Seaport
Senior Fatah officials, for their part, have accused Hamas of aiming to cut off Gaza from the West Bank. Fatah spokesman Osama Kawasmeh said (March 1, 2016) that Hamas’ agreement to establish a seaport under Israel’s full supervision and opposition to transferring the Rafah crossing to PA control, constitute clear proof of Hamas’ intentions to sever Gaza from “the homeland.”2
Kawasmeh averred that “no party has the right to negotiate in the name of our Palestinian people…our Palestinian people has a main address, and it is the PLO, the legitimate and sole representative of our people. We will not allow this to be breached and everyone must honor it.”
Fahmi al-Zarir, deputy-secretary of the Fatah Revolutionary Council, declared (March 1, 2016) that “the Hamas movement is not interested in giving up the Gaza Strip and constantly strives to gain control of the West Bank.”3
In his view, “no reconciliation [with Hamas] is possible unless Hamas recognizes that it made a mistake when it carried out the takeover [of Gaza], and it must apologize for the takeover and genuinely and honestly promise that it will not repeat these actions in the foreseeable future. I do not think Hamas is prepared for that.”
The Palestinian people are like a person with two heads that uncompromisingly fight each other over birthright. The Palestinian Authority controls the Palestinian territories in Judea and Samaria and enforces its rule there. But it has no effective control over Gaza, which is under the complete dominion of Hamas and its military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades.
The international initiatives aimed at recognizing the “state of Palestine” in the pre-1967 territories ignore the Palestinian rift that paralyzes and nullifies a Palestinian leadership that could take binding decisions in the name of the Palestinian people, let alone decisions on a historic compromise with Israel that would make a sustainable diplomatic solution possible.
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Notes
1 http://www.wafa.ps/ar_page.aspx?id=MQRhCea207873324483aMQRhCe
2 http://www.wafa.ps/ar_page.aspx?id=0KyQ67a207895214802a0KyQ67
3 http://www.fatehorg.ps/index.php?action=show_page&ID=29122&lang=ar
* Lt. Col. (ret.) Jonathan D. Halevi is a senior researcher of the Middle East and radical Islam at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and is a Fellow at the ACD. He is a co-founder of the Orient Research Group Ltd.
* This article has been posted on the JCPA website on March 8, 2016