Too late for Abbas
Too late for Abbas
By BARRY RUBIN, JPOST
The evidence for the Palestinian national movement's collapse is accumulating daily. It is becoming increasingly clear that the Palestinian Authority will lose the parliamentary elections scheduled for January if it does not cancel them first.
Two recent events have worsened his situation. The opening of the Egypt-Gaza Strip border under essentially full PA control was widely portrayed as a PA victory, but this conclusion is misleading. The PA's border controls are a joke and both terrorists and weapons are going to pass freely with no one interfering effectively. Neither the Egyptian security forces nor the European Union observers are going to risk any confrontations for the purpose of saving Israeli lives.
Yet curiously it is not Israel that is most endangered by this situation. Israel has a defensible border, a strong army, and good intelligence which can block almost all attacks from that front. The real loser is the very PA that is cheering its new border-control role.
[...]Could it possibly be clearer that Abbas is the Palestinian leader in name only and is incapable of negotiating any agreement with Israel or implementing anything he promises?
WHAT DOES it say that the most popular forces in Palestinian politics are Hamas and Fatah hardliners who engage in terrorism and insist that military force not diplomacy is the way to reach their goal? What does it signify that the big winner in Jenin, Jamal Abu Rob, who chose "Hitler" as his nom de guerre, is another terrorist leader?
The answer is this: moderates have no chance of leading the Palestinians; there is no prospect of progress toward a negotiated peace for many years. But there is an even more immediate triple problem for the Palestinians themselves: Abbas cannot lead the Palestinians, Fatah cannot unite itself, and Fatah cannot defeat Hamas.
The writer, director of the Global Research
Posted by Ted Belman at December 8, 2005 07:33 AM
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Tim
said:
Which leaves you with the Iranian proxy group of Hamas, I'm not sure you traded up or down in this arrangement
Posted by: Tim on December 8, 2005 12:17 PM
Too late for Abbas
By BARRY RUBIN, JPOST
The evidence for the Palestinian national movement's collapse is accumulating daily. It is becoming increasingly clear that the Palestinian Authority will lose the parliamentary elections scheduled for January if it does not cancel them first.
Two recent events have worsened his situation. The opening of the Egypt-Gaza Strip border under essentially full PA control was widely portrayed as a PA victory, but this conclusion is misleading. The PA's border controls are a joke and both terrorists and weapons are going to pass freely with no one interfering effectively. Neither the Egyptian security forces nor the European Union observers are going to risk any confrontations for the purpose of saving Israeli lives.
Yet curiously it is not Israel that is most endangered by this situation. Israel has a defensible border, a strong army, and good intelligence which can block almost all attacks from that front. The real loser is the very PA that is cheering its new border-control role.
[...]Could it possibly be clearer that Abbas is the Palestinian leader in name only and is incapable of negotiating any agreement with Israel or implementing anything he promises?
WHAT DOES it say that the most popular forces in Palestinian politics are Hamas and Fatah hardliners who engage in terrorism and insist that military force not diplomacy is the way to reach their goal? What does it signify that the big winner in Jenin, Jamal Abu Rob, who chose "Hitler" as his nom de guerre, is another terrorist leader?
The answer is this: moderates have no chance of leading the Palestinians; there is no prospect of progress toward a negotiated peace for many years. But there is an even more immediate triple problem for the Palestinians themselves: Abbas cannot lead the Palestinians, Fatah cannot unite itself, and Fatah cannot defeat Hamas.
The writer, director of the Global Research
Posted by Ted Belman at December 8, 2005 07:33 AM