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| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Natan Sharansky : The price of ignoring Palestinians' needs |
| 2006-02-04 |
| Hamas's victory in the Palestinian elections is the logical outcome of a "peace process" more than a decade long that completely ignored what was happening within Palestinian society. Rather than seriously link the peace process to the building of a free society among the Palestinians, the democratic world, including Israel, turned a blind eye as Palestinian civil society was hollowed out, its streets taken over by armed thugs and its youth indoctrinated to glorify suicide bombers and despise Israel and America, Jews and Christians. The international community repeated its shallow formula for peace like a broken record. International legitimacy, Israeli concessions and billions of dollars in aid were used to strengthen Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority - the "moderates" who had ostensibly renounced violence and accepted Israel's existence - and marginalize extremist groups like Hamas. The Palestinian election result is the fruit of this failed approach to peacemaking, which amounted to nothing more than supporting a corrupt dictatorship. The world believed that seriously pressing Palestinian leaders to enact real reform would only weaken the Palestinian Authority internally and strengthen Hamas. The truth is precisely the opposite. By failing to insist that the Palestinian Authority dedicate itself to improving the lives of Palestinians, the United States, Israel, the EU and other players in the peace process made themselves contemptible in the eyes of Palestinians who saw their lives only getting worse. When Arafat died, I had hopes that perhaps a new path to peace would be taken. But it was not too be. Abbas was not told unequivocally that without serious reforms, he would receive no support from the free world. On the contrary, he was given a pass when he blatantly refused to confront terror groups. For its part, Israel's government, encouraged by the effusive praise of the international community, embarked on a foolish policy of one-sided concessions, which, as I feared when I resigned from the government last May, only strengthened the forces of terror within Palestinian society. To the outside world, the Palestinians have now chosen the party of terror over the party of peace. But in the eyes of most Palestinians, the differences between Hamas and the "moderate" Fatah were not primarily in their views toward Israel. In fact, satellites of Fatah, such as Tanzim and the Al Aksa brigades, were no less responsible for the terrorism against Israel than were Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Indeed, the leading figure on Fatah's list was Marwan Barghouti, a man serving five life sentences in an Israeli prison for his role in terror attacks. No, the real difference for the Palestinians was that a Fatah-run Palestinian Authority was rightly seen as a corrupt and feckless organization that had done and would continue to do nothing to improve Palestinian lives, whereas Hamas was untainted by corruption and appreciated for providing real social services. With the vote being a choice between corrupt terrorists dedicated only to themselves and honest terrorists who are also dedicated to others, is it any surprise that Hamas won by a landslide? I believe that many Palestinians who voted for Hamas voted to end corruption, to restore law and order and to implement real reform; the slogan that Hamas chose in its election campaign was not "Throw the Jews into the Sea," but rather "Change and Reform." The paradox is that the only party that Palestinians see as credible on this internal reform agenda was a terror organization dedicated to Israel's destruction and which has declared President George W. Bush "the enemy of God" and "the enemy of Islam." Now that the Palestinian Authority's corrupt dictatorship has collapsed and a terror organization riding a wave of resentment with the status quo is assuming power, the free world has an opportunity to restore moral clarity to the peace process. The world must base their support for this new regime on two ironclad conditions. First, Hamas must explicitly abandon the goal of destroying Israel and renounce terrorism. Second, it must dedicate itself toward building a free society for the Palestinians. For 12 years, Israel and the world have imposed the first condition and ignored evidence when it was violated. As for the second condition, not only were democratic reforms seen as irrelevant to peace, supporting a corrupt dictatorship was seen as essential. If the new Palestinian regime does not abide by these conditions, the free world, including Israel, must actively confront it and withhold legitimacy, money and concessions. But we must also seek ways to support any Palestinian individuals and organizations that do abide by these conditions. My fear is that the results of the Palestinian elections will discredit the whole concept of democratic reform in the Middle East. But that would be to discredit an idea without it having been tried. For all the talk of the need for Palestinian reform and democracy, the only thing that the world insisted upon was holding elections. Elections do not a make free society. Elections in a "fear society" in which there is no law and order and in which democratic institutions are nonexistent, can bring the worst elements to power. I hope that the policy of promoting democracy in the Middle East has not been dealt a fatal blow. Like so many tens of millions of Arabs in the region, there are countless Palestinians who want a better future, and we must seek every way to work with them. If we do not, we will end up not only betraying them once again, but also endangering ourselves. (Natan Sharansky is the co-author of the best-selling book ''The Case For Democracy'' and a candidate for the Likud Party in Israel's forthcoming parliamentary elections.) |
| Posted by:anonymous5089 |
| #9 Anonymoose, Egypt and Jordan didn't impose effective control over their portions of the Palestinian Territories before the conquests of 1967. What makes you thing they would do so now? Recall, as soon as Egypt got control of the border crossing from Israel, they opened the gates to weapons passage, relieved that the under-border tunnels from their military cantonments wouldn't need to be used henceforward. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-02-04 22:33 |
| #8 First, Hamas must explicitly abandon the goal of destroying Israel and renounce terrorism. And the chances of this happening are.....? |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2006-02-04 18:12 |
| #7 The problem is not Paleos (or French Muslims, or Tai Muslems). The problem is people who believe that they've divine sunction to rob, rape, and murder. |
| Posted by: gromgoru 2006-02-04 18:06 |
| #6 'Moose, that's probably the most successful outcome possible and I'd love to think it was possible. Instead, I think the most likely outcome is a forced Paleo evacuation of Gaza and the WB after some other Muzzy country makes a WMD attack on Israel. This won't end happily for the Paleos under almost any circumstances. |
| Posted by: mac 2006-02-04 16:25 |
| #5 The problem with that theory is defeat what? The Paleos are the closest thing to living in anarchy and choas. They have no real government, other institutions, enforcement, even major warlords. They *are* defeat, there is nothing left to defeat. My suggestion is that the Gaza Strip be completely turned over to the military administration of Egypt, and the West Bank, to Jordan. Both countries under the mandate to disarm and order their Paleos, so that there is finally some there, there. Other than a few gunslingers on either side, there is nothing to stop the Egyptian and Jordanian armies from fully occupying the Paleo lands--other than the utter horror both Egypt and Jordan would have at getting *more* Paleos. But until the Paleos are forced to have something, they are nothing more than a solvent dissolving away any efforts to give them something. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-02-04 15:41 |
| #4 Agreed Robert. Unfortunately, that will ultimately require a lot of dead people. |
| Posted by: Scooter McGruder 2006-02-04 14:59 |
| #3 What the Palestinians need is a good, hard, final military defeat. Something that lets them know they've lost, let's their supporters know they lost, and makes it clear they'll never win. |
| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2006-02-04 14:17 |
| #2 The Paleao are not supposed to live and create a state. They are supposed to all die eliminating Israel. And the Arab world would prefer that they just get along with it now and stop farting around with stuff like rights and democracy - it doesn't apply. Would the fodder get moving please. |
| Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 2006-02-04 13:12 |
| #1 Oh, crapola. Everybody who was involved in the peace process tried damn hard to get the Paleos living a good life, to make themselves a place fit to live, and to end the conflict. It was the Paleo leaders who bent over backwards to keep their own people poor, stupid, and living in squalor and hate; while the leaders stole everything of value. Now they live in de facto chaos, with the Hamas-led chaos of the Gaza Strip still mis-managed by Hamas, and the Fatah-led chaos of the West Bank still dominated, if not led, by Fatah. Instead of calling them Hamas and Fatah, they could equally be called the Crips and the Bloods, for all the good they do. AND IT IS NOBODY'S FAULT EXCEPT THE PALEOS THEMSELVES. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-02-04 13:05 |