Just World News with Helena Cobban

If Zalmay Khalilzad, the US Ambassador to Iraq, is– with the full backing of President Bush and apparently the US Congress– engaging in negotiations with leaders of the Sunni Arab insurgency in Iraq, who have been targeting (and killing) US troops continuously for the past three years and in many places continue to do so, who have engaged in some extremely inhumane acts against noncombatants, and whose rhetoric is often extremely anti-US… Then on what basis does the Bush administration, with apparently the full backing of the US Congress, call for “no negotiations with Hamas”, an organization that has never in its history targeted US troops or other assets and that with one exception has maintained a ceasefire in its own theater of operations (Palestine/Israel) for the past ten months?
Don’t get me wrong. As I have written on several occasions, I think it is excellent that Zal has been reaching out to the (authentically Iraqi) Sunni leaders in Iraq to try– as I understand it– to find a peaceful way to ramp down the violence and arrive at an agreed, legitimate political order in that country.
But if he, a US Ambassador, can talk to those insurgent leaders, why on earth should US officials at a high rank not also be talking to leaders and members of a party in Palestine that recently emerged the winner of a democratically contested election– with a similarly eirenic goal in mind?
I would be “shocked” indeed [irony alert there] to learn that the interventions of a foreign power were dictating US policy in this matter.
Just a reminder to everyone here: peace is made between opponents, not between people who already like each other. If we are serious about trying to find a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestine conflict, then talking to all relevant parties is the only way forward. In Palestine, as in Iraq… Please, let the pro-Israel “lobby” be reminded of these essential facts, and sent politely on its way with all its special pleading. It’s time to get serious about making peace and averting another generation or two of strife and war.

I have a column in the CSM today: it’s titled
Hope for a Mideast resolution could grow with Hamas leadership
.  In it, I do a quick analysis of the Hamas victory and write:

The strong internal discipline within Hamas, as opposed to the indiscipline
and factionalism within Fatah, indicates that a strong Hamas leadership
can be a more effective participant in peace diplomacy than the Fatah leadership
has ever been. (Interestingly, this view has been expressed even by some
Israelis.)

The main evidence I adduce for Hamas having much stronger internal discipline
than Fateh is (1) its performance duing the ceasfire of the past ten months–
as opposed to the enormous lack of discipline showed within fateh, and (2)
its performance in the recent elections, where actually it was only the fact
that Hamas stuck rigorously to running single lists of candidates at the
distruict level, while Fateh had many competing lists at that level, that
gave Hamas the resounding (74 seats out of 132 total v) victory it got in
the polls.

I note that despite the strength of that victory in terms of seats, Hamas
did only get 44% of the popular vote– and its leaders know and understand
this, which is one of the rreasons why they continue to argue for a government
of national unity, rather than acting as “winners who take all”.

Today, in addition, there is an extremely interesting and significant

op-ed in the WaPo
, written by Mousa Abu Marzook, who is the deputy to Khaled Mashaal, the
head of Hamas’s political bureau.  He writes from Damascus– where he
has lived for most of the time since being deported from the US in 1997.
 It is titled simply What Hamas is seeking.

I find it very significant and hopeful that Abu Marzook addressed this
message to an American audience so soon after the Hamas victory.  (Interesting,
and relatively hopeful that the WaPo had the good grace to publish it, too.)

Abu Marzook writes: “Through historic fair and free elections, the Palestinian
people have spoken.” (Interesting that he doesn’t dwell on the 44% issue
there.)

Continue reading “Prospects with Hamas”

I wrote a column for Tuesday’s CSM about the Hamas victory. (It’ll be up on their website tomorrow evening, and I’ll link to it then.)
In researching it I came across some good reporting from the SF Chronicle’s Matthew Kalman, from Ramallah, and the FT’s Harvey Morris, from Gaza.
I was also intrigued by Haaretz’s recent report that around half of Israelis said their government should negotiate with a Hamas-led administration. (Can’t find that link now.) This report by Ian Black in today’s NYT gives a snapshot of the multidimensionality of (Jewish) Israeli attitudes. Certainly, they look much more nuanced and more potentially hopeful than the hard line the Olmert government evidently feels it needs to uphold at present. (Though I also saw that Defense Minister Mofaz had described Hamas’s behavior since the election as “reasonable.”)
Israeli blogger Imshin has also had some interesting reactions to the Hamas victory: here and here. Including, in that latter post, this:

As the hysteria continues, I can’t help thinking ‘What do we want from the Palestinians?’ They did what was right for them. I probably would have voted for the Hamas too, if I were in their shoes. The corrupt, thieving Fatah had it coming.
How long were people expected to tolerate such chaos, such anarchy?

I wish I were there– in both countries… but I’m intending to be, soon. (Gotta finish this work on the Africa book first. It really is a project I believe in deeply.) But the big bottom line for me right now– as so often in the past– is that the Israeli-Jewish public seems noticeably more realistic and nuanced in its reactions than their PM…. And a thousand times more realistic and nuanced than Israel’s ever-hysterical “amen corner” here in the west– and I so far include Bush and Blair in that category, and probably a lot of other EU leaders, as well.

Since Hamas’s victory in last Wednesday’s elections most of the MSM in the west– Israelocentric as ever– has focused overwhelmingly on “What on earth would this mean for the peace process?”
(As if there had actually, over the past four years existed any peace process! What peace process? Since 2002, Israeli PM Ariel Sharon completely refused to negotiate with the Palestinian Authority– and he maintained that boycott of peace talks even after the election of Mahmoud Abbas as PA President last January… Ehud Olmert, despite stating that he “wants” to get back into talks with the Palestinians, hasn’t gotten around to doing anything about it… So I am still totally mystified by all those “concerned” pundits who say “What will the Hamas victory do to the peace process?” What on earth are they talking about?)
Meanwhile, in the real lives of real Palestinians, chafing under their 39th year of life under foreign military occupation, there will be the huge challenge of trying to assure a peaceful transition of authority from the old Fateh-dominated PA to the newly elected Hamas adminsitration. Ensuring the peacefulness of a political transition from one party to another is a task at the core of democratization… A task that is perhaps even more important than being able to hold a “free and fair” election.
I’m remembering the role Jimmy Carter played, in Nicaragua, in 1990, when Daniel Ortega’s ruling Sandinista Party suffered a surprise defeat at the hands of Violeta Chamorro’s party. Carter played a good role then, stressing the essential democratic principle of ensuring an orderly and calm political transition from one party to another…
And he’s playing the same role in Palestine today. At a time when pundits in what’s called the “western donor community” are voicing all kinds of scary warnings (or perhaps, veiled threats?) to the Palestinians, that the US and EU donor governments “are constrained by law” from directing funding to the PA if it led by a pro-Hamas government, Carter is telling us that isn’t so, and we should all remain calm. This, from today’s NYT:

Former President Jimmy Carter, who led a team of election observers for the Palestinian voting, said in an interview on Friday that the United States and Europe should redirect their relief aid to United Nations organizations and nongovernmental organizations to skirt legal restrictions.
“The donor community can deal with it successfully,” Mr. Carter said. “I would hope the world community can collectively tide the Palestinians over.” He urged support for what he said [international aid-to-Pals boss] Mr. Wolfensohn was describing to him as a $500 million appeal.
“It may well be that Hamas can change,” Mr. Carter said, remembering his presidency, when the Palestine Liberation Organization under Yasir Arafat finally agreed to recognize the existence of Israel and to forswear terrorism. “It’s a mistake to abandon optimism completely.”
He urged Israel and the world: “Don’t drive the Palestinians away from rationality. Don’t force them into assuming arms as the only way to achieve their legitimate goals. Give them some encouragement and the benefit of the doubt.”

Good for him.
There are, of course, many other problems of the political transition that the Palestinians face, even before they get to these issues of economic aid.
Fateh has been in power in the PA since it was established in 1994, and before that in the nationalist movement since 1969. It has massive, deeply entrenched systems of patronage that criss-cross right across the Middle East and around the world. Nearly all of those are now in jeopardy– both because the new, pro-Hamas government will rightly seek control over all national resources, which have become sadly and badly commingled with Fateh’s resources over the years– and because, even while Hamas and its allies will be trying to do that, there’s a very bitter power battle going on inside Fateh, itself.
I wrote a long “obituary” for the secular-nationalist vision of Palestine represented by Fateh, here, on December 30. There, and in the piece I wrote on Palestine for Boston Review two years ago, I noted the crumbling/implosion of the last vestiges of internal discipline inside Fateh.
This near-complete absence of internal discipline in Fateh is already considerably complicating the task of ensuring an orderly post-election transition to the newly-elected administration. In this story, from AP, we learn the following:

Angry [Fateh-affiliated]police stormed the parliament building in Gaza and armed militants marched into Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas’ compound in Ramallah to demonstrate their rejection of Hamas’ authority. Their defiance raised fears of a spike in violence between Palestinian factions.
Clashes have already broken out between the two sides. Hamas gunmen wounded two policemen in Gaza early Saturday in what authorities said was a roadside ambush. The attack came hours after another firefight wounded a Hamas activist and two police officers, one of whom was in a coma Saturday.

Let’s hope for an improvement in discipline, calm-seeking, and de-escalation from all sides. (We are much more likely to see it coming from the Hamas side, than from Fateh’s.)
We learn from that AP story, too, that Hamas’s over-all leader Khaled Mashaal, has suggested that Hamas’s armed forces could be merged into the Palestinian forces— and also, very significantly indeed, this:

Mashaal also said Hamas would abide by existing agreements with the country “as long as it is in the interest of our people.”
Israel and the Palestinians have a host of agreements dealing with everything from administration to peace frameworks. Mashaal did not say which agreements he was referring to.

These are, it seems to me, very mature early decisions to be coming from an organization that, just a week ago, probably did not dream it would end up winning a clear majority in the parliament…
I want to write more, sometime, about the “international aid” that has been doled out to the Palestinians over the past 12 years, and the function it has played in actually keeping the Palestinians in subservience to Israel. The Americans and Israelis– and some EU nations– want it to carry on playing this role! But Hamas is very unlikely indeed to play ball with that.
That’s why I think Jimmy Carter’s suggestion– that aid should continue to go to the Palestinians, but not through the old US- and Israel-dominated channels– is an excellent one. Let’s have international “aid”– to both the Palestinians and the Israelis– that actually supports a robust international diplomacy that terminates this conflict rapidly, and in a decent and sustainable way. Let’s end the system of international “aid” that has massively subsidized Israel’s illegal colonial project in the Palestinian territories while supporting a corrupt Palestinian administration that was expected to do the Israelis’ work of internal repression, for them.

People fearful of the effects of the Hamas victory in Palestine might like to go back and do some serious study of the whole transition in South Africa… From a situation of harsh inter-group conflict, extreme fearfulfulness among all groups, and armed violence that resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands– perhaps millions– of Black Africans in and especially beyond the borders of South Africa, as well as of some (low) thousands, or possibly even only hundreds of White South Africans… from there, to a situation of inter-group peace and basic civility within just four years.
How did that transformation happen? That is precisely what I am writing about these days…

Continue reading “From Tshwane (Pretoria) with love”

According to nearly complete election returns from Palestine, Hamas reportedly won 76 of the 132 seats in the upcoming parliament.
I am fairly optimistic about the impact this could have on progress towards a real, sustainable peace between Palestinians and Israelis. Read some of my reasons for this here.
Oh wow. That AP news report says that Fateh got only 43 seats. That is truly a debacle for the movement that (1) dominated the reconstitution of Palestinian national life in the 1950s (but oh, that was a long time ago now), and (2) has dominated the entire governance and patronage system inside the West Bank and Gaza since 1994.
The report also says this:

Mahmoud Zahar, a top Hamas official, said the group would extend its year-old truce if Israel reciprocates. “If not, then I think we will have no option but to protect our people and our land,” he told Associated Press Television News.

That he announces a readiness to extend the truce is good news. But note that he’s stating that at this point it would have to be reciprocal. Over most of the past year, Hamas has abided by a truce (tahdi’eh– literally, a “calming”) against Israel that Israel never subscribed to and indeed that Israel never abided by.
If Zahar is holding out the offer of a reciprocal truce now– will Israel respond?
The AP report also notes that Hamas’s top leader, Khaled Mshaal, called Abu Mazen from Syria, and

“He stressed Hamas insists on a partnership with all the Palestinian factions, especially our brothers in Fatah,” Hamas said on its Web site.

This, after Fateh for decades– that is, so long as Y. Arafat was still alive– always steadfastly refused to engage in power-sharing with Hamas. (Abu Mazen tried to do some power-sharing with Hamas back in 2003, when he was PM. But Arafat still refused– and that was a major reason why Abu Mazen resigned back then… My sense is he is most likely still open to working with Hamas this time round.)
Interesting days.