By Tony Sayegh
The Palestinians, who are the only colonized people in the world today, have been struggling for their freedom and independence for close to 100 years, yet their actions show that they have learned very little in all these years. As a result they seem incapable of putting together and executing a national project that would deliver this freedom and independence. In the meantime the colonizers and occupiers excel in forging ahead with their plans to devour what little is left for the Palestinians and to ultimately squeeze them or , depending on regional developments, “transfer” them out. The picture could not be bleaker. If there is any hope left, it lies in the Palestinians conducting a harsh self-examination that spares no sacred cows nor tries to minimize how dire the situation is.
I hear a lot said about Palestinian democracy and the efforts (by Usrael) to end this experiment. Yet, at crucial times, there is little evidence of this democracy. Key decisions and agreements are still made by a few “leaders” with no input from ordinary Palestinians. A case in point is the Mecca agreement concluded under the auspices of his royal highness king Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. I am still waiting for any debate about its merits, or lack of, in the so-called parliament, the press or any other forum. Suddenly, true to form, most Palestinians fall in line and sing the praises of “Palestinian unity.” No dissenting voices are heard within the “democratic” Hamas or among the public at large. Some Hamas leaders even went as far as accusing anyone opposed to this agreement of being an enemy of the people!
This has been the pattern for 90 years and as a result the Palestinian project can’t get off the ground. Is it any wonder that after three generations of resistance the most observed resistance to the occupation in the West Bank is the sight of kids throwing stones at Israeli tanks? There is no growth, evolution, learning or even a process. The people are leaderless and the so-called leaders are more concerned with appearing in front of cameras or flying from capital to capital. By contrast, Hizbullah did not even exist in 1982 when Israel occupied South Lebanon. By 2000 (in 18 short years) Hizbullah was able to organize a fierce and effective resistance that culminated in the only known forced Israeli withdrawal from occupied Arab land.
I would like to take just a few examples to illustrate that the Palestinians have learned very little in all those years.
After WWI the Palestinians, and the Arabs in general, were duped in fighting with the British and the French to get rid of the Ottomans. And what do the Palestinians get in return? British occupation and the Balfour declaration in 1917 committing the British government to dismembering Palestine and to the Zionist cause of stealing most of the country and throwing the Palestinians out. The British stayed in Palestine to empower the creation of the Zionist state and left only when the Zionist forces were strong enough to defeat the combined Arab armies. The U.N., being the imperial tool that it is to this day, voted to partition the country and bless the new Zionist state. Did the Palestinians learn anything from that? I remember my father talking about never trusting the British again. Yet, Palestinian “leaders” (including those of Hamas) are pleading with Britain and the U.S. to play a “more active role” in the “peace process!” Hamas is urging the European powers that were largely responsible for the creation of Israel to lift the blockade and to resume their charitable contributions! Palestinian “leaders” go from meeting to meeting with Rice, Blair and the Quartet pleading for a “solution.” The Quartet is made up of the EU, U.S., U.N. and Russia, the same cast of characters that created Israel in the first place.
Here is another illustration. After the treason of most Arab leaders in 1948, with the king of Jordan actively collaborating with the Zionists and the kings of Egypt and Iraq ordering their forces not to intervene to help the Palestinians, the Palestinians swore never to trust the corrupt Arab leaders and to rely on themselves. Yet at a time when the Arab world is at its rock bottom in terms of subservience to the U.S. and when Arab nationalism is virtually dead, the Palestinians are supposed to celebrate an agreement cobbled together under the financial clout and patronage of the most corrupt and reactionary American puppet, king Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. Ismail Haniyyah could not praise his rotten majesty enough. He even compared his sponsorship of the agreement to an action by the Prophet Mohammad! What a buffoon and a hypocrite! If the agreement is that good for the Palestinians, why do they need his rotten majesty? He is not the only U.S. stooge that the Palestinian “leaders” meet and coordinate with. Abbas is in Jordan almost weekly to “coordinate” with the other Abdullah! Can anything good come out of all this? Have the Palestinians really learned anything?
Hamas originally attacked, and rightly so, the Oslo agreement and all the structures that resulted from it, including the PA. However, Hamas now insists on being a part of this same illusion of a government which was set up to relieve Israel from the burdens of occupation and to act as Israel’s cop in the occupied areas. Yet Hamas is now lauding this “national unity” as a historic agreement. Say what? The Palestinians are being dishonest with themselves and are following mirages and illusions made possible by empty rhetoric.
The Palestinians swore for two generations that only through resistance and self-reliance they could hope to restore some of their rights. Yet their actions today belie all that. Hamas is observing a unilateral “truce” while Israel proceeds with land confiscations, more colonies, assassinations, daily abduction of scores of Palestinians and the ultimate absorption of all of Palestine. Hamas is even offering a 10-year truce! I think in 10 years there will be nothing left of Palestine.
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