Israel Matzav

The three-reichlet solution?

In 2007 and 2008 I did three posts that considered the possibility that instead of there being a 'Palestinian' reichlet and the State of Israel, the powers that be would try to force two 'Palestinian' reichlets on us - Fatah in Judea and Samaria and Hamas in Gaza. With a Fatah party convention due to meet in Bethlehem on Tuesday for the first time in 20 years, the local leader of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades warns that if the 'young' intifadeh leadership does not find its place among Fatah's leaders - something which to this point the older generation seems disinclined to allow - Fatah itself may split albeit not necessarily on neat geographical lines.

“There will be a clear split within Fatah,” Abdullah Abu Hadid, secretary of Fatah in Bethlehem and a leader of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, told The Media Line in an exclusive interview. “We have the leaders of the first and second intifadas and the real leaders of the Palestinian people, the leaders of the Palestinian street.”

...

“I think that what’s known as the Old Guard in Fatah gave what it could and it has nothing more to give,” Abu Hadid said. “The movement needs to have new blood in its leadership, a young leadership.”

“The sixth Fatah conference is drowning in oppression with people who have nothing to do with Fatah or its history,” he added. “They just want to choose an Oslo leadership with a Zionist-American plan.”

...

Abu Hadid said he wanted to see Marwan Barghouti, the former Fatah West Bank secretary-general now serving five life terms for murder in an Israeli jail, elected to the central committee and even as leader.

He said the jailed leader was “Fatah’s savior and salvation” but warned that his appointment to the central committee would not be enough to stem a rebellion within the ranks.

Abu Hadid warned of a “third intifada” directed this time against the Palestinian leaders as well as the Israelis. He said the sense of frustration among ordinary Palestinians – at the lack of progress in talks with Israel, the economic situation and the corruption of senior officials – was worse today than in the weeks preceding the outbreak of the last intifada in 2000.

“If there’s a third intifada, it will be in order to change the course of negotiations, to change the conduct of the Palestinian Authority, and change the conduct of the current leadership,” he said. “The people won’t enter a direct confrontation with the Israelis without correcting things at home and without amending things domestically.”

“It’s worse now than it was in 2000,” he continued. “The Palestinian street is impoverished, the prices are rising without stop, Palestinian dignity is diminishing, Israelis are being hostile in Judaizing Jerusalem, demolishing houses in Jerusalem, arresting Palestinians on a daily basis, and the leadership isn’t capable of protecting people.”

Hmmm. That's not what Abu Mazen told Jackson Diehl a couple of months ago.

Abbas and his team fully expect that Netanyahu will never agree to the full settlement freeze -- if he did, his center-right coalition would almost certainly collapse. So they plan to sit back and watch while U.S. pressure slowly squeezes the Israeli prime minister from office. "It will take a couple of years," one official breezily predicted. Abbas rejects the notion that he should make any comparable concession -- such as recognizing Israel as a Jewish state, which would imply renunciation of any large-scale resettlement of refugees.

Instead, he says, he will remain passive. "I will wait for Hamas to accept international commitments. I will wait for Israel to freeze settlements," he said. "Until then, in the West Bank we have a good reality . . . the people are living a normal life." In the Obama administration, so far, it's easy being Palestinian.

Are Abu Mazen and Abu Hadid living in two different countries? Are they preparing to live in two different countries? Hmmm.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 8:58 PM