'Crisis and the clashes the responsibility of the Dahlan gangs.'

Friday, June 15, 2007
As'ad AbuKhalil:
Well, the conspiracy is unfolding before your eyes now. It is unfolding in Iraq, Somalia, Lebanon, Palestine, and Afghanistan. Do you really need more evidence of a US-Saudi-Israeli conspiracy in the Middle East region? You look at Palestine and you see a reference to a Palestinian "civil war" as it is being called.

People used to say that in Palestine it is very unlikely to have a Palestine civil war because the Palestinians have harbored a strong aversion to internecine battles and strife. But that is not true: collaborationist Palestinians have been killing other Palestinians, and dragging other factions into civil war, since at least the 1936-39 Palestinian revolt. The collaborationists were then represented by the Nashashibis and the Hashemites of Jordan. And one should remember that Fath under Arafat was always more willing to fight other Palestinians than to fight Israel. Fath under Arafat fought other Palestinian organizations prior to Black September in Jordan, and then did the same in Lebanon.

But what is new today is that the entire Palestinian leadership of theFath movement was eliminated (assassinated by Israel and its allies), and a new leadership was installed by the US and Israel (with the support of client Arab regimes). We have never had in the history of Palestinian struggle a more open collaborationist regime in Palestine. And it is openly aligned with Israel and the US: this is unprecedented. I mean, even under the Village Leagues and the notorious Muhammad `Ali Al-Ja`bari: there were those silly denials of collaboration, and the Palestinians made sure that those attempts don't go very far. Not anymore.

And you see press reports to Salam Fayyad as "independent". Independent? Who brought this World Bank official to Palestine? Who forced him on Yasir Arafat? The Palestinian people? His own popularity or popular base? He is as much an independent as much as Mr. Bush is a "uniter not a divider."

And the characters in this saga are just almost fictional. Yesterday, the official statement or Ottoman Faraman (it was really drafted and read as a far a man) by Mahmoud Abbas was read by none other than Tayyib`Abdur-Rahim. Are you kidding me? He was dressed in a fancy suit, but this is `Abdur-Rahim. We knew him from his days in Lebanon. He was known as Abu At-Tayyib: he was in charge of Force 17. Force 17 was responsible under Arafat of dirty tricks and dirty fighting and dirty murders. That was its mission. And to have this same man yesterday speak on "constitutional matters" was laughable.

But less laughable than Condoleezza Rice offering opinions on the proper constitutional procedures in Palestine. Don't get me wrong: I have never been a fan of Hamas: not of its ideology and not of its practices. I also believe that, like Fath, they seem to be better fighters against other Palestinians than against Israeli occupation soldiers. That has to be observed. And Hamas has the blood of innocent Palestinians on its hands--not as much as Fath gangs, but still.

Yet, this crisis and the clashes are without a doubt the responsibility of the Dahlan gangs. They basically refused to accept the democratic results of the last parliamentary elections (under occupation): they just--under instruction from Israel and US--would not allow Hamas to rule. They were arming and building armed gangs to take on Hamas and whoever was willing to defy Israel and US dictates.

But the US and Israel (along with the Arab clients) did not know that no matter how much money and weapons they dump in the lap of Dahlan gangs, these fighters lack the cause or doctrine to make them effective as a fighting force. The last time Dahlan held a public rally in Gaza, he surrounded himself with kids and women because he could not trust what should have been his own constituency.

There are lessons of what happened in Gaza for Lebanon and Iraq and elsewhere: in terms of the arming of Sunni tribes and Shi`ite gangs in Iraq, and the arming of the Hariri forces in Lebanon. These will not fight, and would crumble at the first clash.

The Bush Doctrine is deep trouble, make no mistake about it. But then again: how foolish was the decision by Hamas to run in the elections and to accept to rule? They basically foolishly assumed that there was a true democracy in Palestine when it is under occupation? (The same may apply to the same calculations of Hizbullah when they joined the Sanyurah government).

The Saudi media--without a sense of irony--are now resorting to equating Hamas with Taliban and Al-Qa`idah: as if what works in New York City can really work in the Arab world. They think that they can really convince Arab public opinion that they (House of Saud and its allies) represent a secular alternative?

And please, don't give me that line that Fath is "a secular organization." We know Fath well, and know that Arafat was guilty of arming and financing fanatical religious groups since his days in Lebanon: just like what Arab regimes and Israel (and US) have done.

Khalid Mish`al today responded to that allegation in his press conference by denying that Hamas plans to impose a religious order. Don't get me wrong: both Hamas and Hizbullah tried to do that in years past before they realized that they can't continue to grow if they did not change. Neither the Lebanese nor the Palestinians would put up with a religious order. Both are sinful people, thankfully.

Norman Finkelstein & As'ad Abukhalil on Dennis Ross

The Camp David II Negotiations: How Dennis Ross Proved the Palestinians Aborted the Peace Process
Issue 142 (Winter 2007) Journal of Palestine Studies Abstract
by Norman G. Finkelstein

This article, excerpted from a longer essay deconstructing Dennis Ross's book on the Palestinian-Israeli peace process from 1993 to 2000, focuses on the Camp David summit.

In particular, it examines the assumptions informing Ross's account of what happened during the negotiations and why, and the distortions that spring from these assumptions. The article demonstrates that, judged from the perspective of Palestinians' and Israelis' respective rights under international law, all the concessions at Camp David came from the Palestinian side, none from the Israeli side. In reflecting on Ross's narrative, the author explores what he considers its "main innovation": the subordination of the normative framework of rights to the arbitrary and capricious one of "needs."

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The Note-Taker as A Historian: The Pain of Reading the Account of Dennis Ross
Monday, April 23, 2007
by As'ad Abukhalil

I normally would not have recommended Dennis Ross' The Missing Peace especially that he has the literary skills of, well, note takers. His book is no more than a compilation of his notes on US negotiations as part of the so-called "peace process."

I may not recommend that you read the 800 pages of this book, but students of political science should read it (to see the deception and lies of diplomats), as should all Arabs. They should see how their leaders--all their leaders, Hafidh Al-Asad and `Arafat included--negotiate away the rights and aspirations of the Arab peoples if it meant keeping themselves in power, or solidifying their rule.

I certainly left this book with more contempt for Hafidh Al-Asad (who was busy sending laudatory secret messages to Israeli leaders while maintaining his empty Ba`thist rhetoric in the Syrian media) and for `Arafat--not that I ever respected those two, not to mention the rest of the Arab tyrants. I singled out those two leaders because some Arabs, especially Palestinians, may still harbor some illusions about the two.

And it is rather funny that Ross thinks that he is very intelligent, while he is, well, not. Extremely not, I mean. You read this book and realize that the author was not able to even provide an interesting profile of any of the leaders that he met and negotiated with. He is just not capable of that; he is not even capable of providing any new insights or interesting analysis. He can only take notes, and notes were taken, and compiled in this tedious book. Ross tells everything, but keeps many important things out: like how `Arafat and Asad constantly asked that he be removed for his obvious bias against Arab interests.

Ross only rarely mentioned this complaint, and only in passing. But you read this book (and you read everything he has said and written since he left office) and realize how right Asad and `Arafat were in asking that this man is not qualified (not in knowledge and not in terms of objectivity) to be a neutral negotiator. He tells you where he stands on p. 6 (he says that he "identifies" with the Israeli people). It is also clear in the rest of the book: he mentions his friends in Israel right-and-left, but has not a single Arab friend, not even the puppets.

And his references to Arabs are consistently patronizing: and when an Israeli prime minister compared Arabs to children (something David Ben Gurion also had done) he seems to agree. It was quite incredible--or maybe not--that `Arafat told Clinton (the most pro-Israeli president until Bush) that he had "blind trust" in him (p. 10).

And look at his generalizations about the Palestinian people: "Victimization has deep roots in the Palestinian mind."(p. 42). Well, could that victimization be due to...well, victimhood" And please, Mr. Ross. Tell us more about the "Palestinian mind." As for Arab charge that US holds double standards regarding the implementability of UN Security Resolutions, he expresses surprise. He says that there is "a difference betweeen the Security Council Resolutions."(p. 43). Exactly. That was the point of the Arabs, Mr. Ross.

I did learn in this book that the lousy PLO leadership, under the lousy `Arafat, allowed US officials to censor, edit, and "refine" the text that was read by Haydar `Abdushafi in the Madrid conference. I was not surprised to learn about the role of Rejje Larsen: he remains to this very day a tool of the US (he also is a good friend of Ross). (p. 118).

But there is one amusing section in the book. It was when Ross waxes poetic. He told his friend (the deputy chief of Mossad): "Ephraim, we have just watched a field of mines transformed into a field of dreams" (p. 164). Is there better poetry than this?

Like a good drama, you will laugh and cry reading his book. I mean, will you not cry when you read that when Rabin died, Ross writes: "I was devastated and started to cry."(p. 210). And it was quite amusing how the US government deals with Arab leaders: with all the contempt and condescension that they so deserve.

Before meeting with Mubarak, Clinton asks his aides: "What do you want me to do with him?" (p. 213). Abu Mazen told Ross that he liked "Bibi" "personally." (p. 392) And it is not true that the Syrian negotiators insisted on full withdrawal of Israel from Syrian lands. Gen. Omar agreed to an adjustment in the hills over the river "as much as 50 meters", or so says Ross. (p. 560).

And so submissive was Arafat's leadership to US and Israeli officials that he agreed to remove Palestinian flags in Ramallah before meeting with Barak (p. 597).

And please Ross: as it is well-known that you know no Arabic, so refrain from using Arabic words. He even misspelled a simple word like Ra'is (he misspelled it in a way akin to spelling "president" as preaeakekajdf;ajd;flkjad;fj).