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The New Power in the PNA
By George Friedman
Hamas has beaten Fatah in a key election and is now the dominant
political party among the Palestinians. Many observers expressed
surprise at the outcome, but the only thing that should have surprised
anyone is that there was surprise. Hamas was facing a corrupt Fatah
faction that had been driven into the ground by Yasser Arafat. Arafat's
successor, Mahmoud Abbas -- who was widely celebrated by Western leaders
-- is in fact an obscure party functionary whose primary claim to
leadership was his relationship with Arafat. While Arafat, the icon of
Palestinian nationalism, could not be repudiated, repudiating Abbas was
easy. Like the political wing of Fatah, he stood for nothing but the
perpetuation of Fatah and the system of patronage that Arafat created.
When it came to Abbas, Western media and leaders confused political
exhaustion with virtue.
But it was not simply internal Palestinian politics that drove the Hamas
victory. A wave of Islamist politics is sweeping the Muslim and Arab
worlds, and the Palestinians are far from immune. The Islamist movement
is doing far more than simply challenging the West: It is challenging
the secular Arabists who were the heirs of the Nasserite tradition. The
Islamists are confronting figures like Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. In many
ways, Fatah was the embodiment of secular Arabism -- the purest form of
Nasserism. The Palestinians were among the most secular in the Arab
world. Therefore, challenging and defeating Fatah represents a critical
moment in the history of the Arab and Muslim world. It represents a new
high-water mark for Islamists.
There was yet another process at work in the election. Arafat and the
Palestinian National Authority (PNA) that he essentially created and
dominated have existed in a complex relationship with Israel. In many
ways, the PNA was a creation of Israel, living within boundaries that
Israel defined. Whatever its level of involvement in the suicide bombing
campaign against Israel, via Marwan Bargouthi and the al-Aqsa Martyrs
Brigade, Fatah still accepted the existence of the state of Israel. As a
secular movement, it had no inherent moral objection to Israel's
existence -- only a political objection, and political objections are
inherently flexible.
Hamas has a moral objection to Israel's existence, deriving from its
understanding of Islamic texts. But it also had serious political
objections to Fatah's approach to Israel. From Hamas' point of view,
once Arafat had negotiated the existence of a quasi-state -- the PNA --
he became casual about negotiating the two critical things: first, the
definition and rights of the Palestinian nation and, second, the
transformation of the sort-of-state the PNA represented into an
authentic state. An authentic state, by Hamas' lights, meant a state
with an army that it was free to deploy in a clearly defined territory.
Even if Hamas accepted the existence of Israel in some sense, its view
was that the other side of the equation had not been fulfilled. Only the
illusion -- not the reality -- of a Palestinian nation-state had been
created. Hamas' objection to Fatah was that it had accepted an illusion.
Its objection to Abbas was that he was content to preside over an
illusion. Corruption, the decline of Arab secularism and the inability
of Fatah to articulate the interests of the Palestinians led it to
defeat after decades of dominating and defining the Palestinian cause.
The issue today is what Hamas will do with its power. It must be
understood that Hamas has not yet reached an unassailable position among
the Palestinians: It defeated but did not blow out Fatah. Fatah is still
there and can, particularly after a defeat like this, recover. Moreover,
Hamas has never faced the problem of governing. Its unity is the unity
of an opposition party, and its purity is the purity of a movement that
has never had to award contracts for paving roads. There is a vast
difference between opposing the rascals in power and taking power
yourself. A party unused to ruling can very quickly become everything
that it has opposed -- a bureaucratized, patronage-driven entity more
interested in holding onto power than in governing.
It is very possible that this will happen to Hamas. Certainly, this is
what Israelis hope will happen. There is a strand of thinking among
Israelis that argues that Hamas' victory is the best hope there is for
peace in the Middle East. The logic runs thus: Negotiating with the PNA
under Arafat or Abbas was an exercise in futility. Arafat was
duplicitous and Abbas powerless. No settlement reached by Fatah would
ever have any meaning because Fatah could not deliver the rejectionists
among the Palestinians. Hamas embodies the rejectionists. If Hamas were
to enter into an agreement -- even if it had opposition on its flanks,
like Ariel Sharon did on the Israeli side -- it ultimately would be able
to deliver. And since peace is always made with enemies, better to deal
with your worst enemy than with hapless moderates like Abbas.
Moreover, this line accepts that Hamas rejects the right of Israel to
exist, that it has waged and can continue to wage suicide bomb attacks
in Israel, and that it intends to govern by whipping up religious
sentiment that must, by definition, be anti-Israeli. Nevertheless, this
reasoning goes, the experience of government will affect Hamas in two
ways. First, Hamas has come into power on a tidal wave of hope -- but
those hopes inevitably will be dashed. Hamas will, in a fairly short
period of time, come under criticism for failing to deliver on those
hopes. And second, as we have said, because Hamas is ill-prepared for
the mechanics of governing, it will commit a series of amateurish
errors, further dulling its bright credentials. Therefore, Hamas -- a
radical Islamist movement with a rejectionist policy -- simultaneously
will embody the most radical position among Palestinians while
transforming into a normal political party. Not only will it be able to
negotiate from a position of authority, but its appetite for
confrontation will be dulled.
This is a view shared by many Western observers as well as Israelis, but
there is, as one can see, a deep contradiction in the thinking. On the
one side, Hamas is valued as a powerful revolutionary force --
therefore, it can negotiate authoritatively. On the other, it will be
moved to negotiate because the experience of governing will exhaust it
sufficiently that it will move from radical to routine politics.
Before this question of what Hamas will do with its power can be
answered, two immediate challenges are posed to both Israel and the
West. Western countries funnel a great deal of aid to the Palestinians.
One of the charges made against Arafat was that he, in effect, stole a
great deal of that money. It was one of the charges leveled by his
Palestinian critics, and one of the ways they wound up in Palestinian
jails. At this point, depending on how the PNA reconstitutes itself,
that money is likely to be passed to the control of Hamas functionaries.
In effect, Hamas will be the recipient of Western aid.
Israel has a similar problem. The Israelis collect a good portion of
Palestinian taxes and pass them back to the PNA -- one of the reasons we
call the PNA a pseudo-state. When the Israelis remit the funds to
Palestinian accounts, those accounts will be controlled by Hamas. Hamas
has announced its intention to take its own militias and designate them
as a Palestinian army. The Israelis have accepted the concept of a
Palestinian police and security force, but accepting the existence of a
Palestinian army -- let alone a Palestinian army that is in reality
Hamas' militias -- and passing tax funds to them to spend as they wish
would challenge the Israeli understanding of what a Palestinian state
will mean. Sharon certainly didn't envision that -- and with his
incapacitation, he has come to embody the gold standard of the Israeli
position on the Palestinians.
But forget the Israelis for a moment. Consider the position of the
Americans and Europeans. First, all sides have agreed that there should
be a Palestinian state and have provided funding to the PNA. Second, all
sides believe deeply in the concepts of national self-determination and
free elections. Third, all sides oppose terrorism and the kind of
suicide bombing campaigns carried out by Hamas. Even those governments
most sympathetic to the Palestinians have opposed Hamas' rejection of
Israel's right to exist and the suicide campaigns.
So then, we have an ongoing flow of money to a PNA that is seen as the
legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, and what appears to
be a free and honest election of a group that is regarded by virtually
everyone outside the Muslim world as among the least savory of
terrorists. A decision must be made fairly quickly. Does the world honor
the principle of national self-determination, even when the nation
determines it wishes to be governed by people who are regarded as
morally reprehensible?
Those who argue for national self-determination and free elections
always seem to think that the outcome will be the election of nice folks
who'd be at home in Wisconsin. This is as true of the Bush
administration as of Amnesty International. It is the universal
self-delusion of the West. OK, so now the Palestinian people have
spoken, and they have spoken for Hamas. Since Amnesty International has
no power, it will be able to finesse its position more easily than the
Bush administration -- which does have to make a decision.
The decision to be made is clear and must come soon: Does the United
States continue to provide funds to the PNA, even if those funds wind up
in Hamas' coffers? This question has broad ramifications. One of the
goals the United States has set itself in the war against jihadists is
to create an environment in which free elections can be held in the
Muslim world. We guess the assumption has been that, given a choice,
Muslims would vote for pro-Western, secular regimes. The Palestinians
have voted for an anti-Western, religious regime. Which gives -- the
doctrine of the absolute right to self-determination, or the absolute
opposition to groups designated as terrorists?
The Bush administration does not have the luxury of ignoring this one.
Unless action is taken, the money will continue to flow. Sending money
to Hamas will surely cause the administration to say, "Does not compute,
does not compute." Cutting off the money will signal to the Islamic
world that the United States is absolutely committed to democratic
institutions, unless it doesn't like the outcome.
The Israelis, for their part, will have to figure out whether they want
to rupture relations with the PNA by cutting off tax funds collected
from the Palestinians. Doing that could result in the resumption of the
intifada and suicide bombings. The Israelis have no appetite for this.
Thus, the United States and Israel will be regarding each other with
fairly blank looks on their faces, wondering, "What do we do now?"
Meanwhile, Hamas will be moving rapidly to take control of the
mechanisms of the PNA. They have made a lot of bold promises, and they
need to turn their election into a psychological victory. At the moment,
their minds are not on international relations, but on consolidating
their political and psychological position among the Palestinians. To
the extent they are looking beyond their immediate realm, they are
looking at the Islamic world.
That means that they will be saying and doing things that increase the
fervor of their followers and give opponents a sense of their relentless
inevitability. Personnel shifts, particularly the replacement of
officials known to be close to the West or Israel, will take place
quickly. Statements will be made that will be frightening to the West
and exhilarating to the Palestinians. In the United States, Israel and
Europe, the blank look will turn to serious concern, and the pressure to
act will grow.
That will be the critical point. Hamas benefits from a sense of
embattlement -- the sense that it is confronting the enemies of Islam.
As it backs the Israelis and Americans into a corner, and both start
reacting, Hamas will increase its strength and authority. It will also
look to countries like Saudi Arabia -- a fellow Sunni entity, rather
than Shiite Iran -- and the other Gulf states for support. Some European
countries will continue funding Hamas under the theory that engagement
will moderate the movement. And that will be the tipping point.
We have never believed that a long-term solution to the
Israeli-Palestinian crisis could be found. It is certainly true that if
Hamas, in becoming a governing party, is forced by its circumstances to
negotiate a settlement with Israel, then our theory would be wrong. But
the other possibility is that Hamas, due to internal political
considerations as well as the reaction of Israel and the United States,
will become more inflexible. We tend to believe that is the likely
outcome. But even if it turns out to be the first case, we long have
argued that the geographic realities of the Israelis and Palestinians
preclude the existence of two viable states. Hamas, even if it enters
the peace process, knows the problem and will demand more than Israel
could possibly concede.
The peace process is not in worse shape than it was before the Hamas
win, because the situation was never any good. The new constellation is
interesting, but not all that different. There will be hints of
improvement followed by disappointment, coupled with spasms of violence.
We don't see how this can change.
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