<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?><oembed><version><![CDATA[1.0]]></version><provider_name><![CDATA[Occupied Palestine | فلسطين]]></provider_name><provider_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com]]></provider_url><author_name><![CDATA[occupiedpalestine]]></author_name><author_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/author/hajarhajar/]]></author_url><title><![CDATA[Year of Living Dangerously: Palestinians on the&nbsp;Brink]]></title><type><![CDATA[link]]></type><html><![CDATA[<p><strong>By Mikail Jubran | March 31, 2011 | Palestine Chronicle<br />
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<p>During  the past couple of weeks we have witnessed a somewhat stall of the Arab  spring. An ongoing civil conflict that is raging in Libya pits the  ‘ancien regime’ against a rag-tag rabble of self-proclaimed freedom  fighters who thought that international intervention would guarantee  their success. It appears they may have miscalculated terribly the  tenacity of their well-entrenched opponent. Now, even Syria is showing  signs of popular revolt. While this new Arab Order may appear to be in  some disarray, among the Palestinians a simmering anger percolates. This  fury could be about to spill over into popular rage.</p>
<p>One stark  fact confronts the Palestinian leadership and that is they never faced a  more seminal moment in time. While there is always hope for the future,  the Palestinian people need to search for it and seek it in the right  places. They should no longer allow themselves to be blinded by their  own ideological hallucinations and obsessions. The Palestinian Authority  is fearful of their own population, who has been closely watching the  explosive events in their backyard.</p>
<p>The stirs of echoes for a  new Palestinian political strategy reverberate within the power circles  of Ramallah, with ideas and notions in abundance. However, can and will  the Palestinian leadership show the boldness to grasp a new direction  before its ongoing dilemma deepens further? To escape this ever-widening  stalemate, and act to progress forward, the PA must grasp true  political reform in which the past must not become prologue. In other  words, any basis for reform and elections in the Palestinian territories  – formulas embodied in the Oslo accords – are defunct. The Palestinian  leadership must shed the burdens of its past failures. They need to  enumerate an entirely new basis for their political legitimacy. This can  only be created by the ultimate and sole source of authority – the  Palestinian people; for it is only their leadership that can articulate  and implement authentic programs of structural, legal and procedural  reform; fundamental change that is proactive and not reactive, and is  fully guided by the Palestinian people themselves, and for their  specific benefit.</p>
<p>The machinery of Palestinian society – from the  teachers, lawyers, jurists, trade unions, along with the assistance of  the numerous NGOs operating within the Palestinian territories must  become the center foci on which Palestinian reform is premised. A newly  elected representative Constituent Assembly would need to act  immediately to establish a mandate that would end Israel’s occupation &#8211;  not negotiate with it. This entails truly creative methods of struggle  that fully mobilizes all Palestinian resources available to isolate and  make untenable the main aspects of the occupation. An Israeli component  comprised of groups or individuals, with whom a common basis of  resistance against the occupation is established, must assist in the  advancement of any new Palestinian strategy.</p>
<p>Palestinians should  have learned much from the history of the struggle that the South  African people endured and the vision they sought of a multi-racial  society in which no group or individual was ever swerved. Therefore, the  Palestinian people must resist the images emanating from Israeli  violence, forcible separation and the subordination of Palestinians to  any notion of Jewish supremacy.</p>
<p>In the aftermath of the recent and  ongoing violence in Gaza and the West Bank, Israel’s government has  only shown that it wants nothing more than to make Palestinian life  collectively more miserable and even more unlivable, whether by military  attacks or by impossible political conditions that only serves to suit  Prime Minister Netanyahu’s obsession with stamping out Palestinian  political activism. He is blinded by his own ideological hallucinations  and fixations to see that he can bring neither peace nor security.  Netanyahu’s recent threat to take unilateral action such as annexing all  Israeli settlements on Palestinian land if the Palestinians  unilaterally seek world recognition of a state has underscores these  manias. He has even said that Israel would limit water supplies and  restrict Palestinian use of Israeli ports for trade and commercial  purposes. Netanyahu’s opening volley is the Knesset’s newly passed law  authorizing Israel&#8217;s Supreme Court to strip anyone convicted of  espionage, treason or aiding the enemy during war of their citizenship &#8211;  a gross display of Israel’s arrogance of power. This move is indeed a  dangerous turn for all Israeli Palestinians.</p>
<p>What American and  European reaction to Israeli intentions to carry out its threats can  Palestinians expect? The Palestinian leadership can only contemplate  this as it watches other Arab leaders ingratiate themselves with the U.S  and vie for the title of most important U.S. ally. This shows that Arab  leaders are simply ignorant of how contemptuous most Americans are of  them, and how little understood is their cultural and political status  in the U.S.  Furthermore, American ignorance is equaled by European  attitudes toward the mainstream Arab leadership, and of which are  permeated with utter indecisiveness. The EU only scurries about  dispatching emissaries to Tel Aviv and Ramallah, make blaring  declarations from Brussels, fund a few projects and then, more or less,  leave it at that. European leaders are not taking unilateral Palestinian  moves toward statehood seriously – hence their cool reception to PA  intentions to push for a vote at the United Nations next September.</p>
<p>Today,  the U.S. is consumed in denial about Israel’s treacherous policies and  its shocking behavior toward the Palestinians, as well as the intense  efforts of its defenders to force the U.S. to turn away from Israeli  outrages. Israel is so sure that it can maintain its current policies in  the Palestinian territories and offer no incentive to make any  concessions to the Palestinians as long as it receives the billions of  dollars in gratis U.S. aid.  The U.S. is not prepared, and never will  be, to link U.S. aid to Israeli compliance with international law. Thus  American officials flaunt their ignorance when they out rightly deny  Israel’s brutality and the stark realities of its occupation; they are  ever so intimidated by the Israel lobby that they are afraid to confront  those realities.</p>
<p>Yet, in light of the aforementioned realities,  it appears that Israel’s Netanyahu may have his back to the wall. He is  uncomfortably aware that Israelis live in dangerous times considering  today’s political rumblings shaking the Arab world. There is no doubt  that he fears Israel’s international isolation. On the other hand, maybe  he fears that the PA may ultimately collapse, forcing Israel to  reoccupy major Palestinian towns and cities thereby incurring severe  financial strain on the Jewish state and leaving Israel to face violent  Palestinian resistance.</p>
<p>These haunting consequences have forced  Netanyahu to unfold another so called “Peace Plan” possibly during his  upcoming address at the AIPAC conference in Washington. This “new spin”  envisions the establishment of a Palestinian state with provisional  borders comprising about half of the West Bank with the deferment of any  talk on core issues to a more opportune time. To the Israelis, the term  provisional really signifies permanence. Netanyahu makes this move  because he has no real policy, or it could be that maybe he does in fact  have one – to prevent the establishment of any sovereign Palestinian  state, and to enlarge and strengthen the settlements – in effect  perpetuating Israel as apartheid, and a garrison state.</p>
<p>It will  be obvious to the Palestinians that such a plan will have nothing to do  with peace. It only serves to stall any negotiations, as Netanyahu will  act to leverage these until the Palestinians accept outrageous Israeli  demands and requirements &#8211; i.e. recognize Israel as a state of the  Jewish people. If one looks at the fine print they will see that  Netanyahu’s scheme is not really new. It actually is a take from a  combination of already failed plans of the past under Ariel Sharon and  Ehud Barak, which also gave the Palestinians barely half of the West  Bank and under suppressing conditions. Netanyahu knows that time is  running out for Israel and so it must pull all the stops to deny a  Palestinian state whose existence will force him to settle the issues of  borders, settlements, and a land corridor to Gaza, the status  Jerusalem, and sharing water resources. He would be happy to drag out  any negotiations until there is nothing left to negotiate. Make no  mistake; this is what his real intentions are. The man has to act to  appease his right wing government so he can hold on to power.</p>
<p>These  exigencies are now shaking the PA leadership into some introspection.  They know that they cannot continue to allow themselves to be  continually bombarded by double-speak from the Americans, whom the  Palestinians feel, are pointing a gun to their head. The PA leadership  also realizes that they will need to counter Israel’s policy of  encouraging internal strife among the Palestinians. This is what makes  Palestinian political unity ever so urgent. The PA leadership must face  the inevitable – reconciliation with Hamas is imperative. This is why  young Palestinians go out into the streets in Ramallah and Gaza alike.  Unity is not only in the interests of the Palestinians, it also serves  the interests of the Israeli state. Enlightened Israelis know this well.</p>
<p>The  determined show of diplomatic independence and its campaign to get  international recognition of their state will indeed pose a challenge  for the Palestinian leadership. They cannot wait for Israeli actions,  which will sooner or later, take the Palestinians over the brink. What  their leadership must do is prepare to undertake nothing less than a  strategy that will mean a conclusive diplomatic battle with Israel. To  effect this, the Palestinians must not be deterred by their past  mistakes. They cannot afford to look back. The PA must play their  strategic hand and realize that Israel has no more cards to deal.</p>
<p>Most of all, Palestinians have to realize that they too, live in dangerous times.</p>
<p><em>&#8211;  Mikail Jubran is Palestinian pro-reformist advocate and a specialist on  Palestinian political affairs in Ramallah, Palestine. He served as the  Director of Communications with the Palestine Liberation Organization’s  mission in Washington, DC from 1988-1993, and now divides his residence  between Ramallah and Washington, DC. He contributed this article to  PalestineChronicle.com.</em></p>
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