What Remains Of The Country

Azmi Bishara     Al-Hayat     2003/08/7

For reasons that are too obvious to be explained, the vanquished political mind is divided into two main streams: challenging reality by denying its existence and considering any contact with it as an acceptance of failure on one hand, and dealing with the political reality represented in a pragmatic attitude, and based on refusing the logic of submission to power, which would only boost that power's arrogance. A number of Palestinians and Arabs have openly promoted the idea of failure, as if we were facing some sort of a conflict between armies and forces that are equally powerful; as if the struggle against the occupation did not embody a just cause; as if Israel had triumphed in this confrontation. Some Palestinians thought that by agreeing to a ceasefire, the Palestinians were admitting their defeat. Those who claim this do it with the same logic when they used to say "We triumphed" in Beirut in 1982 over Sharon. Those who claim this should not be surprised when Mofaz pretends that the fact that the Palestinians accepted the ceasefire is a result of Israel's victory and persistence in making the Palestinians understand it was in their best interest to cave in to Israeli superiority. The truth is there is no such thing as an Israeli military superiority in an occupied-occupying relationship.

However, the logic of submitting to the arrogance of force is not considered as such, knowing that it is making an effort towards more achievements. In order to do that, all it has to do is change the goal, forget about people and itself and the cause that was once the source of legitimacy in dealing with politics amid people whose nation was taken away from them, whereas the remaining part of it crawls under occupation: the cause of liberation. If one would like to participate in the dialogue regarding the last steps in the details of the achievements that showed in the American admiration for some person or in the smile or laugh of the American President due to a certain incident, all one needs to do is change his orientation and adopt a different logic from that of the issue from which the legitimacy of dealing with politics under the occupation originally emerges. If one were not to do that, then he would become literally "clueless." Imagine yourself, dear reader, clueless in a party full of movements and chaos you know nothing about. This is how the Palestinian people feel.

How can we view the release of Palestinians prisoners following the latest Israeli pattern as an achievement? First, we need to keep in mind that Israel organizes a series of administrative arrest campaigns, which it turns into a cause enabling it to make "good-will gestures." Then, we need to suppose that the "world" does not have time for details such as the fact that most of them were about to finish their administrative arrest period in a short while anyhow, knowing that Israel has no specific charges against them as to prosecute them, and that there are too many prisoners inside Israeli prisons. Then, we need to remember that Israel makes daily declarations according to which the purpose behind these releasing the detainees is to help the new Palestinian Authority on the Palestinian scene: "We realize how sensitive the detainees' cause is to them," (they are always talking about the Palestinian guests that the Israeli official had just met), and the Palestinian party has pointed out how sensitive this matter is to them." If the goal is redefined as such, as to enhance the position of the Palestinian leadership that has started implementing the Roadmap, then the release of these detainees becomes an achievement. And so is the visit to the White House. Why? Because it paves the way for the return of the American-Palestinian honeymoon. In fact, the Palestinian political society has always bragged about Yasser Arafat having set Palestinian records in entering the White House compared to the rest of the world leaders, regardless of the U.S. President's womanly occupations while waiting for the delegation to enter the oval office or rectangular office, and the devil knows why we ought to know their shape. Anyway, what did these honeymoons come to? Apparently, the Palestinian institution was busy and charmed with the sheer fact of visiting the White House as to realize or assess the course of the U.S.-Palestinian relationship and to decide whether the visit itself were a real political achievement.

The Palestinians are facing now a similar situation, as some of them are trying to squeeze their minds as to find the political Palestinian achievement ever since they accepted the Roadmap without any terms and with such enthusiasm, but they find nothing except for visits and promises of finance. The visit is the achievement of the new government, meaning that it enhances its position and diplomatic relations, as well as its international legitimacy in order to enable it to implement its share of the Roadmap. No more or less. Moreover, the government does understand this fact, unlike Arafat who misread the objective of visiting the White House. Arafat did not understand that the whole point was to reward him for having changed and encourage him to continue. It was not to show that the White House had changed, and certainly not that Arafat was going to be indulged. This mistake cost him a lot when he started asking for indulgence and refusing suggestions in Camp David.

Needless to say that the promised money also serves the same goal in two aspects: first, to enable the new government to form security forces capable of maintaining "security and order" and to recruit unemployed people, hence gaining the support of larger social categories amid the unbearable economic recession hitting the poor and middle classes equally.

What is the price of these achievements that are all about enabling the Palestinian leadership to lead? The price is to reduce the Palestinian national project into a government project that has become obvious. This country has started as a slogan of a national Palestinian authority over any liberated region, then became a state over any liberated region, then a Palestinian state according to the borders of June 4, with Jerusalem as its capital, and the right of return, until we came to the state of Sharon and Bush and their terms to implement the establishment of this country, and then to acknowledge that the Palestinian resistance is terrorism that is being negotiated on the Palestinian level and oppressed on the Israeli one, waiting for the authority to reign and impose its power before Israel runs out of patience.

According to Bush's logic, the Palestinian state is the reward awaiting the Palestinians at the end of the road, or the tunnel, in case they respond to the Israeli and American terms. However, if they were to do it, they would lose any ability to affect the decision regarding this State, its nature, borders and coexistence with the settlements on its territory, as well as its relations with its Arab entourage. The U.S. and Israel will decide the borders of this country in bilateral negotiations.

On the Israeli level, the Palestinian pragmatism was interpreted as a triumph of Sharon's logic. While there is no other alternative now for the Labor party but the project of the separating racist wall, and while Sharon is still investing his force and "surviving" the unorganized Palestinian pressure, the Israeli Premier, who failed on both security and economic level, is seen as a politically successful person in the eyes of his people, as Palestinians are doing nothing but retreat facing him.

According to Israel, the Palestinian party should show more maturity in this new situation of his, as to accept the "Israeli compromises" such as releasing the tax money, releasing a number of detainees, facilitating the arrival of financial assistance and facilitating the formation of security bodies, as well as handing the Palestinian administration this or that city as to reach a similar situation to that of October 2000 in an amended way. This would pave the way for a temporary Palestinian state that would last for a long time on 40 per cent of the West Bank, in exchange for abandoning the right to return. As for the other rights, Israel will surely not accept them, but no one will demand the Palestinians to give them up in the next 15 years. It is a Palestinian State that will not even resolve the problem of settlements.

If the promised Palestinian state does not include a solution for the most important elements of the Palestinian cause, as to make up for the historical injustice, then what is left of it as a national Palestinian project? And what distinguishes the conflict over the power from that over the state? The difference is unclear and the relation between this conflict and the justice for the Palestinians is even less obvious.