Opinion | Columnists
West finances the occupation
The aid the Palestinians receive from the West helps Israel continue the occupation and encourages Palestinian corruption.
- By As'ad Abdul Rahman, Special to Gulf News
- Published: 23:51 August 22, 2008
- Image Credit: Photo Illustration: Dwynn Trazo/Gulf News
People are fed up now with the repeated statements by some Palestinian leaders that they have no other choice but to continue negotiations with Israel, which - they tell us - are futile, anyway. Many, including some officials of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), are aware of the fact that Israel uses negotiations as a means to buy time to change facts on the ground in East Jerusalem and wide areas in the West Bank, swallowing more Palestinian land to spread the cancerous colonies and confiscate water and other natural sources.
What makes astonished observers even more astonished is that several PNA and Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) officials openly declare their inability to continue such negotiations, especially now that the Israeli policies seem to "punish" the moderate Fatah by their continued war in the West Bank and "reward" the "terrorist" Hamas with a "truce" in the Gaza Strip.
On the other hand, more than one senior Palestinian official confirmed that the leadership was about to take a decision concerning the few available options to confront Israel's policies and practices. On its part, the White House has declared that the United States is still continuing its efforts to push both parties to reach an agreement before the Bush presidency comes to an end.
Recently, the world media astounded us by using such words as "begging" and "beseeching" while commenting on the financial crisis that the PNA is going through as Western and Arab contributing states are not fulfilling their commitments. The PNA is on the brink of bankruptcy.
Indeed, many observers blame the Palestinian leadership for placing all its eggs in the American-Israeli basket. That is where a prominent figure of the Palestinian intelligentsia, the controversial Professor Sari Nusseibeh, has demanded that the Europeans and the Americans "stop their financial aid to the PNA".
For this aid, as Nusseibeh describes it, does nothing but "support Israeli occupation", keeping the Palestinians under Israeli hegemony and "encouraging PNA corruption".
Israel should not make use of American and European financial aid in continuing its occupation, Nusseibeh adds. "Such aid must be coupled with serious negotiations to bring an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem."
With such a call by a well-known and a very moderate friend of the West (and the Israelis) the Western world has to realise the major defect in its present policy. In fact, the greatest beneficiary of Western financial aid to the PNA, therefore, is the Israeli economy, not the Palestinian. The contributing countries are, actually, financing the occupation and exempting Israel from its legal and financial responsibilities towards the Occupied Territories.
Not a secret
In this context, one construes that Israel wants the PNA to play two roles: (a) that of a security agent for Israel, and (b) the civil local Authority that takes care of the humanitarian duties towards the people of the West Bank and Gaza; duties that are legally those of the Israeli occupiers.
Although this plan is not a secret, some PNA figures prefer to put their heads in the sand when people protest against the negotiations that do not seem to have an end. An increasing number of Palestinian politicians and writers rightly demand that negotiations with Israel must be strictly regulated by a defined mechanism and timetable.
Should such negotiations come to an impasse, the so called "peace process" must be terminated, followed, perhaps, with the dissolving of the PNA itself. It is obvious, though, that certain figures in the PNA, specifically within the present Salam Fayad government are unable to take a firm stance regarding negotiations. "For taking the slightest serious position will lead to the discontinuation of the international financial aid".
The PNA should stop contacts with Israel. In fact, within the PNA, there is a growing demand for telling the whole world soon that it is time for the PNA to be dissolved. The present Fayad government was formed after the "brotherly rift" between Fatah and Hamas.
To confront the Israeli occupation and its policies, no Palestinian government can move forward without total national and political support. This is why it is vitally important on the part of the Palestinians to do their best to achieve their national goals.
One is moved to ask if this can be achieved by dissolving the Authority which has been shackled with so many humiliating agreements. In this context, it is necessary to remember that the PNA was founded with the purpose of negotiating an end to the occupation. As it has failed to fulfil its purpose, with the occupation refusing to budge, one wonders if there is any more need for negotiations or for the PNA itself.
Besides, is it not time to move the fin-ancial burden back on Israel? As Israel refuses to recognise the basic rights of the Palestinians, making the PNA a mere "intermediary bank" that receives money from the West and spends it practically on helping the continued Zionist occupation, is it not wise to expose this fact by dismantling the PNA? And perhaps by reviving the spirit of the first civil and peaceful Palestinian intifada?
Professor As'ad Abdul Rahman is the Chairman of the Palestinian Encyclopedia.
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