Abbas's Decison Signals Need for Implementation Not Negotiations for Two State Solution

President Abbas's decision not to seek another term as head of the Palestinian Authority complicates issues but it also clarifies them. The announcement comes at the end of a turbulent few weeks that saw President Obama humiliate him in New York by asking him to a photo op with Prime Minister Netanyahu and then ordering him to withdraw support for the Goldstone report, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lecturing him in Abu Dhabi and then lavishing praise on Mr. Netanyahu for the unprecedented act that the right-wing Israeli has yet to take.

The Israelis and the Americans couldn't dream of finding a better Palestinian leader than Abbas.
The Palestinian leader has also been kicked around by radical Palestinians and the Islamic Hamas movement for his unwavering faith in a peace process that seems to be politics as usual in yet another spineless U.S. administration.

The Israelis, the Americans, the international community and any genuine proponent of a negotiated settlement to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict couldn't dream of finding a better Palestinian leader. Mr. Abbas has publicly attacked his own party's hot heads declaring his opposition to the militarization of the intifada. He also mocked Hamas for its useless rockets against Israel and convinced delegates to the Sixth Fatah convention that nonviolent negotiations are the way forward.

Mr. Abbas's frustration is understandable. Instead of the other parties responding to his moderation, they interpreted them as a reflection of the weak party to the conflict. Palestinians might be weak but they are clearly stubborn on what it is that they will not concede on.

In his public statement Thursday, Mr. Abbas laid out his own red lines: an independent state on the 67 borders including East Jerusalem and a fair solution to the refugee problem. By restating that position he has declared a shift in the paradigm. Instead of negotiations leading to a solution, he has said that his involvement in any negotiations has to be based on how to implement this universally accepted two-state solution.

Late last month, Mr. Abbas signed a decree announcing the Jan. 24 date for presidential and parliamentary elections. Two weeks earlier, he had also signed the Egyptian reconciliation agreement with Hamas in which he was willing to accept a six-month postponement of such elections if there is reconciliation. The Hamas refusal to sign that document left him with little choice but to carry out the constitutional mandate. Mr. Abbas, of course, has not resigned. Any such resignation will mean that the Hamas-supported, recently released by Israel, speaker of the Palestinian legislative council, will become president for 60 days until new elections take place.

The announcement that he will not seek another term becomes crucial only if elections will indeed take place. In 2006, Mr. Abbas refused all suggestions to the contrary and organized elections that led to the overwhelming victory for Islamists. While his and other Palestinian Liberation Organization nationalists will certainly win, it is highly unlikely that he will go ahead with such elections without Gaza's participation and without some type of national unity agreement.

Credit: New York Times, "Room for Debate"

 

Follow Daoud Kuttab on Twitter: www.twitter.com/daoudkuttab

Comments

[Macready]

"yet another spineless U.S. administration"

you are so right Daoud . . .

[alexa07]

"The announcement comes at the end of a turbulent few weeks that saw President Obama humiliate him in New York by asking him to a photo op with Prime Minister Netanyahu and then ordering him to withdraw support for the Goldstone report, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lecturing him in Abu Dhabi and then lavishing praise on Mr. Netanyahu for the unprecedented act that the right-wing Israeli has yet to take."

One glaring mistake after another in regard to Palestine by the Obama people that keeps in motion all the influences they probably do not want to be strengthened--more international satellite news coverage & condemnation of Israeli brutalities; increased BDS pressures against Israeli business interests; more bilateral agreements between other nations in the region & elsewhere that don't consider US interests; more criticism of US hypocrisy & double standards in regard to Israeli nukes; the world disappointed by yet another fiasco & missed opportunities for peace in the region.

[doughnut70]

Of course you leave out the biggest problem with your argument. Neither Abbas or any other Arab leader of any stature currently supports a Jewish State with any borders that includes the "right of return" and other privileges that allow Israel to continue in the role it was created for to be a homeland and a haven for the Jewish people. Until they do that, no discussions over borders can go anywhere because no matter what compromises Israel might make, they won't put a stop tot he violence.

[Daoud Kuttab - Huffpost Blogger]

To the contrary, Abbas does recongise Israel within the 1967 borders just like the rest of the world including the US. Whether Israel is a Jewish state or a secular state is something that its citizens must agree. As far as I know 20% of the population are not Jewish and there has yet to be agreement in Israel about who is a Jew?

[BubbaC33]

Your answer is a bit disingenuous, Hamas and Hezbollah are each dedicated to the destruction of Israel. Syria does not recognize Israel inside any borders.

[nkhogan]

Thanks again for your column. This is a great repsonse as well to the poster above.

I always appreciate your updates and analysis on the situation and I really wish the Palestinians all the best. May you get your state soon.

[BubbaC33]

No mention was made of an independent Palestinian state during the almost twenty years the West Bank was controlled by Jordan. It only became fashionable after Israel took the West Bank durng the 1967 war. The simple fact of the matter is the Arabs want to achieve in talks what they cannot achieve on the battlefield. And Israel would be foolish to give up any of the West Bank or Jerusaelm.
The author of this article and most pundits ignore a very simple historic fact. A homeland for Arabs has been in existence since 1922. Transjordan was created to serve as a kingdom for the Hashemite allies of the Brits and as a homeland for those Arabs who did not want to live among the Jews. In simpler terms, a two-state solution has been in existence for over80 years.

[Daoud Kuttab - Huffpost Blogger]

Before 1967 the Jordanian government didn't confiscate private Palestinian lands to settle Jordanian beduins. No foreign military troops occupied the west bank, set up checkposts or controlled the air, land and sea and movement within Palestinian territories. An independent Palestinian state was not necessary because Palestine is considered part of Greater Syria and the Arab world and therefore a specific state was an internal issue and not an external one.

[BubbaC33]

Again your answer is disingenuous. Jordan occupied the West Bank for almost twenty years and did not create or allow a Palestinian state. Whether it was an internal or external issue is just a smokescreen you have used to hide a fundamental fact, there was no effort made to create a Palestinian state on the West Bank during the almost 20 years the Jordanians controlled the territory.
Your reply to my posting is greatly appreciated, it was nice of you to take the time to reply. Here is something for you to consider. Israel exists within borders that provide the strategic depth necessary for our defense. Considering the actions our Arab neighbors have taken and the ones they have not taken we would be foolish to believe the time of Arab adventurism had come to an end.
Two things. Jordan was created in 1922 to provide a kingdom for the Hashemite allies of the Brits and to serve as a homeland for those Arabs unwilling to live among the Jews. The area for this creation was taken from eretz Israel, not Greater Syria.

[eileenflemingWAWA]

On 11/5/09, BBC reported:

Palestinians might have to abandon the goal of an independent state if Israel continues to expand Jewish settlements, Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator said, "It may be time for President Abbas to tell his people the truth, that with the continuation of settlement activities, the two-state solution is no longer an option."

Erekat dismissed Netanyahu's, 'generous offer' saying it only opened the door to more settlements and that "Israel has the choice, settlements or peace."

Erekat also said Palestinians made a mistake in the last round of talks by agreeing to negotiate without insisting that Israel settlement building be stopped, and added this time things would be different, meaning the alternative for Palestinians is to "refocus their attention on the one-state solution where Muslims, Christians and Jews can live as equals" as they would in true democracies.

All the settlements are illegal under international law which states occupation is to be temporary, maintain the status quo and that the occupiers are not to transfer their population into occupied territory.

International law has also deemed The Wall illegal which divides Palestinians from Palestinians with 25 to 30 foot high concrete slabs or wire equipped with razor barbs, trenches, sniper towers, military roads, electronic surveillance, remote controlled infantry and buffer zones that stretch over 100 miles wide and deny Palestinians access to their land, families, jobs, holy sites and resources.

http://www.wearewideawake.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1479&Itemid=226

[BubbaC33]

Israel has every right to hold and even to annex the West Bank. Despite your flawed analysis, a nation can hold territory taken in the course of a defensive war. Contrary to popular myth, Israel fought a defensive war in 1967. The Egyptians fired the first shots of the war during the illegal closing of the Straits of Tiran.

[doughnut70]

It should also be pointed out that the original Balfour declaration which was legally binding under international law gave israel the entire area of Palestine (about three times their current size). Israel is not trying to take territory from their neighbors. If they were, they would have taken more than they have when they had the upper hand and wouldn't have been so quick to give back things like the Suez Canal which clearly could have been used as a chip for a lot more territory if nothing else.

[Tony Andrews]

Bubba,

Not according to the Geneva Conventions, to which Israel is signatory, nor according to the International Court of Justice, which has ruled the occupations built since 1967 illegal.