Palestine does not have to be a lost cause
Yes, I know, that’s an unthinkable concession to the reality of Israel’s existence for some and perhaps many dispossessed Palestinians at present, but it does not necessarily have to be the end of the right of return story. Why not? Because it’s not impossible that after a generation (perhaps two) of living side by side in peace with the Palestinians in a mini state of their own, many Israeli Jews would conclude, or at least be open to the idea, that there should be one democratic state for all, possibly in a confederation with Jordan, with equal political and human rights for all. In that event the right of return would be an issue that could be re-visited.
A first statement by a restructured and re-invigorated PNC could also say that in its view the best solution to the problem of Jerusalem is for it to be an open, undivided city and the capital of two states.
If I was drafting a first statement for a new PNC, I would also have it address head-on one of Zionism’s most absurd propaganda claims – the assertion that a Palestinian mini state would pose a threat to Israel’s existence. Even an armed Palestinian state neither would nor could. Why was explained to me many years ago by Arafat. When I raised with him the Israeli assertion, he began his answer with a question. “Do you really think we Palestinians are that stupid?” He went on to say that if a Palestinian mini state initiated any military or violent action against Israel, or even if it failed to prevent a terrorist attack on Israel by Palestinian dissidents from within its own borders, Israel would retaliate massively, perhaps even to the point of crushing the Palestinian state out of existence. Arafat’s main point was that after so many years of struggle and sacrifice to get a mini state, the Palestinians would not be stupid enough to give Israel’s leaders a pretext to take it away from them and close the Palestine file for ever.
It seems to me that the policy guidelines for a new and credible Palestinian leadership answerable to a reconstructed and re-invigorated PNC are, or ought to be, clear. There is absolutely no point in seeking to negotiate with insufferably self-righteous and deluded Israeli leaders who are not remotely interested in peace on terms the vast majority of Palestinians (and also most other Arabs and Muslims everywhere) could accept.
One explanation of why there is no point in negotiating with Israel’s leaders is provided my Jewish friend, Professor Moshe Machover (with whom I do not always agree). Born in Tel Aviv, he started out in Israel politics on the Left and then gave up, moving to academia in London in 1968, where still today he is a champion of the need for international resistance to Zionist colonization. In an article for The Cambridge Student in December last year, he wrote this:
“Israeli leaders realized they could exploit the situation of the PLO leaders and, by dangling in front of them vague political promises as well as granting them some real personal privileges, get them to serve, in effect, as proxies for Israel in controlling and suppressing the Palestinian masses.
“At that point, Israel departed from its previous policy of not talking to the PLO. Instead, it embarked on a strategy of an endless so-called ‘peace process’. This is how it goes. At each stage, Israel demands new concessions from the Palestinian side. If the latter balks at making these concessions in full, Israel breaks off the talks and blames the Palestinians for being extreme and intransigent. If the Palestinians accept, then Israel, making few if any actual concessions, finds some other excuse to prolong the process. A favourite Israeli ploy is to strike at Palestinian targets, for example assassinating leaders it describes as ‘terrorists’. If some Palestinian group responds by killing Israelis, then Israel can break off the ‘peace process’ and blame the Palestinians. Meantime Israeli colonization of the occupied territory proceeds at full steam, thus creating new facts on the ground. Next time the negotiations resume, the concessions made by the PLO at the previous round are taken as the new starting point, and Israel demands fresh concessions. And so it goes.”
Even more so in the light of Al Jazeera’s revelations, it follows, or so I believe, that the policy of a new and credible Palestinian leadership should concentrate on educating and mobilizing the citizens of nations, the Western nations most of all and America in particular, to press their governments to do whatever is necessary to end Israel’s occupation. A real commitment to do so by the governments of the major powers led by the U.S. is the absolute prerequisite for a real peace process.
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