Israel wants a weak and submissive authority

Written by: Nihad Abu Ghosh

There is a debate in many international and local circles about what the government of Israel is pushing for of a total collapse of power, because of its extremist program, its most extreme and brutal behavior, and its clear efforts to resolve the conflict on the ground by armed force, iron, fire, bulldozers, and other measures of Judaization, settlement, oppression, and piracy of Palestinian funds, by unilateral decisions taken by institutions. Occupation without negotiations and in isolation from any international resolutions.

The reality is that the parties to the current Israeli government do not agree on a unified stance towards the PA. There are those who do not mind dissolving and undermining it, as Smotrich and his partner Ben Jvir openly announce, as the former calls in his program to replace the PA with local and regional bodies elected by the Palestinians in proportion to their tribal and clan reality. Because, in his opinion, they do not constitute a people and do not have national rights, but Benjamin Netanyahu and his party (Likud) do not necessarily share all of the extreme right's views, and like the parties to the previous government, they prefer that the Palestinian Authority remain weak and submissive.

The Palestinian National Authority arose as a result of the Oslo Accords on the one hand, and by a decision of the bodies of the Palestine Liberation Organization, specifically the Palestinian Central Council in its session held in Tunis in October 1993, four weeks after the signing of the Oslo Accords. From President Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, in the presence of US President Bill Clinton and the testimony of the US and Russian foreign ministers.

Although the aforementioned agreement was concluded in extremely bad international and regional circumstances for the Arabs and the Palestinians, and it came immediately after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the first international war on Iraq, the Palestinian leadership found in the agreement at that time an opportunity to establish a foothold on the homeland, and to save the Palestinian cause from erasure and liquidation. It wagered on the existence of a serious Israeli desire for peace and settlement, as evidenced by the results of the Israeli elections in 1992 that brought the Labor Party government.

But Israel, experienced in negotiations, in control of the land and supported absolutely by the victorious United States in the two wars (cold against the Soviet Union and bloody against Iraq) planted the aforementioned agreement with dozens of clear and vague clauses, in addition to mines that can explode at every moment, making it general, loose and wide-ranging. The stronger party, which is Israel, controls its interpretation and implementation, and the Palestinian side - according to the memoirs of a number of those who negotiated the agreement, stood behind it and drafted it - were in the utmost haste, and neglected essential items and points (such as the issues of settlement, prisoners, and the political relationship with Jerusalem and Jerusalemites) and it was possible to achieve achievements And significant breakthroughs in these areas would have occurred if the Palestinian position had held together a bit and showed some firmness, which was also revealed by the memoirs of Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres and their aides.

The Palestinian Authority, and the Palestinian people in general, remained subject to the pressure and blackmail of the Israeli governments, which used all their tools and strengths to subdue the Palestinians and demand them to make political concessions. In this context, Israel's control over the Palestinian funds that were supplied to the Palestinian treasury through clearing, was the easiest and most effective weapon. Even used to punish the authority for its domestic and international political stances, such as the formation of the tenth government headed by Ismail Haniyeh, then the national unity government, through joining the Rome Protocol and the International Criminal Court, and insisting on paying the salaries of martyrs and prisoners, up to the recent draft resolution in the United Nations for the International Court of Justice referendum. regarding the occupation and its practices. In addition to hacking clearing funds.

Israel also used the issues of prisoners and mass arrests, control of water, crossings, import and export, and even invasions of areas classified (A) and its control of the main roads and entrances to cities and villages, and access to VIP cards as tools to blackmail the authority.

Israel rejects the PA being the nucleus of a national project that aims for freedom and independence. It does not recognize the Palestinians as a people with political rights, but as a population with subsistence rights only. Therefore, the occupying state fights any manifestation of actual sovereignty, such as control over land, water, airspace, borders, and the electromagnetic field. Of course, it does not care about the manifestations of sovereignty and formal splendor that our officials are keen on, such as honorary titles, privileges, and escorts. At the same time, Israel and its main currents do not favor the collapse of the Authority because its survival brings Israel a number of benefits, most notably the exemption of the occupying state from any responsibility towards more than five million Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza, and the occupation is not interested in returning to managing the traffic system in the streets of Palestinian cities, nor to managing Education and health. The occupation aspires to reduce the PA's role in the security and economic functions, in a way that contributes to protecting Israel's security. Prior to that, the occupying state is concerned with continuing to mislead the world and make it believe that there is an ongoing political process. ), and that everything must be resolved through negotiations, not through the United Nations or international courts, and this is exactly the flimsy argument used by the United States and its Western allies to support the Israeli position and always vote for it.

So Israel wants the authority to remain, but it wants it to be submissive and weak, and unable to take decisive national decisions, just like a patient who continues his life depending on means of resuscitation and injections. Changing the functions of the authority and confining it to the service side, instead of this weak authority swallowing up the Liberation Organization and with it the factions of the Palestinian national movement.