The Wind of Change

unpublished

Suppose President Obama addresses the Knesset with the following,

“The wind of change is blowing through this region and whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact.. and our national policies must take account of it.

Well you understand this better than anyone, you are sprung from Europe, the home of nationalism, here in Israel you have yourselves created a free nation. A new nation. Indeed in the history of our times yours will be recorded as the first of the Jewish nationalists…

will the great experiments.. now being made.. prove so successful .. that the balance will come down in favour of freedom and order and justice? .. What is now on trial is much more than our military strength or our diplomatic and administrative skill. It is our way of life. The uncommitted nations want to see before they choose.”

Replace region with continent, Israel and Jewish with Africa and African and you get extracts from Harold Macmillan's "Wind of Change" Speech, the prime minister of Britain delivered to the South African parliament in Cape Town in 1960.

In 1962, the UN General Assembly adopted resolution 1761 condemning apartheid South Africa and calling for economic and military boycotts. It only took Australia 23 years to conform, when the world progressively served economic, sports, cultural and academic boycotts.

Australia was not alone in dragging its’ feet to embrace the freedom for the non-whites. The US and Britain considered the ANC terrorists and were protective of the apartheid state vetoing the imposition of UN economic sanctions on South Africa.

Tolerating Apartheid policies was a crime then as it is today. Except the world has evolved in so many years, Australia itself ended racial discrimination policies in the mid 70s and the US civil rights movement prevailed not long before then.

The recent intense hostility to the global boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel offers three arguments; Israel policies are not that of apartheid, BDS measures extremist and anti-Semitic should give way to negotiations and that Palestinians themselves would be harmed by it.

In 2009, The Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa (HSRC) released a study confirming Israel policies conform to those of apartheid in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

The practices exhibit the three 'pillars' of apartheid. The first being laws and policies that establish Jewish identity for purposes of law and afford a preferential status and benefits to Jews over non-Jews. The second is to fragment the Palestinian territory to ensure Palestinians remain confined to the reserves designated for them while Israeli Jews enjoy freedom of movement. The third is Israel's invocation of 'security' to validate sweeping restrictions on Palestinian freedoms.

In reality, two people live on the land and only one government controls the lives of everyone that lives on it, always encompassing the “chosen ones” and that is the Israeli government.

Claiming BDS extremist and anti-Semitic is false and suggesting only negotiations would resolve the conflict is uninformed. Adopting non-violent measures of economic, academic and cultural boycott is exercising legitimate action to serve human rights and equality against those that commit or tolerate discrimination. Akin to the international movement that liberated the blacks in South Africa, national ones also delivered as in the case of the Montgomery Bus Boycott by the blacks in America and the Swadeshi movement which ended British colonialism in India. None were deemed anti-race then and not all Jews support Israel’s policies today.

The Palestine-Israel conflict is not a borders dispute, an ancient religious struggle or that of two waring countries. Palestine and Israel describe the exact geography representing two different peoples. Six decades on, the former seeking to exist while its people continue to be displaced and the latter fearing for its’ existence as its people continue to flock in. Dividing this geography denies the displaced their legitimate right of return to their homes and displaces even more to make the split happen.

The customary proposition to resort to negotiations is an insult to Palestinians after 63 years of suffering, last 20 out of which were devoted to empty negotiations. When the powerful and the powerless negotiate an ever expanding set of concessions emerge, but never peace. This is precisely what the leaked Palestinian papers showed us. Only global BDS can provide the essential non-violent balance.

Claims that Palestinians will be harmed are deceiving. In fact the Palestinian civil society called for BDS. Israelis’ of Palestinian origin living in their birthplace are considered 5^th column by many including the Moldavian-born Minister of Foreign affairs Avigdor Lieberman. Candidates for potential “transfer”, they have vested interest in ending their status as second class citizens in their own country. BDS has succeeded to end exactly that. The rest, behind a concrete wall in the West bank or under siege in Gaza, have nothing to lose. Claims of damaging the economic prosperity of the West bank or preventing Israeli medical help for Gaza can surely be tolerated, as neither ever truly existed.

In the age of universal human rights, acts of colonisation, collective punishment and discrimination must end. The age of global social justice and global social media, gives everyone everywhere a choice. The wind of change is blowing, and time may judge those making the wrong choice harshly.

Amin Abbas

Diaspora Palestinian 

12th April 2011

We have a Dream!

Unpublished

Forty-five years ago, on the 28th of August 1963 to be exact, Martin Luther King Junior stood in front of a crowd of many thousands at the Lincoln memorial and said  “I have a dream”. That memorable line came to signify the greatest demonstration in the history of his nation, the march on Washington for jobs and freedom.

Dr King, the preacher, Nobel peace prize winner and undisputed leader of the US civil rights movement, came to the fore almost two centuries  after the US declaration of independence. Enshrining the people's inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, the application of this model document for modern liberty had its shortcomings when it came to the negro. But a prevalent culture of racial discrimination couldn’t withstand the upheaval that began  with Rosa Parks on an Alabama bus. The inspiration of Gandhi and the philosophy of Satyagraha, or non-violent resistance, prevailed, and America had its Civil Rights Act.

Forty-five years on, the face of American racial equality  still bears its scars and blemishes. The riots in Los Angeles after the beating of  Rodney King and the havoc in New Orleans post-Katrina exposed the dream's fragility. Yet the very real prospect of a black man as 44th president raises the hope that the majority of Americans may  truly have overcome on the question of race.

Dr King affirmed the power of non-violent resistance. Be it ending colonial rule in India or equality and civil rights in the US or South Africa, the moral standing of the oppressed can overpower the brutality of the oppressor. In addition to the obvious drive to end an ideology of subjugation, Dr King’s struggle challenged three notions; the doctrine of "separate but equal"; the idea of peace as the absence of conflict rather than the presence of justice; and the shallow understanding of people of good will. All three bear relevance to  the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Often misunderstood as a case of two warring countries and peoples, this is in reality a case of a place with two names. Controlled by one government, that of Israel, the inhabitants belong to one of two crowds, A and B. Crowd A rules, crowd B is ruled; crowd A has access to all roads, crowd B has access to some roads; crowd A can live anywhere, crowd B can live somewhere; crowd A has the law of return, crowd B has no right of return; crowd A has full rights and crowd B may have some basic rights.  

In the late 80s, when crowd B, the Palestinians, embarked on their own spontaneous non-violent resistance, the first Intifada, the  Israeli military failed to suppress it. The rapid successes of the popular resistance led the Israeli leadership to adopt the strategy of "separate but equal", encapsulated in the dreadful Oslo accords that Israel declined to even honour. Since then the Israelis have extended this approach with their one-sided disengagement from Gaza and the building of the walls of separation. Unlike Dr King and his movement, the Palestinian leadership failed to grasp that privileged groups seldom give up those privileges voluntarily, and that separate was not equal.

Dr King’s movement rejected calls to soft-pedal their resistance for the sake of easing tension. From Dr King’s perspective, it was always the absence of peace and justice that caused conflict, not the other way around. The status quo is never an option for those under oppression.  For today’s Palestinians, however, decades of Israeli occupation, economic misery and the residence of half their  population of around nine million  in  refugee camps are not perceived as sufficient to justify resistance. They constantly face total alienation by the United States, Europe and the subservient Arab regimes at  the slightest hint of unrest.

For Dr King, the shallow understanding of people of good will was more frustrating than the total misunderstanding of those of ill will. He didn’t tolerate the ignorant position of the white Christian leadership, and confronted the indifferent clergy of the intolerant South. The world's ignorance of and indifference to the rights of the Palestinians, living as sub-class citizens in their native land at best and stateless refugees at worst, is wrong and immoral. A world that preaches universal values of equality and is anxious to apologise to  native peoples for past colonial injustices has a duty to face up to the needs of Palestinians.

For their part, Palestinians must lay the terminal peace process and the stunted form of segregated governance it created to rest. They must reinvent inclusive organisations of resistance and mobilise at the grass roots to embrace a new way. They should study Gandhi, King and Mandela and what has been tried and worked.  A fresh blend of Satyagraha and Sumud, or steadfastness, must be the strategic and shortest path to Palestinian freedom.

Let us dream that one day, Palestinian children will be judged not by their race or creed but by the content of their character.

Amin Abbas

Diaspora Palestinian

August 2008

Historical fact the first casualty in Benjamin Netanyahu's outlook on expansion

Published (The Australian)
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/historical-fact-the-first-casualty-in-benjamin-netanyahus-outlook-on-expansion/story-e6frg6zo-1225849628004


MORE than 3000 years ago, the Bible tells us, Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt and through the wilderness to Mount Sinai. 
 
There, God gave them their laws and entered into a covenant with them, by which he would give them the land of Canaan in return for their faithfulness.

Last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a conference that "the Jewish people were building Jerusalem 3000 years ago and the Jewish people are building Jerusalem today".

Even if we take the Bible's account and Netanyahu's as isolated points on the spectrum of history, problems present themselves. After all, every serious scholar of the region is aware that non-Jews as well as Jews lived in the Holy Land in Moses's time, and that historical and archaeological evidence points to the ancient Philistines and Canaanites being among the ancestors of today's Palestinians.

What's more, a lot has happened in the intervening millennia, not the least being the building, cultivation and daily life by generation upon generation of Palestinians. Perhaps Netanyahu believes it is the divine promise, rather than the length of tenure, that matters. If he believes God is on his side in claiming all of Jerusalem, then one wonders why negotiate at all? This may explain Israeli willingness to ignore international law, UN resolutions and even basic human rights.

Netanyahu recently told his country's parliament that the establishment of Jewish neighbourhoods in no way hurt the Arabs of East Jerusalem.

From the late 1960s to this day, Jewish colonies have grown across East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Using murky tactics such as natural growth, Jewish names such as Ramat Shlomo, or calling them neighbourhoods does not obscure three facts: they are built on occupied land in breach of international law; they seriously impair the future development of the Palestinian people; and are exclusive to Jews.

Palestinians suffer variously from the confiscation of land; the removal of permits defining people as resident in Jerusalem, effectively deporting them; and the ever-present threat of demolition of homes Israel deems illegal.
In August last year, the Hanoun family were thrown out of their home in East Jerusalem's Sheik Jarrah district, where they had lived for more than 50 years. Their place was immediately taken by Jewish settlers. Were the Hanouns in no way hurt?
The people of al-Numan, a village between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, which now falls within Israel's greater Jerusalem municipality, were defined by Israel as West Bank -- not Jerusalem -- residents so they are now considered illegal residents in their own homes. Jerusalem is a city with two systems, one boosting what is Jewish and the other strangling what is Palestinian.

This is not a situation in which a stable majority claims precedence over a minority. In Israel, the majority group aspires to increase its own numbers and its hold on land, reducing the proportion of the minority within it (and some Israelis, such as Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, hope to end the minority's presence altogether).

Israel's Prime Minister is not ignorant on this, but sees himself as the leader of the Jewish people, rather than a state made up of Arabs and Jews, which controls the lives of millions of non-citizens through its occupation.

In defending the recent East Jerusalem settlement decisions, there are the five responses: settlements have been built for the past 42 years; this only extends existing Jewish areas; work won't start for three years; these areas are not intended to be returned anyway; and, obviously, Jews were there 3000 years ago. If the wrong is done long enough, upsized over time, occasionally with delayed execution and always ignoring the victim, there is no wrong in it anymore.

The recent Obama administration pressure on Netanyahu's government for an unambiguous freeze on settlement activity, including East Jerusalem, is long overdue, but the road of rocky relations between those involved won't end any time soon.

The world cannot continue to be a passive witness to segregation and ethnic discrimination blinded by diplomatic excuses and biblical promises. It is time international law and human rights extended even into those places Israeli Jews hold sacred.

Amin Abbas is a diaspora Palestinian

A pledge to submit, not belong

Published (National Times, The Age)
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/a-pledge-to-submit-not-belong-20101104-17fcr.html

"This country shall remain forever the home of the descendants of those people who came here in peace . . ."
"There is a deep-set difference, and we see no prospect of it ever being effaced. Nothing in the world can put these two races upon an equality. Nothing we can do by cultivation, by refinement, or by anything else will make some races equal to others . . ."

Whose words? The first statement is by Australia's wartime prime minister, John Curtin, and the second by its first prime minister, Edmund Barton, both reaffirming the White Australia Policy.

 

Fortunately for this country, the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 made the use of racial criteria for any official purpose illegal. In today's Israel, however, the prospect of the Knesset approving the controversial loyalty pledge promises to deliver two inseparable outcomes, one desired and one denied: first, the formal recognition of Israel as a Jewish state by its non-Jewish new citizens, and second, confirmation of Israel as an ethnocracy.

Israel calls itself a democracy while insisting that the rights of people of the faith supersede the rights of people of the land. Palestinians who have had to endure 60 years of being occupied, displaced or discriminated against, are now coerced – either through Israeli legislation or Israeli demands at the negotiating table – to formally recognise the cause of it all. The crux of the demand is for Palestinians to surrender the historic right to their homeland to any Jewish outsider wishing to call it his or her own.

Strangers taking over my house by force is catastrophic, me responding by handing them the deed is insane. Undoubtedly for Palestinians, recognising Israel as a Jewish state surpasses any other obstacle to peace. It is a preposterous proposition to abandon one's legitimate rights once and for all.

In fact, it is the 3 million voiceless Palestinian refugees in the neighbouring countries with everything to lose from this pledge. Many have held on to the keys of their homes since 1948 — keys unlocking bitter memories of displacement and hardships lived ever since, but still representing the longing and right to return. These keys will never unlock doors in the cities and villages of today's Israel, but clinging on to them and saying "no" to such proposals as the pledge are the only means left to preserve awareness of their plight.

As for ethnocracy, it is defined in the Webster's dictionary as a political regime instituted on the basis of qualified rights to citizenship, with ethnic affiliation, defined in terms of race, descent, religion, or language, as the distinguishing principle. In Israel's case, being Jewish is what grants one the privilege.

Israel, like other ethnocracies, is characterised by uncompromising control – the legal, institutional, and physical instruments of power deemed necessary to secure dominance of one ethnic group over all others.

Wars continue to shape and reshape the country's frontier. Land taken by force soon becomes buffer zones against new enemy lines, without the slightest consideration of the hardships inflicted on native populations. The state's actions are always to serve exclusively those it aims to protect — the Jewish people.

Israel's much-trumpeted quest for "peace" can also be understood as an instrument of protection and control, rather than a strategic choice to end the conflict. It is a tactic used to weaken the other side, delay outcomes and pre-empt any serious resolution of political and territorial questions. Sadly, the recent push to continue with the peace charade is mainly to appease the Obama administration.

This Clayton's peace has served Israel well in the past few years, alongside the more conventional act of building walls to restrain the 2.5 million Palestinians of the West Bank, despite some easing of restrictions.

The West Bank has become a bizarre Monopoly board; higher scores can only be achieved if the politics of the day are favourable. At best, however, you'll have a set route, a maximum travel distance and Jerusalem has been declared off limits. If you're in Gaza, the rules change a bit: the dice are confiscated and you can only stare at the board.

The pledge of loyalty to the Jewish state, another act of control, simply cements the ethnocracy's rules. Prime Minister Netanyahu told us few days ago that "The state of Israel is the national state of the Jewish people", ignoring — as he always does — the 1 million (or 20 per cent) of his own citizens who are not Jewish, not to mention the other 4 million Palestinians whose lives he ultimately controls.

More than a century ago, Edmund Barton was also very specific about which race he was partial to, saying: "The doctrine of the equality of man was never intended to apply to the equality of the Englishman and the Chinaman."
Whether the people we refer to are labelled "Jewish" or "English" or "White", what we are left with – then as now – is the unmistakable opposite of equality.

Amin Abbas is a diaspora Palestinian 
4th November 2010

Palestine Is Our Home

Published (Newmatilda)
http://newmatilda.com/2009/06/24/palestine-our-home

In all the speculation over what the US and Israel will do with Palestine, the perspective of Palestinians themselves tends to be overlooked completely.

Since Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent trip to Washington to meet Obama, there’s been plenty of discussion over the future of Palestine-Israel. It appears to many that we’re seeing a genuine opportunity for movement on the stalled peace process. Obama is keen on two-states. Netanyahu, under pressure, has mentioned the possibility of a (highly conditional) Palestinian "state", but is nonetheless content with the Palestinians out of sight behind the Wall. Israelis want Israel for Jewish people everywhere.

But what about the Palestinians? What’s their perspective? Zionists, moderates, outsiders — even dissident Israelis — get more space to talk about the issue, including how it affects the aspirations of Palestinians, than Palestinians do themselves. Their views are rarely expressed in the mainstream media. As one of those Palestinians, let me give you my take.

There is a hollowness in the modern Palestinian psyche, a product of the failed Oslo agreement, the establishment of the Palestinian Authority, the weakening of the PLO, the emergence of Hamas, a long history of captive American administrations and decades of Israeli occupation, dispossession and economic distress. Along with that, the Palestinian perspective is complicated by the lack of an always-cohesive position on contentious matters (including the two-state issue), by their differing representation in the political landscape, and by the diverse conditions different sectors of the Palestinian people live under as a result of 61 years of conflict.

Of those different population sectors, the refugees (who represent almost half the Palestinian people) have endured the longest and gravest effects, have the least representation and would gain very little under many versions of the two-state proposal. And significantly, in Netanyahu’s version of the future, they are virtually non-existent.

One fundamental issue here is this: if the displacement of the Palestinians from their homes since 1948 is an accepted fact, why is their natural and legal right to return offensive and unrealistic? Any serious attempt to resolve the conflict involving a people cannot ignore the plight of half the people it has impacted. Had Palestinians actually stayed in Palestine back then, would Israel have been established — despite the presence of what would have been an overwhelming Palestinian majority? In essence, Palestinians had to be forced out to make a "viable" Israel, and their consequential personal loss is yet to be acknowledged, returned to them or compensated for.

Where injustice is perpetuated, peace does not flourish, and that is a problem facing those who would seek "peace" without addressing the right of Palestinians to return to their homeland. If a family were to be removed from its home in Melbourne, forced to live in Canada, America or England, and forbidden to return, how could we possibly justify that? Could it be justified by telling those families that there are other countries they can go and live in which are majority-Christian, English-speaking and considered Western? Would that make their dispossession acceptable? If the answer is No, how is that different from Palestinians refusing to consider Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt or any other country as an acceptable alternative to their own homes? And those homes are not simply "in Palestine" they are actual homes, in actual towns. If the Melbourne family would reject returning to Perth as a compromise, a family from Haifa will predictably demand to return to their family home in Haifa instead of settling in Jenin.

For Palestinians still living in Palestine-Israel there is another problem. Recently, Israel’s Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, formalised his plan to test the allegiance of the one-fifth of Israeli citizens who are of the indigenous Palestinian minority. The plan, proposed by his party Yisrael Beiteinu ("Israel Is Our Home"), would require these Palestinians to swear loyalty to the Israeli state — the very state that came to replace their own, and displace their people. Many will likely decline to take the racially prejudiced oath, lose several of their rights in their own birthplace and perhaps be thrown in jail and lose their citizenship for commemorating their dispossession.

Let’s be clear here: the predicament for Palestinians under Lieberman’s plan doesn’t equate to an Afghan migrant facing tricky questions about cricketers for the Australian citizenship exam, it rather equates to telling Cathy Freeman that she will lose her citizenship unless she swears loyalty to Australia, agrees that the dispossession of her people was a good thing, and swears that Australia is an exclusively Christian country and that non-Christians should have fewer rights. And if later she is deemed to have broken this oath — for example by attending a commemoration of the dispossession of Indigenous peoples — then she’s suddenly stateless and has no rights at all.

Israel’s peculiar selective democracy affords an Australian citizen more rights than an Israeli citizen, if the Australian is Jewish and the Israeli is of Palestinian origin. This would stay under Netanyahu’s vision for the Palestinians.
The exact shape of the next "peace plan" may be something between Obama’s and Netanyahu’s proposals. Such a "solution" would look like this: Palestinians living in Israel will permanently be inferior citizens, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza will be the citizens of a virtual Palestine, living on scattered pockets of land (albeit with fewer checkpoints and a heavier addiction to international aid); and Palestinians in Jerusalem will have to choose between the two. The refugees in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria will remain in transit in perpetuity, and if they get lucky, they end up as lower-class citizens of another Arab state. None are allowed to return to their homes.

Palestine, according to Netanyahu, will not host all the Palestinians, will not be contiguous, will have no apparent borders, will not have an army and will not control its airspace, water resources or economy. While virtual and intangible, it is promised to be a viable "gas" state. On the other hand Israel will be the "liquid" state that fills the gaps among the Palestinian fragments, and ultimately maintain its present form. The perfect two-state solution!

There is no way that this "plan" will be workable. That is why we say to Mr. Netanyahu that we will pay no attention to his empty and deliberately impossible proposition. Lasting peace brings justice, not illusions that merely improve the living conditions a little for some, legitimise the harsh realities of others and yet expect to be welcomed as conclusive and just.
Netanyahu’s current stance in demanding Palestinians recognise Israel as a Jewish state while giving up the right of return for Palestinians is absurd and extremist. Based on a "divine promise" to the Jewish people, Netanyahu’s plan simply gives millions of people living in America, Australia and elsewhere a collective right — if they happen to be Jewish — to territory that they’ve never set foot in, and would extinguish the legal right of people who were displaced from that very place.

To Barack Obama however we say this: we are fascinated by your energy and truly encouraged by your decency and leadership. We concur with your positive approach of openness and inclusion. On the current recipe for peace however, we hold a different view. We believe that when Palestinian refugees are granted the rightful, unambiguous and urgent return to their own homes, then we can have true peace. Individuals’ rights will have to be the guiding principles, not the bargaining chips, and the settlements must not be only frozen, but become homes for all — Israelis and Palestinians.

Yes, we will have to accept and accommodate the generations of Israelis who know no other home — we must not demand justice with injustice. Perhaps then we will see before us a country like yours, Mr Obama, for both peoples as equals regardless of race or faith. We Israelis and Palestinians have, like Americans, "shed blood and struggled for centuries" and maybe should adopt a motto similar to yours: E pluribus unum — "Out of many, one".

To sum up, many of us Palestinians decline this form of two-states, staunchly challenge the Jewish state and finally say to Netanyahu, and to Lieberman, "Palestine Beiteinu": Palestine is our home.

Amin Abbas
Diaspora Palestinian
 24 June 2009

Truth on the West Bank

Published (The Australian)
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/truth-on-the-west-bank/story-e6frg6so-1225809208754

 TOM Gross (The Australian, December 8) may have visited a West Bank, but I am not sure if it was the same place, west of the river Jordan, that I visited five weeks ago. The picture he is painting is completely different to what I saw.

Of course, Gross's experience will likely differ from mine. He is probably travelling as an Englishman, with Israel giving him far more freedom of movement than me in my own country as a Palestinian. His drive from Jerusalem to Nablus, as he describes it, is nothing short of fiction to the Palestinians living in the West Bank. Jerusalem, the birthplace of my mother, is, in fact, completely off limits to us.

As for the prosperous economy Gross is describing, let's get the facts straight. We are talking about a primitive and predominantly agricultural economy strangled by more than 41 years of conflict and occupation. The 7 per cent or 11 per cent growth figures suggested mean nothing when the baseline is below zero. The Nablus stockmarket, the second-best-performing in the world so far this year, according to Gross, happens to be recovering from the late-2008 crash; has only 39 companies listed; has been very volatile since the first trade in 1997; and its al-Quds Index has been hovering around 500 for most of this year, way lower than its record of 1128 points in 2004.

To put this into perspective, the PSE market cap is currently under $US2.4 billion ($2.6bn), a little more than half its $US4.5 billion high in 2005. By comparison, the Amman stock exchange's market cap of $US34 billion today is nearly double its 2005 market cap of $US18.6 billion.

An economy with no port, no airport, inadequate infrastructure and restricted access to its own markets is not viable and won't grow. Any assertion of an economic boom in the West Bank is false, and any comparison with the few trillion US dollars of the Shanghai stock exchange in any respect is a joke.

Some of the Palestinian farmers referred to by Gross happen to be my uncles and cousins. They were never trained by Israeli agricultural experts or supplied with any irrigation equipment. Rather, they continue to be disadvantaged by the superior Israeli technology and market access. The EU recently offered some subsidies to some Palestinians -- but Israel has never done so. All the farmers I met were complaining about one thing: the lack of water. One said, "Every time we dig a deeper well, they go even deeper and our wells get sucked dry."

It is true that the Jewish National Fund is considered an Israeli charity in some countries, but one that has been strictly protecting the interests of the Jewish people since the turn of the last century. It is also true that Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayad live in villas, drive their BMWs and Mercedes and are living a normal life. That is, however, way beyond the reach of the great majority of the 3.5 million living in Gaza and the West bank, the people that Gross is unlikely to have met.

Amin Abbas is a diaspora Palestinian living in Australia

11 December 2009

Real nowhere land

Published (The Australian)
 http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/real-nowhere-land/story-e6frg6ux-1111116328365

TOMORROW Palestinians - geographically displaced, politically divided and economically distressed - will be marking 60 years since al-Nakbah (the great catastrophe).

Their misfortune began in May 1948, on the same day Israel celebrates its 60th birthday. The yin-yang character of the day marks a new beginning for one people and the beginning of the end for the other. Most people think of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as one between two warring countries and people. This is no fault of theirs.

The terminology describing the place is baffling. Occupied Territories, West Bank and Gaza Strip, 67 green-line borders, 242 borders, armistice borders, UN partition borders: the list goes on. As opposed to Israel, where does Palestine begin and end? Who are its inhabitants?

Israel, for one, is visible, recognised as a country, albeit with changing borders, and a flag. For Palestine, it depends on who and when you ask. Muddled definitions aside, it has to be somewhere between the river and the sea; and going by the maps of the pre-1948 period, it would be exactly that, from the river to the sea. For the past 60 years, however, Palestine has been a transitory compilation of land and territory that Israel had no interest in.

Speaking of the people, ambiguity changes hands. As opposed to the Palestinians, who are the Israeli people? The Jewish people of the state supplemented by those outside longing for aliyah, or the citizens of the state of Israel, including the Jews, Christians, Muslims, Druze, Bedouins and others. How are the modern Israelis related to the Yishuv, the Jewish community in pre-1948 Palestine?

Can a country for the Jewish people anywhere in the world be a home for all its other citizens? The rationale defining the Jewish people, whether Polish, Russian, German, Palestinian or any nationality, challenges the notion of sharing and belonging to a nation and a place.

The Palestinians' existence as a people with a native identity is not based on biblical history. A blend of predominantly Semites, including Muslims, Christians and Jews, that inhabited the area was a coherent society with national aspirations. Of the Middle East countries struggling to achieve independence from colonial rule in the first half of the 1900s, Palestine was more highly developed than many, earning it a Class A mandate from the League of Nations, putting it on a fast track to independence.

The British had other ideas. Influenced by Zionist pressure, the national rights of 90 per cent of Palestinians were ignored to accommodate the wishes of the 10 per cent Jewish minority.

Sixty years later, Palestinians no longer come in keffiyeh colours, white and black. They have seven distinct shades. The darkest goes to those in Gaza, where misery, lack of power and a mounting death toll keep black in fashion. The West Bank Palestinians are barely better off: the brutal occupation and the wall keep grey always in sight.

The third shade are those Palestinians living in East Jerusalem, subjected to daily intimidation and discriminatory regulations aimed at forcing them to leave. The fourth is in pre-1967 Israel, the so-called Israeli Arabs. These second-class citizens, cast always as a "demographic threat", are considered lucky to have democratic and legal rights but are subject to bias in 17 basic rights, one of which denies an internal refugee the right to live in their home village of 1948.

Farther north, the refugee camps of Lebanon hold the bleakest shade. This is where time stopped in 1948, where the sun does not visit the dense camps with windowless walls and narrow alleyways.

To the southeast, the refugee camps of Jordan are better off. The financially strained semi-citizens of Jordan have some rights. They are often reminded of their guest status when there is any political unrest, a predicament they share with Palestinians residing in Kuwait, Egypt, Libya and other Arab states. The minority of diaspora Palestinians finding opportunities for better lives are the exception. Every group is under a different set of restraints, spelling out what they can say or do.

West Bank Palestinians cannot visit Jerusalem or cross the wall; Israeli Arabs cannot go to Gaza or Arab countries; the refugees in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria cannot go to Palestine and a host of other countries; and the people of Gaza cannot go anywhere at all. Palestinians are even barred from many jobs in Lebanon.

As we mark 60 years, we are left with two unfortunate realities: a state that doesn't know who its people are and a people who don't know where their state is. If we are serious about resolving this conundrum and accept that some realities supersede past injustice, three key principles should still hold: no territories can be made exclusive to people on the basis of race or faith; all people are equal, in rights and before the rule of law; and the wrong is acknowledged and individual rights are served and respected, including the fundamental right of the displaced to return to their homes.

At 60, Israel won't be retiring its status as the home for the Jewish people, and the strenuous labour for Palestine continues. But the tradition of the place has it that those who belong to a biological lineage will one day come into their legitimate inheritance.

Amin Abbas is a diaspora Palestinian.
14th May 2008

The Arab Misbaha

A popular Arabic saying goes “when the Misbaha breaks, all the beads fall”. Misbaha is the string of beads used by Muslims to count during prayer.

The commotion in the Arab world continues to swell and won’t settle anytime soon. Protesters in Cairo are leading the way and continue to flock down Tahrir square in greater numbers every week. Mubarak may still be holding to his chair, but when music stops he surely won’t have one. The revolution is firming to bring over 30 years of his rule to end  The question however, if the US and the west would allow Egyptians to rid themselves not only of Mubarak but also of those associate with his legacy like Omar Suleiman, his new deputy.

The last couple of weeks confirmed that the Arab generations that grew under oppressive regimes and controlled media were finally liberated by Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. The efficient and long-established practices of mukhabarat or secret service are no longer adequate to face the supremacy of the internet-powered masses. Fear, an old ‘‘friend’’, is now on the “blocked” list for these people.

Amid the storm that is now blowing in Egypt, Yemen, Jordan and Syria, Israel is right in the eye of the storm.  The calm today doesn’t reflect the growing anxiety of what this storm may bring tomorrow and there is no hiding of that stance. For Israel, the will of millions of Egyptians equates to nothing concerning who should rule over them. Instead, it advocates for the faltering oppressive regime to be protected. But the Americans find it awkward to preach democracy one week and the opposite the next.

Israel’s fears are well founded. It always hedged its bets on the permanence of neighbouring regimes compliant with Israel’s’ interests regardless of their popularity. Being content to posture as the defiant and strong aggressor among a sea of foes may prove very precarious when the prison guard disappears. True peace is one made between peoples, not governments, whatever Israel may think

Starting in Cairo, if the mounting US strings of influence wane under the momentum for change and the pleas for stability and slow transition give way to transparent popular leadership, three outcomes will emerge across the region — political reform, economic opportunity and a new outlook on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

It is traditional wisdom that to reshape the Arab political terrain you must start from Cairo. Hosting the largest population, military and political influence, Egypt maintains the leader’s role by exporting its workforce, culture and a reading of Islam which counters that of the Saudis.

Doubting the readiness of Arabs to embrace democracy is deceptive and self-serving. Challenges exist, but the majority of Egyptians are tolerant and well educated, and the Muslim Brotherhood will ultimately have to reflect that — the radicals are inconsequential and despised by the majority.

In existence since 1928 and maintaining its popularity by offering services to the poor, the Brotherhood naturally appeals to a few in a country with impoverished millions. Alleging that the majority of its members are radicals is deceitful. Barring sporadic extremist off-shoots attributed by some to Sayyid Qutb’s writings, the group has predominantly advocated non-violence since it was founded by Hassan al-Banna.

The protesters in Tahrir Square and centres like it across the Arab world are young, energetic and internet-savvy. Whilst mostly secular Muslims and Christians, the ones with Islamist tendencies are in fact far more influenced by the likes of popular television preacher Amr Khaled and may not even know who Qutb is. Khaled denounces violence and advocates for better education, positive change and peaceful coexistence with the West. The new celebrity activist Wael Ghonim released this week is a far more accurate representation of the orchestrators of this revolution, not the brotherhood. Ghonim is well educated, smart, has very positive outlook and more importantly, strong exposure to the democratic west.

But would a democracy let alone one that engages with Islamists be allowed to emerge? In the Palestinian Authority, Hamas was elected in transparent elections, only to come under attack the very moment it was sworn in. Consequently Hamas failed, without its pragmatic voices being given the chance to speak, substitute activists with diplomats and transition the movement to a political party. Instead, the West opted to ignore the wishes of Palestinian voters, divide them and push Hamas further into radicalism.

The US and the west ought to let people choose, and respect the choice. Allow sincere inbred democracies that take in moderate Islam to come forward. Strengthen Egyptian moderates, impair the extremists’ portrayal of the west as the interfering enemy and dispel the myth that all Muslims are extreme and violent. Secularism and moderate Islam are not mutually exclusive, and the Egyptians can make it work.

Economically, the stagnant, primitive and consumer-oriented Arab economies are a blend of protective communist and follower capitalist, with combined gross domestic product (GDP) for the 22 countries for 2009 matched by that of Canada alone at $1.6 trillion.

The global economic crisis, unemployment and ragged infrastructure are enormous impediments to turn these economies around. A stable and democratic Middle East, with its strategic geographic location, its access to natural resources, the availability of human capital and access to large markets - including its own - in Africa and Asia are ideal ingredients for economic growth to feed a reformist political agenda

Lastly, the prospect of Israel facing a fresh political scene dictated by the free will of the masses, instead of briefings in diplomatic cables, is perhaps wishful thinking today, but a real possibility tomorrow.

From the Palestine papers saga of last week, we can conclude first that the helpless Palestinian Authority will soon follow Ben Ali. Second, that blatantly continuing the Palestinian dispossession and settlement building will prove to the world that Israel is not in the least bit interested in peace.

The social networks can also expose what Israel was once able to hide. Recognising its own geography, Israel should urgently seek people-to-people peace. Peace shaped by individuals’ rights is more credible than one that bargains with those rights. Only then can Israelis and Palestinians accept each other and accommodate the generations that have lived on or were displaced from the land they both call home.

The Arab giant may have not been fully awoken yet, but it has certainly been given a good stir this week. As for the Arab Misbaha, it broke couple of weeks ago.

Amin Abbas

Diaspora Palestinian 
3rd Feb 2011

The Revolutions the Arabs had to have

“alsha’b yoreed eskat al-nizam”; “The people demand  the fall of the regime”

The most popular melody in the region these days and most dreaded by the leaders. Lyrics by the people, with no foreign engagement or funding allowed in this grand and long-awaited production. The musical chairs in the Arab world have only just started.

The Arabs are inspired to revolt. The infectious fairytale freedom movement refuses to abate; Peaceful, spontaneous, youthful and with clear purpose. This is not only history being made; it is shaping to be the finest for Arabs in a long time. The loss of life is heartbreaking and regrettable, and yet the sense of collective pride and hope has not been the same in generations.

Libya is a challenge. Silmiyeh - peaceful had to be at the heart of it all; more Egypts not Iraqs awaited.  The inborn model for totalitarian regime change known to deliver that Arabs must protect and grow.

Gaddafi and Assad’s “outside conspiracy “nonsense still goes on. The silliness and outright lies are bizarre, for Arabs however, one-man fiction shows became the norm. The blend of fear and propaganda forever worked, but the rules of the game have suddenly changed. The era for these pathetic dictators has ended.

The protests continue to set course, however no genuine change is offered. Dictators are dogged by power illusions and greed. Oust Bin Ali and Mubarak are examples of this, the later - means notwithstanding, contender in the richest men club with Carlos Helú and Bill Gates, as for Gaddafi, candidate for war crimes against his own people. The Arab masses however, with their newly found might, recognize the acts of despairing leaders and are no longer interested in more miscarriages of democracy or eleventh hour offers. They demand the return of their countries and fortunes back to them.

The rapid revelation of events goes beyond the rejection of corruption and absolute power; and demonstrate the serious disparities in future outlook and values and the total failure of the old guard to recognize the sense of urgency of the younger generation, a steady seepage of confidence in regimes that lacked popularity and legitimacy in the first place.  Leadership that does not represent, speak for or is even interested in the people it leads has to go.

Surely, an abundance of challenges exist even for Cairo and Tunisia, leading the way of transition. Impartiality of the military, influence of the old guard, entrenched corrupt networks, economic pressures and external influences including that of the US and the West.

The role of the West is despicable in the region. Dictators were protected when considered friends and shady or even tax payers dollars easily traceable to the likes of Mubarak and others. Exposing this dirty laundry is old news, but is now too Hippocratic to sustain, and the reason why a role for the west is unpopular today.

The thorny challenge begun when the tribal and oil producing Libya deviated from the blueprint. Straying in violence, the weakened army had a limited role to play in tipping the balance, and the peaceful masses turned rebels became the prey to Gaddafis' bombs and bullets. The undesirable western involvement could not be avoided and lives had to be protected.

As this unsettling scenario sets a violent precedent, swift action ought to bring focus back on a political alternative. The frail regime must be confronted with popular and internationally recognized resistance to further isolate the man. Gaddafi is on borrowed time and it is the Libyan people that ought to shorten it.

Saleh is following the footsteps of Bin Ali and Mubarak and Yemenis are sticking to the peaceful game-plan. The Army and diplomats have taken the people’s side, and Saleh’s chair is sliding away under him. For Syria, now in the mix, the brutal mukhabarat or secret service state won’t survive the mounting will of the oppressed, and likely to conform to the Egypt model. Concessions were not forthcoming from Assad, and the script of the deposed dictators is in play; quell protests, sack the government, block the internet and accuse Aljazeera and foreign interference.

More challenging are the Oil Sheikdoms. The Khalifas of Bahrain had the opportunity. Shifting from absolute to constitutional monarchy, giving more powers to the people and considering serious reforms may save them. They should accept the country’s make up as the sectarian games has only dead ends. But Bahrain’s neighbors won’t allow this among their fold.

US support for the Saudis to help to quell the protest in Bahrain has one explanation; No democracy is the Gulf is allowed. The risks and economic implications enormous, the political landscape harder to read and the US can’t afford neither watch nor actively intervene. But recent wisdom suggests that is the people that have the final say after all.

For Palestinians the challenge is even greater. The occupied and dispossessed lead by the corrupt, powerless and divided as they face up to the mighty, Israel, as it continues the land grabs and settlement building. And yet, Palestinians foremost priority is to agree on common vision for the future, a crucial prerequisite to their long awaited transformation.

In September, the Egyptians will elect new leadership and so too the Palestinians.  Chances are, the out-of-touch Palestinian Authority will follow Ben Ali and Mubarak, and the peace charade will go with it.

The new Egyptian Prime Minister, Essam Sharaf, went to Tahrir square the first Friday after he was appointed and said, “I draw my legitimacy from you the people”. Within minutes, his speech was posted on facebook with thousands of “likes” against it. Arabs are looking for leaders to like and be inspired by. These are the revolutions the Arabs had to have!

Amin Abbas

Diaspora Palestinian 

March 2011