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Palestinian Leaders Say What the Americans Want to Hear

[Ha'aretz] Meron Benvenisti - After years of bloodshed that has brought the Palestinians only terrible disaster, Prime Minister Salam Fayad is returning to the formulas that his teacher and spiritual mentor Yasser Arafat declaimed when he was on the skids after the first Gulf War and was in desperate need of American aid. In moments of weakness, Palestinian leaders say what the Americans want to hear. A new generation of Fatah people will extend their hands into the coffers of the Palestinian Authority, which will fill up again with donations from the international community. This feeling of deja vu, however, ignores experience accumulated during the intifada years and ignores the burden of the blood and the hatred that have changed the relationships between the two communities in fundamental ways. In addition, if there will be a process of coexistence, the process is limited to a not very large part of the Palestinian people and includes neither the city-state that is forming in Gaza nor the diaspora. In 1993, Arafat spoke in the name of half of the Palestinian people. Now Fayad is speaking in the name of about one-quarter, who live in the West Bank; all the rest will have to look after themselves.
2007-08-03 01:00:00
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