Palestinian Authority Vs. the People - Intifada Palestine 10/28/15, 12:55 AM

Confronting the Obvious Truth: Palestinian Authority vs. the People - Intifada Palestine 10/28/15, 12:55 AM

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I think not, Mr. Erekat. Twenty years is long Support Intifada Palestine via Paypal enough to show that those who have taken part “ in their people’s oppression, cannot possibly be the advocates of their people’s freedom.

RECENT POSTS by Ramzy Baroud

Disgust at Walmart’s Israeli soldier (MEMO) – Saeb Erekat is an enigmatic character. Despite minimal popularity among costume for kids Palestinians, he is omnipresent, appears regularly on television and speaks with the Confronting the Obvious Truth: moral authority of an accomplished leader whose legacy is rife with accolades and an Palestinian Authority vs. the People Israel’s descent into unmasked, right astute, unwavering vision. wing extremism: A new generation rises to fight occupation, settler- When Palestinians were polled by the Jerusalem Media and Communications Center colonialism, apartheid (JMCC) in August, just prior to the current Intifada, only 3 percent approved of his We are lifelong Zionists. Here’s why leadership – compared with the still meagre approval rating of 16 percent of his boss, we’ve chosen to boycott Israel Israeli self-inflicted hate… Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas. Even those who are often cast as Wait, Netanyahu said what? alternative leaders – Fatah leader, Marwan Barghouti, and former Gaza-based Hamas Hebron activist showed Israel’s crimes Government Prime Minister, Ismail Haniyeh – were nowhere near popular, achieving to the world Israel Is Occupation Addicted – by 10.5 and 9.8 percent of the vote respectively. Gideon Levy [VIDEO] Netanyahu absolved Hitler of the final

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It was as if Palestinians were telling us and their traditional leaderships, in particular, solution by placing the blame for the Holocaust on the Palestinians that they are fed up with the old rhetoric, the constant let-downs, the unabashed Assad and Putin meet at the Kremlin corruption and the very culture of defeat that has permeated the Palestinian political (transcript) elite for an entire generation. Secrets of the Syrian War President al-Assad and President Putin Abbas has operated his political oﬃce on the assumption that, so long as Palestinians meet in Moscow Jerusalem chaos is a warning of things received their monthly salaries and are content with his empty promises and to come occasional threats – of resigning, resisting against Israel, lobbing bombshell speeches Is Putin Iran’s “Senior Partner” in Syria? at the UN, etc. – then no one is likely to challenge his reign in Areas A and B – tiny Third Intifada Or Zionist Jihad: Israel Escalates Tensions With Execution Style cantons within the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Jerusalem. Force

Rising tensions in the Occupied Territories have led to dozens of deaths and hundreds of clashes. Are we witnessing the Third Intifada? RECENT COMMENTS

Erekat has been the primary enabler of that PA charade, for he is the ‘chief negotiator’, legal eagle on Disgust at Walmart’s whose protracted term in that precarious post has negotiated nothing of value for the Israeli soldier costume for kids Palestinians. Luis on Disgust at Walmart’s Israeli soldier costume for kids In 2002, I followed the Israeli invasion of the supposedly self-autonomous PA areas in Hp B on Disgust at Walmart’s Israeli soldier costume for kids the West Bank, when Erekat made an appeal on Arabic television to the Israeli Vacy Vlazna on Confronting the Government to exercise sanity and common sense. The entire display of the PA Obvious Truth: Palestinian Authority vs. leadership was beyond tragic, proof that it had no real authority of its own and no the People r on Disgust at Walmart’s Israeli soldier control over the events on the ground as Palestinian ﬁghters battled the re-invading costume for kids Israeli army. He appealed to Israel as if he felt genuinely betrayed by its military onslaught.

When Al Jazeera released thousands of secret documents in January 2011, revealing ARCHIVES discussions behind closed doors between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators, Erekat held the lion’s share of blame. With a clear mandate from his superiors, he appeared Select Month uninterested in many Palestinian political aspirations, including Palestinian sovereignty in occupied East Jerusalem – the spark behind the current and previous Intifadas. He offered Israel the “biggest Yerushalaim in Jewish history, symbolic number of refugees LIKE US ON FACEBOOK return, demilitarised state… what more can I give?” he was quoted in the Palestine Papers. Intifada Palestine What is particularly interesting about Erekat, and equally applicable to most PA leaders 15,942 likes and officials, is that, no matter how devastating their roles – which they continue to play out, whether through political incompetence or outright corruption – they do not seem to go away. They may change position, hover around the same circle of failed Like Page leadership, but they tend to resurface and repeatedly regurgitate the same old Be the first of your friends to like this language, clichés, empty threats and promises.

After retreating for a few weeks as Intifada youth took to the streets to protest the Israeli occupation, PA spokespersons, including Erekat, are now back on the scene, speaking of squandered opportunities for peace, two states and the entire inept discourse, as if peace was ever, indeed, at hand, and if the so-called ‘two state solution’ was ever a solution.

In a recent interview with ’s ‘UpFront’, Erekat warned that the PA was on the verge of shutting down, as if the very existence of the PA was a virtue in itself. Established in 1994 as a transitional political body that would guide the process of Palestinian independence, the PA morphed to become a security arm that served as a ﬁrst line of defense for the Israeli army, in addition to guarding its own interests. Billions of dollars http://www.intifada-palestine.com/2015/10/confronting-the-obvious-truth-palestinian-authority-vs-the-people/ Page 2 of 5 Confronting the Obvious Truth: Palestinian Authority vs. the People - Intifada Palestine 10/28/15, 12:55 AM

later, and after intensive military training provided by the US, the UK, Italy, and other western and ‘moderate’ Arab countries, the PA security forces have done a splendid job of cracking down on any dissent among Palestinians.

So why is Erekat warning of the PA collapse as if the sorry leadership in Ramallah is the center of everything that Palestinians have ever aspired for? “Soon enough Netanyahu will ﬁnd himself the only [one] responsible between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean because he is destroying the Palestinian Authority,” Erekat said. So what? According to the Geneva Conventions which designate Israel as the Occupying Power, Netanyahu is, indeed, responsible for the welfare, security and well-being of the occupied Palestinians, until a just political solution is assured and enforced by the international community.

Using the same tactic which, along with Abbas and other PA oﬃcials, was utilized repeatedly in the past, he vowed that “soon, very soon, you’re going to hear some decisions” about disbanding the PA.

It matters little what Erekat and his Ramallah circle determine as the proper course of action. Not only has his language become obsolete and his references irrelevant, but the entire Oslo ‘peace process’ travesty – which delivered nothing but more illegal settlements and military torment – was dead a long time ago. In fact, it was the Al-Aqsa Intifada in 2000 that killed Oslo and the ten years between the end of that uprising and the advent of a new one were ﬁlled with mere haggling and desperate attempts at breathing life into a ‘process’ that made some corrupt Palestinians a whole lot richer.

The hope is that the current Intifada will cleanse the residue of that dead process, and surpass the P Palestinian political discourse which is unfairly championed by Erekat and his peers, but to break political boundaries as well, uniting all Palestinians around a whole new political agenda.

There are many opportunists who are ready to pounce upon the current mobilization in Palestine, to use the people’s sacriﬁces as they see ﬁt and, ultimately, return to the status quo as if no blood has been shed and no oppression still in place.

After reiterating his support for the two-state solution which is now but a fading mirage, Erekat told Al-Jazeera, “We are fully supporting our people and their cry for freedom.”

I think not, Mr. Erekat. Twenty years is long enough to show that those who have taken part in their people’s oppression, cannot possibly be the advocates of their people’s freedom.

This article was originally published at Middle East Monitor

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About the author

– Dr. Ramzy Baroud has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books include ‘Searching Jenin’, ‘The Second Palestinian Intifada’

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and his latest ‘My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story’. His website is: www.ramzybaroud.net.