The question that has been bandied about over the past 13 months, since the Hamas victory in the elections over the Fatah, led by Arafat’s protégé Mahmoud Abbas, has been whether Fatah would choose reconciliation with Israel over an alliance with the warlike Hamas.

Over the past week, it seems that Fatah has made its choice – to align itself with Hamas in total war against Israel.

On Monday, the Palestinian Authority’s Ma’an News Agency interviewed the spokesmen of Fatah, Jamal Nazzal, who spoke candidly about the Fatah-Hamas coordinated war alliance against Israel:

Ma’an: You have said that President Abbas defended Hamas in Europe as a qualified partner in the coalition, yet Hamas criticized your comments. Why?

Nazzal: The spokesmen of Fatah are advocates of Hamas in the foreign media, and the president’s ambassadors always explain to the world’s public that Hamas has developed a new stance, which is supportive of peace. Foreign journalists say that Hamas is committed to destroying Israel, so how can the Palestine Liberation Organization pretend that they can achieve peace with Israel in the name of the Palestinian people? In this context, we remind them of Hamas’ positive declarations regarding acceptance of a peaceful solution including coexistence with Israel.

Ma’an: Do you see any shift in Hamas’s stance following the Mecca agreement?

Nazzal: We are satisfied with the declarations of [Hamas politburo chief] Khaled Mashaal. He is really helpful for President Abbas in convincing the world of the agreement. However, there are some spokesmen in the Palestinian territories who try to boast that Hamas respects rather than commits to the already-signed treaties. This might send some mistaken impression to the Quartet in regards to the ‘worthiness’ of Hamas to get the siege lifted, while, in the point of view of the Westerners, Hamas is leading a war against the existence of Israel. In fact, Hamas is holding a truce with Israel, and this is something well-known.

Ma’an: What about the difference between the respect and the commitment to the deals signed between the PLO and the rest of the world?

Nazzal: Hamas did not sign these agreements and is not asked to recognize these agreements. But when Hamas is in the government of the Palestinian Authority, it should adapt to the situation. Anyway, the Mecca agreement has decided these issues.

Ma’an: What about the Fatah spokesmen and their statements?

Nazzal: After Mecca, things cooled off, and the noise reduced. Hamas now avoids accusing others of not being nationalists and has abandoned the language of daggers. Fatah dealt positively with this trend.

Ma’an: What about Fatah?

Nazzal: Fatah’s language has changed since May 2006. We are committed to the resistance because if the resistance ends, Fatah ends. We are a wide movement, and contain all sectors of society. You can find Marxists as well as religious people in the Fatah movement. We have to deal with all these people in the movement, and we have extensive relations with all the liberation movements in the world. Our language in Fatah is the Palestinian hope and the Palestinian ambitions.

Ma’an: Don’t you think that the Fatah spokesmen are responsible for the tense atmosphere also?

Nazzal: When [Major General] Muhammad Gharib and his children and friends and others are killed by the Executive Force, and when [Fatah member] Shalayil is besieged by Hamas, the spokesmen of Fatah are asked to not publish such news to avoid escalation. This is strange; it is the same as when Israel accuses Palestine TV of incitement when it publishes pictures of Palestinian children who were killed by the Israeli forces.

Ma’an: Do the Fatah spokesmen have any advantages for the movement?

Nazzal: What matters here is the number of Fatah members being assassinated by the Israelis, and the number of prisoners from Fatah; they number 7,150 out of 11,000 Palestinian prisoners.

Ma’an: How do you see the future?

Nazzal: In Mecca, we were forced to choose between satisfying Israel or Hamas. We chose Hamas and made concessions for the sake of the higher Palestinian interests. We joined Hamas under blockade without guarantees that the blockade will be lifted. Hamas too made concessions for the benefit of the Palestinian higher interests. The PLO will speak on behalf of all the Palestinian people. We will be committed to the Arab and international legitimacy and respect the signed agreements. We have ended the differences between each other in spite of the pluralism and criticism we have in the Palestinian arena.

David Bedein can be reached at Media@actcom.co.il. His Web site is www.IsraelBehindTheNews.com.

©The Bulletin 2007

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David Bedein
David Bedein
David Bedein is an MSW community organizer and an investigative journalist.   In 1987, Bedein established the Israel Resource News Agency at Beit Agron to accompany foreign journalists in their coverage of Israel, to balance the media lobbies established by the PLO and their allies.   Mr. Bedein has reported for news outlets such as CNN Radio, Makor Rishon, Philadelphia Inquirer, Los Angeles Times, BBC and The Jerusalem Post, For four years, Mr. Bedein acted as the Middle East correspondent for The Philadelphia Bulletin, writing 1,062 articles until the newspaper ceased operation in 2010. Bedein has covered breaking Middle East negotiations in Oslo, Ottawa, Shepherdstown, The Wye Plantation, Annapolis, Geneva, Nicosia, Washington, D.C., London, Bonn, and Vienna. Bedein has overseen investigative studies of the Palestinian Authority, the Expulsion Process from Gush Katif and Samaria, The Peres Center for Peace, Peace Now, The International Center for Economic Cooperation of Yossi Beilin, the ISM, Adalah, and the New Israel Fund.   Since 2005, Bedein has also served as Director of the Center for Near East Policy Research.   A focus of the center's investigations is The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). In that context, Bedein authored Roadblock to Peace: How the UN Perpetuates the Arab-Israeli Conflict - UNRWA Policies Reconsidered, which caps Bedein's 28 years of investigations of UNRWA. The Center for Near East Policy Research has been instrumental in reaching elected officials, decision makers and journalists, commissioning studies, reports, news stories and films. In 2009, the center began decided to produce short movies, in addition to monographs, to film every aspect of UNRWA education in a clear and cogent fashion.   The center has so far produced seven short documentary pieces n UNRWA which have received international acclaim and recognition, showing how which UNRWA promotes anti-Semitism and incitement to violence in their education'   In sum, Bedein has pioneered The UNRWA Reform Initiative, a strategy which calls for donor nations to insist on reasonable reforms of UNRWA. Bedein and his team of experts provide timely briefings to members to legislative bodies world wide, bringing the results of his investigations to donor nations, while demanding reforms based on transparency, refugee resettlement and the demand that terrorists be removed from the UNRWA schools and UNRWA payroll.   Bedein's work can be found at: www.IsraelBehindTheNews.com and www.cfnepr.com. A new site,unrwa-monitor.com, will be launched very soon.

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