“I think we are witnessing the last gasps of violence by those Palestinians who want to block this accord,” Yosse Beilin told Jerusalem Post reporter David Makovsky. Way back on November 30th, 1993!

Labor MK Yosse Beilin has never been big on Palestinian violations. When he was Deputy Foreign Minister he even asked AIPAC to stop compiling reports on PLO compliance. And today he is doing his best to minimize their significance.

Beilin and his fellow travelers have a problem now with Netanyahu. As of this writing it appears that the PM may actually insist on some measure of Palestinian compliance before continuing down the Oslo path. In fact, the Ministers’ Committee for National Security set some clear requirements, including the confiscation of illegal weapons and action on Israel’s requests for the transfer of terrorist suspects. Something which few observers believe the Palestinians will ever do.

Days before the signing of the Declaration of Principles, Amos Oz wrote in the Jerusalem Post that “Once peace comes, Israeli doves more than other Israelis, must assume a clear-cut ‘hawkish’ attitude concerning the duty of the future Palestinian regime to live by the letter and spirit of its obligations.”

Since then Oz, Beilin and the rest of the Left have done just the opposite.

If Oslo was truly just an “experiment”, as Beilin and others originally presented it, then it wouldn’t be such a disaster if it failed. But as Beilin now readily admits, Oslo was not a test but instead an attempt by the Labor-Meretz coalition to create permanent Palestinian facts on the ground before the 1996 elections. Forget about all the talk about “mandate” and “democratic process”. The Left was determined to make the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza unstoppable, regardless of what the Israeli people should decide when given their first chance to vote since “Oslo” became more than a city in Norway. So here we are after the elections and Netanyahu is finally starting to do the little that he can under the very agreement which Beilin and his colleagues drafted. Under the agreements which they negotiated, Israel can build settlements, set the extent of each of the further redeployments (FRD) and require strict controls on Palestinian ports. These same agreements require the PLO to break up and disarm Palestinian militias, transfer terrorists to Israel for prosecution and refrain from incitement.

Got the score? Israel is acting legally and the PLO isn’t. So instead of talking about violations of the agreements, Beilin talks about violations of some amorphous “spirit of Oslo”, giving equal footing in his “five point plan” to legal Jewish construction and illegal Palestinian arms smuggling. And instead of calling straight out for an end to Palestinian terror, Beilin opts to sap it of meaning by making it a mutual call against terror and violence, knowing full well that this means bolstering the Palestinian equation that a bomb in Apropo is no more violent than a bulldozer on Har Homa or the imposition of temporary restrictions on the entry of Palestinian workers.

It’s bad enough that Beilin and his ilk are doing everything they can to deny Israel its moral advantage in the court of world opinion. But this isn’t the only reality which they have distorted.

Labor leaders assured the public that everything was under control since the late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin had a “map in his mind” of the final agreement. Beilin, a key player in the negotiations, recently admitted that Rabin never let him take a peak at the map. After he was murdered, Leah Rabin explained to Beilin that Rabin had no plan.

The “Beilin-Mazen plan” may also not be what Beilin has been telling the public. When Dr. Khalil Shikaki, the Columbia University educated head of the Center for Palestine Research and Studies (CPRS) in Nablus, released his most recent poll, he surveyed support for what he terms “a Palestinian version of the so-called Abu Mazen-Beilin Permanent Status Plan.”

When I asked Dr. Shikaki how he came up with the idea that there were different Palestinian and Israeli versions to Beilin-Mazen, he explained that there are “two readings of the same document…There is no such thing as an accurate reflection of the document. It’s a question of how people see it. Both sides tell the people what they want to see in it.” Shikaki’s version is “based on newspaper reports and conversations with various people.”

It would be easy enough to clear the air on this question if Beilin would make the document public. But as Orit Shani, MK Beilin’s Legislative aide, explained, “Beilin and Peres are the only Israelis who have seen it.”

Beilin’s spokesman, Amir Abramowitz, also hasn’t seen the plan. But that doesn’t stop him from denying Palestinian claims that the plan includes an understanding that the Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem will ultimately be under Palestinian sovereignty.

Likud MK Michael Eitan, whose Beilin-Eitan plan is touted by Beilin as an extension of Beilin-Mazen, also hasn’t seen the plan. “Out of all the hours we spoke, Beilin gave an oral presentation of the Beilin-Mazen plan which took between a quarter hour and twenty minutes.”

Eitan himself claims that the Beilin-Mazen plan doesn’t matter to him. But if the plan does not exist, or is subject to radically different interpretations, then the compromises made by those who endorsed it in the belief that this was the last step towards an agreement were nothing more than a weakening of what at best may be Beilin’s idea of Israel’s opening position.

What drives Yosse Beilin to do this? I’ll leave that to the psychologists. But don’t expect a purely logical explanation. After all, here is a man who, instead of dealing with the world as it is, insists on “convincing himself that ‘yihyeh tov’ [it will be good]…I simply am not prepared to live in a world where things can’t be solved.” (“Haaretz” 7 March, 1997).

We all share Beilin’s hope that our problems can be solved. But that doesn’t mean ignoring reality to get there.

Dr. Aaron Lerner,
Director IMRA (Independent Media Review & Analysis)
P.O.BOX 982 Kfar Sava
Tel: (+972-9) 760-4719
Fax: (+972-9) 741-1645
imra@netvision.net.il

Like a cat with nine lives, the PLO Covenant refuses to die, leaving doubts about the seriousness of the fledgling Palestinian entity’s acceptance of Israel’s right to exist.

That is the message of a panel discussion consisting of journalists and academics, in which a video of the famous PNC vote was shown, sponsored by the Middle East Forum at the Beit Agron Press Center last night.

Speaking before a packed audience, Professor Yehoshua Porat of Hebrew University, an expert on Palestinian nationalism, said the Palestinian National Council has failed to make the changes required by the Oslo Agreement, which calls for the PNC to remove all articles in the Covenant calling for Israel’s destruction.

This accusation comes just over one year after the historic PNC voting session in Gaza, after which Shimon Peres proclaimed that Arafat had fufilled his promise to amend the thirty two year old charter.

Porat countered Peres’s claim, pointing out that the resolution adopted by the PNC that day only declared the PNC’s willingness to change the Covenant, legally leaving it unaltered. Porat also noted that the resolution, which calls for abrogating those articles which stand in contradiction to Oslo, did not specify which articles were to be changed, leaving the Covenant in a state of ambiguity.

Porat revealed that Peres’s belief that the PNC had cancelled the Covenant resulted from a misunderstanding between him and his legal advisor, and Nabil Sh’ath. The day before the vote, Sh’ath told the legal advisor that he would submit to the PNC the next day a resolution calling for the cancellation of the Covenant. However, Sh’ath presented a different resolution, which would then send the matter to the Central Council. He did not relay this change to his Israeli counterpart. When Peres heard the next day that a resolution had been adopted, he assumed that the PNC had fulfilled its mission.

While not disagreeing with Porat’s claim that the Covenant was not legally altered, Joel Greenberg, Jerusalem correspondent for the New York Times, questioned whether this was a cause for concern. Recounting an incident between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators at the Madrid peace talks, Greenberg described how no one on the Palestinian team had a copy of the Covenant when the Israelis brought up the issue. The Israeli negotiators had to provide the Palestinians with one. By this time, Greenberg argued, the Covenant had become a dinosaur. A Palestinian researcher participating on the panel concurred, noting that Arafat had accepted UN Resolution 242, which recognizes Israel’s right to exist, back in 1988. While not officially changing the charter, this change of direction on the part of the PLO made the Covenant obsolete. The legal process of abrogating the charter was completed in the fall of 1996, he said, but did not provide any evidence to verify it.

The showing of the video cast doubts on the claim that the Covenant had ceased to have any importance for the PLO. Speaking before the members of the PNC, Saleem al-Za’anoon, PNC chairman, stated:

“…if we amend those articles, whose amendment is demanded it will mean that we have paid a very high price. And if we prepare a new proposal, it will be less damaging than the 1st solution.”

Porat asked why the PNC failed to change the Covenant in compliance with Oslo if by this time it no longer had any importance. He noted that Arafat has defended his apparent acceptance of Israel to Arab critics by basing it on the PLO resolution of 1974, which calls for the PLO to set up a state on any part of Palestine, and then use it as a launching pad from which to liberate the rest of Palestine. Porat said he does not know that Arafat is acting according to the “phased plan”, but said that he is in doubt since Arafat has not changed the Covenant.

Porat further pointed out that besides not specifying which articles were to be annulled, the resolution did not say all articles that contradict Oslo would be changed. This is a crucial distinction, and it is unlikely that such a semantic error escaped the PNC’s attention. After all, Resolution 242 calls on Israel to withdraw from lands occupied during wars, instead of from the lands or all lands. Israeli officials have argued on occasion that on this basis they have fulfilled their obligations under 242, and therefore do not have to cede more territory. Presumably Palestinians are familiar with this argument.

Article 1: Palestine is the homeland of the Arab Palestinian people; it is an indivisible part of the Arab homeland, and the Palestinian people are an integral part of the Arab nation.

Article 2: Palestine, with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate, is an indivisible territorial unit.

Article 3: The Palestinian people possess the legal right to their homeland and have the right to determine their destiny after achieving the liberation of their country in accordance with their wishes and entirely of their own accord and will.

Article 4: The Palestinian identity is a genuine, essential and inherent characteristic; it is transmitted from parents to children. The Zionist occupation and their dispersal of the Palestinian Arab people, through the disasters which befell them, do not make them lose their Palestinian identity and their membership of the Palestinian community, nor do they negate them.

Article 5: The Palestinians are those Arab national who, until 1947, normally resided in Palestine regardless of whether they were evicted from it or have stayed there. Anyone born, after that date, of a Palestinian father – whether inside Palestine or outside it – is also a Palestinian.

Article 6: The Jews who had normally resided in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion will be considered Palestinians.

Article 7: That there is a Palestinian community and that it has material, spiritual and historical connections with Palestine are indisputable facts. It is a national duty to bring up individual Palestinians in an Arab revolutionary manner. All means of information and education must be adopted in order to acquaint the Palestinian with his country in the most profound manner, both spiritual and material, that is possible. He must be prepared for the armed struggle and ready to sacrifice his wealth and his life in order to win back his homeland and bring about its liberation.

Article 8: The phase in their history, through which the Palestinian people are now living, is that of national (watani) struggle for the liberation of Palestine. Thus the conflicts among the Palestinian national forces are secondary, and should be ended for the sake of the basic conflict that exists between the forces of Zionism and of imperialism on the one hand, and the Palestinian Arab people on the other. On this basis the Palestinian masses, regardless of whether they are residing in the national homeland or in diaspora (mahajir) constitute – both their organization and the individuals – one national front working for the retrieval of Palestine and its liberation through armed struggle.

Article 9: Armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine. Thus it is the overall strategy, not merely a tactical phase. The Palestinian Arab people assert their absolute determination and firm resolution to continue their armed struggle and to work for an armed popular revolution for the liberation of their country and their return to it. They also assert their right to normal life in Palestine and to exercise their right to self-determination and sovereignty over it.

Article 10: Commando action constitutes the nucleus of the Palestinian popular liberation war. This requires its escalation, comprehensiveness and mobilization of all the Palestinian popular and educational efforts and their organization and involvement in the armed Palestinian revolution. It also requires the achieving of unity for the national (watani) struggle among the different groupings of the Palestinian people and the Arab masses so as to secure the continuation of the revolution, its escalation and victory.

Article 11: The Palestinians will have three mottoes: national (wataniyya) unity, national (qawmiyya) mobilization and liberation.

Article 12: The Palestinian people believe in Arab unity. In order to contribute their share towards the attainment of that objective, however, they must, at the present stage of their struggle, safeguard their Palestinian identity and develop their consciousness of that identity, and oppose any plan that may dissolve or impair it.

Article 13: Arab unity and the liberation of Palestine are two complementary objectives, the attainment of either of which facilitates the attainment of the other. Thus, Arab unity leads to the liberation of Palestine; the liberation of Palestine leads to Arab unity; and work towards the realization of one objective proceeds side by side with work towards the realization of the other.

Article 14: The destiny of the Arab nation, and indeed Arab existence itself, depends upon the destiny of the Palestinian cause. From this interdependence springs the Arab nation’s pursuit of, and striving for, the liberation of Palestine. The people of Palestine play the role of the vanguard in the realization of this sacred national (qawmi) goal.

Article 15: The liberation of Palestine, from an Arab viewpoint, is a national (qawmi) duty and it attempts to repel the Zionist and imperialist aggression against the Arab homeland, and aims at the elimination of Zionism in Palestine. Absolute responsibility for this falls upon the Arab nation – peoples and governments – with the Arab people of Palestine in the vanguard. Accordingly the Arab nation must mobilize all its military, human, and moral and spiritual capabilities to participate actively with the Palestinian people in the liberation of Palestine. It must, particularly in the phase of the armed Palestinian revolution, offer and furnish the Palestinian people with all possible help, and material and human support, and make available to them the means and opportunities that will enable them to continue to carry out their leading role in the armed revolution, until they liberate their homeland.

Article 16: The liberation of Palestine, from a spiritual point of view, will provide the Holy Land with an atmosphere of safety and tranquillity, which in turn will safeguard the country’s religious sanctuaries and guarantee freedom of worship and of visit to all, without discrimination of race, colour, language, or religion. Accordingly, the people of Palestine look to all spiritual forces in the world for support.

Article 17: The liberation of Palestine, from a human point of view, will restore to the Palestinian individual his dignity, pride and freedom. Accordingly the Palestinian Arab people look forward to the support of all those who believe in the dignity of man and his freedom in the world.

Article 18: The liberation of Palestine, from an international point of view, is a defensive action necessitated by the demands of self-defense. Accordingly, the Palestinian people, desirous as they are of the friendship of all people, look to freedom-loving, justice-loving and peace-loving states for support in order to restore their legitimate rights in Palestine, to re-establish peace and security in the country, and to enable its people to exercise national sovereignty and freedom.

Article 19: The partition of Palestine in 1947 and the establishment of the State of Israel are entirely illegal, regardless of the passage of time, because they were contrary to the will of the Palestinian people and to their natural right in their homeland, and inconsistent with the principles embodied in the Charter of the United Nations, particularly the right to self-determination.

Article 20: The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void. Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.

Article 21: The Arab Palestinian people, expressing themselves by the armed Palestinian revolution, reject all solutions which are substitutes for the total liberation of Palestine and reject all proposals aiming at the liquidation of the Palestinian problem, or its internationalization.

Article 22: Zionism is a political movement organically associated with international imperialism and antagonistic to all action for liberation and to progressive movements in the world. It is racist and fanatic in its nature, aggressive, expansionist and colonial in its aims, and fascist in its methods. Israel is the instrument of the Zionist movement, and a geographical base for world imperialism placed strategically in the midst of the Arab homeland to combat the hopes of the Arab nation for liberation, unity and progress. Israel is a constant source of threat vis-à-vis peace in the Middle East and the whole world. Since the liberation of Palestine will destroy the Zionist and imperialist presence and will contribute to the establishment of peace in the Middle East, the Palestinian people look for the support of all the progressive and peaceful forces and urge them all, irrespective of their affiliations and beliefs, to offer the Palestinian people all aid and support in their just struggle for the liberation of their homeland.

Article 23: The demands of security and peace, as well as the demands of right and justice, require all states to consider Zionism an illegitimate movement, to outlaw its existence, and to ban its operations, in order that friendly relations among peoples may be preserved, and the loyalty of citizens to their respective homelands safeguarded.

Article 24: The Palestinian people believe in the principles of justice, freedom, sovereignty, self-determination, human dignity, and in the right of all peoples to exercise them.

Article 25: For the realization of the goals of this Charter and its principles, the Palestinian Liberation Organization will perform its role in the liberation of Palestine in accordance with the Constitution of this Organization.

Article 26: the Palestine Liberation Organization, representative of the Palestinian revolutionary forces, is responsible for the Palestinian Arab people’s movement in its struggle – to retrieve its homeland, liberate and return to it and exercise the right to self-determination in it – in all military, political and financial fields and also for whatever may be required by the Palestinian case on the inter-Arab and international levels.

Article 27: The Palestinian Liberation Organization shall cooperate with all Arab states, each according to its potentialities; and will adopt a neutral policy among them in the light of the requirements of the war of liberation; and on their basis it shall not interfere in the internal affairs of any Arab State.

Article 28: The Palestinian Arab people assert the genuineness and independence of their nations (wataniyya) revolution and reject all forms of intervention, trusteeship and subordination.

Article 29: The Palestinian people possess the fundamental and genuine legal right to liberate and retrieve their homeland. The Palestinian people determine their attitude towards all states and forces on the basis of the stands they adopt vis-à-vis the Palestinian case and the extent of the support they offer to the Palestinian revolution to fulfill the aims of the Palestinian people.

Article 30: Fighters and carriers of arms in the war of liberation are the nucleus of the popular arm which will be the protective force for the gains of the Palestinian Arab people.

Article 31: The Organization shall have a flag, an oath of allegiance and an anthem. All this shall be decided upon in accordance with a special regulation.

Article 32: Regulations, which shall be known as the Constitution of the Palestine Liberation Organization, shall be annexed to the Charter. It shall lay down the manner in which the Organization, and its organs and institutions, shall be constituted; the respective competence of each; and the requirements of its obligations under the Charter.

Article 33: This Charter shall not be amended save by (vote of) a majority of two-thirds of the total membership of the National Congress of the Palestine Liberation Organization (taken) at a special session convened for that purpose.