Scoop Link: The Palestine Papers Day 4

Thursday, 27 January 2011, 1:57 pm
Press Release: Scoop Link

Did the PA know about the Gaza war in advance? That's a question raised by several exchanges in The Palestine Papers.

Did the Palestinian Authority (PA)'s leadership have foreknowledge of the Gaza war? That question is raised - though never satisfactorily answered - by several exchanges revealed in The Palestine Papers.

In defending their handling of the Gaza war, Mahmoud Abbas, the PA president, has long held that the PA warned Hamas - both in Gaza and through its Syrian-based leadership - that Israel was planning an attack on Gaza.

The PA always maintained that their information was only based on Israeli press reports; however, minutes of meetings between the PA and Israeli leaders tell a different story.

The Palestine Papers show that Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian Authority negotiator, told George Mitchell, the US Middle East envoy, in a meeting on October 21, 2009 that Amos Gilad, the director of Israeli military intelligence, alerted Abbas prior to the Gaza attack.

Documents reveal a Palestinian Authority that's critical, mistrustful and fearful of Arab neighbours.

Earlier this week, in response to Al Jazeera's first release of The Palestine Papers, Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas tried to dismiss the documents by invoking pan-Arab solidarity.

"We don't hide anything from our Arab brothers," he said in Cairo. "We have been briefing our Arab brothers about all our activities with the Israelis and the Americans."

But there is little Arab unity on display in The Palestine Papers: The documents reveal a Palestinian Authority that is often critical and mistrusting of its "Arab brothers".

Some of the earliest criticism came in July 2007, when chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat met with US security coordinator Keith Dayton. Erekat wanted to weaken Hamas, and asked Dayton to pressure several Arab regimes to cut support for the group:

PA, with US encouragement, delayed a UN vote on the Goldstone Report into war crimes committed during Israel's Gaza war.

On October 2, 2009, the UN Human Rights Council was widely expected to pass a resolution supporting the Goldstone Report, the UN’s probe of war crimes committed during Israel’s war in Gaza in December 2008 and January 2009.

The Council instead agreed to delay a vote on the report until March 2010, following major reservations expressed by the Palestinian Authority, the United States and Israel.

A UNHRC endorsement of the report would have brought Israeli officials one step closer to prosecution before a war crimes tribunal, an event many Palestinians were anxious to see.

But, as The Palestine Papers reveal, the Palestinian Authority apparently sacrificed a potential victory for Palestinian victims in exchange for favorable assurances on negotiations from the United States and, they hoped, from Israel.

Quid pro quo

The Goldstone Report, formally known as the Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, was released in mid-September 2009 amid calls for a review of Israel’s wartime practices. The probe was led by Richard Goldstone, a former South African judge; it identified war crimes committed overwhelmingly by Israeli forces, but also by Hamas, during Israel’s war on Gaza.

Playful banter, inappropriate jokes and bizarre rants: We take you through the "lighter side" of The Palestine Papers.

When it comes to negotiations, the public is rarely privy to what happens during the countless meetings that precede political agreements and the much-publicized handshakes that seal them. But The Palestine Papers give us an inside look into the negotiating room, documenting playful banter, inappropriate jokes and bizarre rants in dozens of meetings between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators during the Annapolis process. The papers also reveal the complicated relationships between officials from both sides, while illuminating how they deal with roadblocks.

One such obstacle emerged during a contentious meeting on May 29, 2008 at the King David Hotel in West Jerusalem, when Israeli negotiators refused to discuss one of the conflict’s core issues, the status of Jerusalem. Samih Al-Abed, the Palestinian Authority’s map expert, tells Udi Dekel, a senior adviser to then-Israeli Prime Minster Ehud Olmert: “We can’t go forward without Jerusalem on the table.”

After a futile back and forth about what can and cannot be discussed and what was and was not agreed to, Dekel says, “I do not have permission to discuss Jerusalem without knowing what arrangements will be in Jerusalem.” Al-Abed replies that his boss, senior Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qurei, said the Palestinian side “cannot discuss Ma’ale Adumim,” the large and illegal Israeli settlement near Jerusalem.

PA negotiators are increasingly proposing an idea that's met with derision from Israelis, sharp criticism from the US.

Palestinian negotiators are more frequently threatening to abandon the goal of a two-state solution in their conflict with Israel and are pushing for a one-state option instead.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) is very well aware that a one-state solution constitutes a threat to Israel, and has used the threat during half a dozen meetings documented in The Palestine Papers.

The two-state solution remains the conceptual basis for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. However, as it has failed to accomplish a final agreement, Palestinian interest in a one-state solution has seemingly grown.

The one-state solution is generally presented as a nightmare scenario for Israel. The likelihood that Palestinians might one day constitute an electoral majority in a bi-national state - which is seen as inevitable - is viewed by many Israeli Jews as a threat to the 'Jewish character' of the country.

Quoted in a post-Annapolis interview with the Israeli daily Haaretz in November 2007, Ehud Olmert, the then-prime minister, warned of the implications of a one-state solution.

Al Jazeera receives numerous mentions, none of them flattering, in this trove of Palestinian documents.

The Palestinian Authority thinks it has quite a few enemies in the region, according to The Palestine Papers, including Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, and other Arab states.

To that list, add a certain Qatar-based satellite TV channel.

Al Jazeera receives numerous mentions, none of them flattering, in this trove of Palestinian documents. It is often portrayed as pro-Hamas, a biased impediment to the “peace process.” Other Arabic-language media outlets are mentioned in the documents, but rarely by name.

The PA is keenly aware – in all of its internal discussion of media coverage – that its actions are often portrayed in an unflattering light.

A “communication problem”

Palestinian negotiators seem to become disappointed with Al Jazeera in early 2008, in the months after the Annapolis conference. Ahmed Qurei complains in February to then-Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni that the channel praises the “daily victories” of Hamas.

ENDS

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