Fatah member calls Abbas 'tyrant' and 'dictator'
In rare, scathing article, prominent Fatah member calls Abbas 'tyrant' and 'dictator'
Article written by Dr. Sufian Abu Zaida, a former prisoner in Gaza and today a lecturer at Al-Quds University, reflects the Palestinians' ongoing loss of faith in their political system.
Is it the dramatic events in Egypt that are responsible for almost completely obscuring a scathing article describing Mahmoud Abbas as an authoritarian ruler who hoards all power to himself? Is it because of the demonstrations by millions of Egyptians on June 30, 2013, that the Palestinians hardly paid any attention to the following words, published on June 27?: “Honestly, no one dreamed we would ever arrive at the present situation, in which all authorities and all senior positions are in the hands of a single person ... We never imagined there would be anyone ... who would hold authorities that even Arafat, with all his greatness and symbolic importance, did not have.”
The article was written by Dr. Sufian Abu Zaida, a member of the Fatah Revolutionary Council, a former prisoner born in the Jabalya refugee camp in Gaza and today a lecturer in political science at Al-Quds University. The piece, “Zaman al-Ra’is,” was published on several prominent Palestinian websites such as Amad, Watan and Ma’an, and depicts in excruciating detail how “the ra’is now heads everything connected to the Palestinian people and the Palestinian cause. He is chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization and president of the State of Palestine and president of the Palestinian Authority, and he is also head of the Fatah movement and the general commander of the [security] forces, and due to the disruption of the activity of the Legislative Council, his [presidential] orders become law ... And in the shadow of the total paralysis that has spread throughout the PLO institutions, he is the sole decider there, and in the shadow of the weakness of the leadership with which the Fatah movement is afflicted, especially its central committee, which hardly functions any longer as a framework for collective leadership, he is the only one in business ...”
Some, with whom Haaretz spoke, have not even bothered to read the poignant text because they automatically labeled the author as a “supporter of normalization with Israel” or as “[former Fatah leader] Mohammed Dahlan’s man,” and dismissed him out of hand. But there are some PLO activists and Fatah members who read this piece and, not for attribution, noted that much of its credibility and power derives from the fact that it was written by someone who was known to have supported Yasser Arafat’s and Abbas’ acceptance of the Oslo Accords and the two-state solution.
They also agree with his other assertions: that the Palestinians are in an unprecedented state of frustration and loss of faith in their leadership; no one believes in the leadership’s ability to defend them against attacks by settlers or to bring an end to the occupation in the foreseeable future; that there is frustration “first and foremost from the shrinking of the Palestinian political order and its reduction to just one man,” as described above; that like Arafat, Abbas, as head of the PA and the PLO, has not appointed a deputy in either institution; that the fault also lies with Fatah officials − who do not demand a change in the situation, and instead tell their leader what he wants to hear; and that the people close to Abbas and the people he consults with are not even senior Fatah members.
Some of Zaida’s peers were critical of the article, not because it isn’t pointing out real problems, but because of its timing, as one key Fatah member who wished to remain anonymous explained. “If not for the serious existential fears that we’re facing, the article would be more relevant,” he said. “It seems like everyone is trying to break us and get us back to negotiations. European diplomats are telling us they know [Benjamin] Netanyahu doesn’t intend to make peace, but that they will still blame us for the failure of the talks. We’re in a lose-lose situation: We’ll lose if we go to negotiations and we’ll lose if we don’t go to negotiations. In such a situation, is Abbas the enemy?” But the same Fatah member agreed that a leadership that enjoyed public trust would be better able to deal with “the existential problems.”
Hamas’ weakening
Abu Zaida says that he wrote the article as an ordinary citizen. But as a veteran member of Fatah and its Revolutionary Council, he has a clear advantage in that he is aware of things that are unknown to the general public.
In the article he mentions the former Palestinian police commander Ghazi al-Jabali. Jabali was accused of a major embezzlement of public funds and vanished from the West Bank. A month and a half ago, he returned and the charges against him were dropped. For his part, Abu Zaida complains that it wasn’t the judicial authority that canceled the charges, as should have been the case, but rather the president’s office − in clear violation of the principle of a separation of authorities.
Abu Zaida says he felt compelled to write his article for public dissemination because in his movement’s institutions, which are essentially paralyzed, there is no substantial discussion of failures and flaws, while decisions made by Fatah’s oversight body – the Revolutionary Council – are not being implemented. This structural weakness will leave Fatah unable to “reap” the fruits of Hamas’ regional weakening in the wake of the Muslim Brotherhood regime’s ouster in Egypt and the loss of support from Iran and Hezbollah.
If Abu Zaida was hoping his article would spark a serious discussion, he was disappointed: Despite its boldness and bluntness, it did not “go viral.” Some Fatah and Legislative Council members even said they were completely unaware of it.
The fact that the article – which was subject to no direct censorship – virtually flew under the radar, fits in with a general tendency in Palestinian society of depoliticization and apathy toward what is happening in the public realm. It’s yet another manifestation of the loss of faith in the old political system’s ability to bring about the promised change (state, independence, end to the occupation, right of return).
Luckily for the article, on June 29, two days after it came out, the official PLO news agency WAFA published a statement on behalf of “the security establishment” (though there is no legal entity by this name) denouncing it. The writer chose to begin with verses from the Koran, from the Sura of the Ladders (No. 70): “They [heretics] think the Day of Judgement is far off; but we see it near at hand.”
Ignoring the substance of his arguments, the anonymous writer or writers reminded Abu Zaida that by Palestinian basic law, the president is defined as the head of the security forces, and declared that they are proud of him and of his orders to fight anarchy and security chaos. The article is an insult to the Palestinian people, they wrote, saying that by casting aspersions on the leadership Abu Zaida was tearing at the Palestinian social fabric “and serving an agenda hostile to the Palestinian people” − just when “our enemies are attacking the president who is standing steadfast” against the pressures to return to negotiations without a halt to settlement construction. “The people can distinguish between someone working for the homeland and someone working for a private agenda and on behalf of private individuals who have fled the homeland.”
This last point was a thinly veiled reference to Mohammad Dahlan, the former minister and head of the Preventive Security Service in Gaza and a member of the Legislative Council, whom Abbas ousted from Fatah. The writers of the response say that the people are not despairing and frustrated. They also suggest that Abu Zaida take into account how the hostile media will convey his statements and use them against the Palestinian leadership.
The condemnation in the official news agency, which is under Abbas’ scrutiny, actually prompted additional people to read his article, says Abu Zaida.
The choice of the “security establishment” as the respondent attests to the great self-confidence this sector has, which derives directly from the fact that the United States, Europe (and Jordan) are not much concerned with the paralysis of the Palestinian democratic system − as long as the security agencies they are training and funding continue their coordination missions with the Israel Defense Forces and the Shin Bet security service. The condemnation in WAFA contains more than the hint of a threat.
In public comments to the response, Abu Zaida wondered what the “security establishment” has to do with the political questions he raised. He believes that others in the movement are not joining him because, unlike him, their salaries and promotions are dependent upon Abbas. The thing that hurt him the most, he added, was that not one of the Palestinian human rights organizations, including the NGOs “that receive money from all over the world” and all the leftist organizations, denounced the threat from “the security establishment” or called Abu Zaida to voice support.
A few people did stand by his side: Most prominent was former commander of general intelligence Tawfiq Tirawi, who now chairs the board of trustees of Al-Istiqlal University (aka the Palestinian Academy for Security Sciences, formerly a military academy) and is a member of the Fatah central committee. Tirawi condemned the intervention of the “security establishment” and called it a violation of the law for freedom of expression and opinion, and an instance of exceeding authority. His taking a stand in support of Abu Zaida (without getting into the content of the article) is akin to a type of physical protection.
Fourteen members of the Fatah faction at the Legislative Council also published a condemnation of the criticism by the “security establishment,” saying it set a grave precedent and that is the job of the judicial authority alone to determine whether Abu Zaida committed a crime.
With regard to his being labeled as part of the “Dahlan camp,” Abu Zaida told Haaretz: “Anyone who expresses the smallest criticism is immediately cataloged in this way. I’ve been a friend of Dahlan for 30 years and I’m not ashamed of that. But there are people, who if they express an opposing view [to the official position] and don’t even know Dahlan, are also accused of being in his camp. This label is part of the silencing tactics.”
The office of President Abbas did not respond to queries from Haaretz.
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