Bad management

Tuesday, September 07, 2004

ate last night, an Israeli helicopter fired a missile into a gathering of mostly uniformed members of the armed wing of Hamas, the Azzadin Brigades, killing 14 and wounding another 45. Hamas, of course, immediately vowed revenge and this morning, Qassam rockets landed at the entrance to Sderot and inside a number of Gush Katif settlements. There were somewhat half-hearted protests by the Palestinians that the site that was struck, a football field, was being used by a summer camp but that did little to explain why so many of the killed were in camouflage uniform. According to the Israelis, the site is sometimes used for youth activities, but overnight it is used by the Hamas for training in such matters as Qassam launches, preparing bombs, and ways to infiltrate settlements. Or as one military reporter said, ‘what youth group holds its meetings at 12:30 at night?’

The incident came after a meeting yesterday between Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, accompanied by the new Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abdul Gheit, and Yasser Arafat. The reports following the meeting were somewhat contradictory. One report said that the Egyptians told Arafat they are no longer ready to send special forces into Palestinian territory to train PA security officers but would be ready to train them inside Egypt. Another report said that there’s been no progress in Egyptian efforts to bring all the armed Palestinian factions together for ceasefire talks, but this morning there were reports saying that the meeting would take place, possibly as soon as next week.

There is no doubt that the efforts for a Palestinian ceasefire are in trouble, not least because of two factors hardly in their hands: the American elections and the political conundrum created in Israel by Sharon’s disengagement plan. Everyone seems to be waiting for the November elections, and everyone expects a change in policy after the elections, no matter who wins – the trouble is that it is very difficult to predict what change would take place. Traditionally, Republican presidents in their second term lose patience for Israeli belligerence, while first-term Democrats take their time before turning to the Middle East crisis and then push for a peace process. But in the current race, it is difficult to tell what either Bush or Kerry would do, so waiting would appear to be the name of the game for both the Israelis and Palestinians – except that the pressures are mounting on both sides.

Thus, Sharon is reportedly sending his consigliere, Dov Weisglass (now a part-time consultant rather than a full time chief of staff) to Washington this week to present the new route for the separation fence to the Bush administration, specifically Condoleezza Rice. The new route is much closer to the Green Line, indeed on it directly in many places, and reduces to a very bare minimum incursions into Palestinian property. All the settlements left outside the fence will get their own, ‘private’ fences, according to the new plan, which was imposed on Sharon by Israel’s High Court of Justice as well as the International Court of Justice – and the fear that the Americans will not stand up to defend the intrusive fence if it reaches the Security Council.

Woman Crucified # 13 by Silvia Rosenberg, mixed media on recycled paper, 20x30 cm.

nce again Sharon is taking a political gamble that will undoubtedly alienate members of his own party, by taking the new fence route to the Americans before he shows it to the government at home. Indeed, the criticism of Sharon policies is turning toward his management style as much as it is directed at the content of those policies, meaning the withdrawal from Gaza and the northern West Bank. For example, Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, the heir apparent in the Likud, made a rare foray into foreign policy and security issues last week when he criticized Sharon’s announcement advancing the disengagement schedule. But Netanyahu focused on how Sharon was ignoring a previous cabinet decision, rather than expressing what Netanyahu is believed to think – that the disengagement itself is a mistake.

On the Left – and internationally, of course -- there is a different criticism that also refers to Sharon’s management, or perhaps his lack of management. For nearly three years, Sharon has been promising the Americans to remove ‘illegal outposts’ in the West Bank. But meanwhile, the outposts proliferate, get services from various government ministries and are defended by companies of soldiers sent by the army, rather than dismantled by those very same companies. On the rare occasions when the army gears up to forcibly evict an outpost, a leak of the plans reaches settler activists, who descend en masse on the outpost to defend it. Sharon’s consigliere has been telling the Americans that the prime minister prefers not to waste political capital on removing outposts when he faces removing entire settlements in Gaza and four more around Jenin. But to many ears it is beginning to sound like an excuse, since Sharon has been repeatedly told by his own party that it opposes any disengagement plan involving uprooting settlements, and he now heads a minority government that few believe will last much longer than the end of this year or spring of 2005, by which time, Sharon has indicated, he wants the disengagement process to be in full swing.

Things are no less complicated on the Palestinian side, where there is constant ferment beneath the surface over Arafat’s management style, which prefers chaos to order, and turmoil to stability. The latest reports are that he is claiming to have unified the dozen security forces into one command – under Moussa Arafat in Gaza – and believes that should longstanding international demands for a single armed forces command. Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority is taking another step toward democracy by scheduling local elections in at least 35 municipalities in December, presumably to be followed by local elections in the other towns as well as a national election. That has sent the Palestinian political scene into a tizzy, as reformists line up to run against Arafat loyalists. In the background, there’s Mohammad Dahlan’s own lobbying for local and international pressure on Arafat to give up executive powers and become a symbolic head of state. Dahlan was in Libya with Moammer Gaddafi this weekend, and Gaddafi apparently intervened to help patch up differences between Dahlan and Arafat. On the subject of Arafat, the Russian foreign minister proposed to Sharon that he offer something to Arafat – freedom of movement outside the Muqata -- in exchange for Arafat giving up his powers. Arafat is the symbol of the Palestinian people, said the foreign minister. According to Israel Radio, Sharon replied, ‘Arafat is a symbol of terror and destruction.’ As for letting Arafat out of the government compound in Ramallah, where he has been holed up since December 2001, Sharon reportedly asked the Russian visitor, ‘would you want him roaming around in Russia?’

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