A chance for real progress on peace

COLIN RUBENSTEIN says Mahmoud Abbas still has more to do to end terrorist attacks against Israelis

Canberra Times - 7 February 2005

Recent events in the Middle East pose both the possibility of progress and the danger of regression into a renewed bout of violence. On the upside, Egypt and Jordan are expected to renew full diplomatic relations with Israel in the coming weeks.

The Israelis and Palestinians are also preparing themselves for what might be a historic summit meeting between Ariel Sharon and newly elected Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Moreover, in another bit of encouraging news, the new US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, is due to arrive in the region this coming week.

The month since the election of Mahmoud Abbas has been one of ups and downs as far as Israeli-Palestinian relations are concerned.

The accession of Abbas to power in the wake of Yasser Arafat's death was seen as the best chance for Middle East peace in years. His passing even raised the hopes for an end to the armed intifada.

But then came the Palestinian attacks on the Karni crossing, which left six Israelis dead and many more wounded and on the Gush Katif junction. Along with escalating Palestinian rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza, the Karni crossing incident dampened hopes and demonstrated to the people of both sides just how much work Abbas has ahead of him.

The Karni attack was a joint operation of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the al-Aqsa Brigades - part of Abbas's own Fatah.

Israeli intelligence officials believe that Iran played a supporting role in the Gaza attacks, which provides proof of the destructive role played by Teheran in its quest to extinguish all hope for peaceful coexistence between Arabs and Israelis. And the Islamic theocrats at the helm of the Iranian government are utterly indifferent to the suffering they might cause to ordinary Palestinians.

The Karni crossing point is the primary artery through which commerce is conducted between Israel and the Gaza Strip. In the wake of the bombing the commercial terminal was closed. But the injury caused to the Palestinian economy was of little consequence to the terrorist puppet-masters in Damascus and Teheran.

According to the Israel Defence Force, the Iranian-dominated Hezbollah halo been responsible for about 20 per cent of the operations against Israeli civilians and soldiers this year. This spate of Palestinian violence caused the Israelis to suspend all contacts with Abbas until tangible measures were taken against Hamas and other terrorist groups. As a result of this pressure, Abbas has directed his security forces to prevent attacks on Israel by force if necessary.

Thus, more than a thousand Palestinian Security personnel have been stationed in the Northern Gaza Strip and ordered by Abbas to shoot anyone who tries to carry out attacks or launch rockets towards Israel. Abbas's action has not only brought about a dramatic reduction in the level of violence emanating from Gaza, but it provides backhanded proof of the extent to which Palestinian terrorism was reliant on Arafat: Abbas is now demonstrating how Arafat could have reduced a amount of violence from the Palestinians at any time.

Israeli security officials have greeted the latest developments with cautious optimism, acknowledging that Abbas is making a real effort to halt attacks from Gaza. Yet while so far his efforts have been positive they also warn that the current calm is very fragile and could be shattered in an instant.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad are undoubtedly using "a period of calm to regroup and reequip for the next round of fighting. An example of this fragility was given last week when, claiming to be acting in retaliation to the killing of a girl in Gaza by IDF forces, Hamas continued its barrage of rockets at Israeli communities.

Hamas's claim was later refuted when PA security forces arrested a Palestinian on suspicion that he was the one who was responsible for the girl's death when, as part of celebrations for his return from the Haj, he shot ammunition rounds in the air, killing the girl.

Hopes for peace and a better future for Palestinians will rest on Abbas's ability to overcome his predecessor's legacy of corruption, mismanagement, terrorism, incitement and a philosophical incapacity to compromise for peace.

Yet, Abbas's narrow political base and the opposition he faces from both internal and external extremists determined to scuttle any peace prospects, makes his future uncertain.

He must quash the terrorist groups that are bent on scuttling the peace process, and end the anti-Israel and anti-Jewish incitement that has come to pervade the official Palestinian media, education system and mosques. He must also dismantle Arafat's ideological legacy and convince his people that Israel has the right to exist, and that compromise and negotiations rather than terror are necessary for the peace that most Palestinians now crave.

If Abbas takes these steps, he will find an Israeli government eager to work with him to achieve a peace based on compromises acceptable to both peoples. Sharon has already shown his peaceful intentions, by staking his political career on his plan to withdraw from Gaza and part of the West Bank, and has repeatedly stated that his goal is Palestinian statehood.

Israeli opinion polls consistently show a comfortable majority of Israelis favour both the Gaza withdrawal plan and a peaceful two state resolution to the conflict, entailing painful compromises once they are convinced they have a Palestinian partner genuinely committed to a negotiated settlement.

Dr Rubenstein is executive director of the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council and previously taught politics at Monash university for many years.