A Circle from Arafat to Arafat

It seems that two regime changes have taken place in the world after 9-11, and a third is in the process. The two changes are fortunate and successful, while the third is still underway, and if implemented, could prove disastrous for Palestine and the Arab World. Apart from Afghanistan and Iraq, there is an attempted regime change in Palestine, to topple President Yasser Arafat. This coup, however, is bloodless and low-profile. All over the Middle East, people are asking if Arafat is still in-charge of the Palestinian Authority (PA). Now, after 34-months of violence, a Road Map promising gradual peace over a 3-year period is in the horizon—but Yasser Arafat is not there to negotiate. He is neither present at the White House, nor at Sharm al-Sheikh, and people are speculating on whether he will survive the Road Map. At a time when Arafat should be standing at center stage, he is being brushed aside by Mahmud Abbas, his long-time ally and Prime Minister. Will he outlive the crisis as he has done over and over in the past, or will he begin his long march into history?

Yasser Arafat has not left his compound in Ramallah since December 2001—an implorable punishment for someone who has spent the better part of his career on an airplane, marketing the Palestinian resistance. Since then, I have followed up on his activity with interest, writing frequently about him, and waiting to see if the “unsinkable” Arafat will fall. He has always surprised me by bouncing back into the heart of political events, although we were often brought to believe that his days were numbered. He insists on being there, to remind the world that Palestine, which has become synonymous with his name, is still there, still alive, still visible to the rest of the world. He has lost some of his authority, since neither the USA nor Israel will deal with him anymore, and he is no longer in control of negotiations, security, or finance of the PA. As much as Israeli prime ministers before Ariel Sharon would have loved to see Arafat in such a state in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, they had no backers in the White House for an anti-Arafat campaign. Mamduh Nofal, one of his aids, told Newsweek: “He is a strong man, but this isolation has weakened him” in reference to the 20-month house arrest that Arafat has been under.

Contrary to what everyone believes, however, I think that Yasser Arafat will survive both Ariel Sharon and George W. Bush. The only factor that can destroy him is death since by the time the Israelis go to the polls again, Arafat will be 78. Yet he has survived many situations harsher than this one: in Jordan in 1970, in the Lebanese Civil War, in the Israeli invasion of Beirut in 1982, in his miscalculated alliance with Saddam Hussein in 1991, his plane crash in 1992, and now this. In Madrid in 1991, the Americans insisted that he not attend the Peace Conference, claiming that his support for Saddam Hussein in the Gulf War had destroyed him in the international community. In a statement similar to what we hear today, President Bush Sr said that in the new world, there would be no room for someone who “allies himself with terrorists.” True to his word, President Bush Sr went to Madrid without Arafat, but Bill Clinton could not sign Oslo without Arafat in 1993. Clinton realized that he could not dismantle Arafat’s authority since he was the center of gravity in Palestinian politics. Power will go where Arafat goes: be it Amman, Beirut, Tunis, or Ramallah. And today, if the Road Map were to pass, only Arafat can rally his people to a compromise with Israel. A senior State Department official told Newsweek that, “even a weakened Arafat has the power to screw things up.” In 1991, Arafat was deprived of going to Madrid, and forced to send off other members of the resistance to negotiate, all being more sophisticated and educated negotiators (Sa’eb Erekat, Hanan Ashrawi, the late Faysal al-Husayni, and Haydar Abd al-Shafi). Undaunted, Arafat took matters into his own hands and sent his airplane every afternoon to Madrid to pick up the Palestinian negotiators and bring them to Tunis, where they would sound him up on their talks, receive instructions, and fly back to Spain. He was making one thing clear: if he could not go to Madrid, then simply, Madrid would have to come to him. And history repeats itself today. If he cannot go to the White House, then simply, the White House would have to come to him. Already, Abbas is sounding him out on his latest talks with George W. Bush, and it is certain the USA cannot broker a serious cease-fire or sign a peace-deal if Collin Powell does not make a courtesy visit to Ramallah. Simply put: the cease-fire with the militias needs his intervention since Hamas and Islamic Jihad will not listen to Mahmud Abbas, whom they consider an American stooge, and the final negotiations need his signature to become official.

The reason for Arafat’s demise, some claim, is his Prime Minister, who is being used as an instrument to undermine him. True, Arafat only agreed to Abbas under international pressure, but he still retains a personal influence and charisma over his people that Abbas will have a hard time matching. The Prime Minister does not have any deep roots in the West Bank and Gaza (which account to much of the patron-client system in Palestine) and doesn’t have the money that Arafat dishes out to buy support. While Arafat has hundreds of people who love him and thousands who rely on him for their livelihood, Mahmud Abbas has no one. Arafat receives $300 million per year funneled as assistance from the Arab world, which he uses to establish social services, education programs, media campaigns, and diplomatic missions, making an estimated 70,000 Palestinian families (out of 3.1 million Palestinians living in the Occupied Territories) directly dependent on him and the PA for their livelihood. We forget that the only reason Mahmud Abbas survived for so long was his alliance and dependence on Chairman Arafat. Even then, he ranked last among popular Palestinian politicians, preceded by Abu Iyad, Abu Jihad, Abu Dawoud, and Abu Hasan Salameh. Especially after the Oslo Accords of 1993, which were graced by his signature, Mahmud Abbas has become exceptionally unpopular in the Occupied Territories, viewed as an enemy of the intifadah after 2000.

Arafat has recently created a national security council with himself as its chairman—signaling to Abbas that dealing with the militias will be strictly his domain. Sidelining Arafat completely will make it impossible for Abbas to come across to his people as a Palestinian nationalist. He simply needs Arafat’s signature to achieve that. The more he cozies up to America, the more he loses credit among his own people. Without Arafat’s blessing yet with America’s unconditional support, Mahmud Abbas might end up being killed at the hands of one of his own countrymen. Only Arafat can make concessions and get away with it. He will not disarm the militias by force, and for the meantime, both he and the militias have found a common enemy in Prime Minister Abbas. For different reasons, they would both prefer to see him out of office. The Prime Minister has unintentionally increased Arafat’s clout of supporters. Today, his ratings are high among members of Fateh, old-time resistance groups like the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), independents, members of the Diaspora, and a novelty: Islamic Jihad and Hamas. If anything, the latest isolation has increased the consensus on Arafat, similar to how the siege of Ramallah did in March 2002. Arafat, however, is wittier than expected, and he has accepted Abbas’s promise to cease operation of the militias, not for security, but rather, to destroy the credibility of his Prime Minister in Palestinian eyes. It was Arafat who encouraged them to fight in the first place (although indirectly) and refused to give into pressure when the USA asked him to disarm them in 2000. The intifadah, heroic as it was, was a boost to Arafat’s career, matched only by the first intifadah of 1987, and he used it as a big media campaign to polish the image he had derived from bad government in the Occupied Territories. The intifadah was manipulated by Arafat to serve as his resurrection. Now, he will be man who saves the veterans of the intifadah from Abbas and the USA, refusing to launch a civil war against them, thereby becoming champion of the street. Even Arafat’s enemies, who once criticized him for being too pro-American, will re-calculate and say that he is definitely better than Abu Mazen, when measured by a nationalist yardstick. Likewise, Arafat will try to save Abbas from the same angry street, then undercut him on the next day to prove that he is still boss and still in control of the people and the government. He is giving Mahmud Abbas enough rope to hang himself.

Damascus
The Washington Report
September 2003