Palestinian politics still in turmoil a year after Hamas election.

Agence France-Press (AFP)

RAMALLAH, West Bank, Jan 24, 2007 (AFP) - A year ago Palestinian politics were thrown into turmoil when Hamas sailed to an unexpected victory in legislative polls, prompting a standoff with the outside world over its refusal to renounce violence and recognise Israel.
    The standoff continues and the turmoil has worsened, with Palestinians having come perilously close to civil war and the economy on its knees because of the international boycott of Hamas.
    Hamas caught the world by suprise when it won a whopping 74 seats in the 132-member Legislative Council on January 25, 2006.
    It unseated Fatah, the party founded by the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, which had ruled the territories for 10 years and was increasingly seen as inept and corrupt.
    Palestinians voted for change, as Hamas militants who had come out of the shadows took their places as lawmakers and Ismail Haniya became prime minister.
    The reaction from Israel, the United States and many other Western countries was quick and uncompromising. Hamas, dedicated to the destruction of the Jewish state, would have to change its stripes or face isolation.
    Israel suspended the transfer to the Palestinian Authority of about 60 million dollars a month -- more than half of its income -- collected in customs duties on goods destined for the Palestinian territories.
    Since its foundation in the late 1980s, Hamas spearheaded a series of deadly attacks on Israel. It was responsible for the bulk of suicide bombings on Israeli targets during the intifada which erupted in 2000.
    Yet when it ousted Fatah at the polls last January, it had been abiding by an unofficial truce for a year, and moderate Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas urged outsiders to respect the results.
    But the United States and European Union were unmoved, and suspended direct financial aid to the Palestinian Authority.
    The economic situation deteriorated, eventually leading to a months-long strike by civil servants that has only just ended, and Abbas began to push for the formation of a government of national unity.
    The aim was to create the conditions for lifting the boycott and aid freeze and to present a unified front in eventual new peace talks with Israel.
    After repeated failure to reach a compromise, a frustrated Abbas announced in December that he would call early presidential and legislative elections.
    Hamas rejected that as an attempted coup, and the intermittent fighting that had pitted Hamas and Fatah militants against each other in the Gaza Strip boiled over.
    More than 30 people were killed in the course of a month, and there were also sporadic but less serious clashes in the West Bank.
    Gazans had already suffered months of violence after Israel launched an offensive aimed at recovering a soldier captured in a raid on a border post last June and to put a halt to Palestinian rocket fire on its territory.
    More than 400 people were killed in that offensive, which was halted by a fragile truce in November.
    Hamas and Fatah eventually put the squeeze on militants to end their fighting and in recent days have redoubled efforts to find a compromise.
    The most recent was a meeting in Damascus on Sunday between Abbas and exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal. Those talks were also inconclusive but more negotiations were promised.
    Looking back over the year, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum said "the greatest performance of this government has been to face off the ferocious Israeli offensive, remain in power without renouncing its principles and avoid the civil war desired by Israel.
    "We wanted to do more, but the world imposed a blockade on the government, and the Palestinian people have been punished for their democratic choice."
    Mahdi Abdelhadi, director of the Palestinian Academic Society for the Study of International Affairs (PASSIA), offered a sobering account.
    He acknowledges that Hamas has managed to stay in power but accuses it of "political hypocrisy by playing word games".
    "Instead of renouncing violence, it talks of a truce; instead of recognising Israel, it talks of recognising the borders of 1967 (when Israel captured the West Bank and Gaza Strip); instead of accepting Israeli-Palestinian accords, it talks of 'respecting' them."
    That has been a "blow to its credibility in the eyes of public opinion."
    The factional clashes, he said, have "opened the door to regional interference in Palestinian affairs and allowed Israel to punish at will ... far from international pressures.
    "In my opinion, the election of Hamas has put the Palestinians into a big prison, where they are fighting each other for power.
    "I think that the only solution lies in holding new elections, which will allow the emergence of new leaders capable of leading the Palestinian people," Abdelhadi said.
    bur/ezz/al/hc

24 January 2007