[News] Palestinian national unity and class conflict

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://samidoun.net/2018/11/palestinian-national-unity-and-class-conflict-by-khaled-barakat/ 



  Palestinian national unity and class conflict by Khaled Barakat

samidoun
November 3, 2018
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/The following article by Palestinian writer Khaled Barakat, coordinator 
of the Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat <http://freeahmadsaadat.org/>, was 
originally published in Arabic in Al-Adab magazine on 2 November 2018. 
To read the original Arabic text, please visit the Al-Adab website 
<http://al-adab.com/article/%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%88%D8%AD%D8%AF%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%88%D8%B7%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%81%D9%84%D8%B3%D8%B7%D9%8A%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9-%D9%88%D8%B5%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%B9-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B7%D8%A8%D9%82%D8%A7%D8%AA>./

When the positions of national forces clash in a country confronting 
occupation and colonization, as has been the case in Algeria, Ireland, 
India, South Africa and elsewhere, it is natural to inquire as to the 
motivations of this conflict and to identify those who benefit from the 
situation as well as those who are negatively affected.

The political and ideological struggle may progress toward armed 
internal war or civil confrontation, especially if the colonizer is not 
far away from the situation.

As we examine the contradictions between forces, we must also understand 
the role of “surrounding” forces that may appear outside the frame of 
the picture or who attempt to emerge in the role of “mediator.” In 
reality, these forces may be a cause of the conflict itself.

While a class-based analysis dominated the thinking of the left in 
general at one stage and at times became the only reference in 
addressing every issue (at times to the exclusion of relevant matters), 
unfortunately, in a later period, it has become almost or completely 
absent. This is particularly true in terms of the interpretation of 
contradictions on the Palestinian national political scene.

Therefore, it is necessary to paint a picture, even an incomplete and 
general one, of the conflicting Palestinian class interests, of which 
these intellectual and political contradictions reflect their public faces.

*The dominant Palestinian minority*

These are the interests and sectors that have dominated the ranks of the 
Palestinian leadership, including the leadership of the people and the 
revolutionary movement for the past century. For example, these sectors 
have dominated the Higher Arab Authority, the key leadership titles of 
the PLO, the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian National Council. 
These interests have symbols and slogans that are subject to change at 
every stage. The leading Palestinian families may be the same, but their 
performance changes alongside changing modes of production, changing 
relationships with the foreign colonizer and reactionary systems of 
guardianship and authority and then with the Zionist occupation. 
However, in all cases they occupy the same central location.

This Palestinian minority has led us, after every stage, battle, revolt 
or uprising, into a major disaster. This occurred at the hands of the 
“Pasha” class, the remnants of Palestinian feudalism, the great 
landowners, merchants and “figures” who participated in aborting the 
1936 revolution. The same happened in 1947 and later, to put an end to 
the great intifada of 1987-1993, and again from 2000-2005. As long as 
this minority, with abundant capital and power yet which does not exceed 
a few thousand individuals, continues to dominate over the Palestinian 
popular majority and to grasp the keys to the Palestinian political 
decision, our people will continue to suffer further disappointments and 
defeats.

*Who forms this minority today?*

It is difficult to identify one sector and call it the “class of the 
minority.” It has multiple roots, but it works in the service of the 
Zionist entity, the reactionary Arab regimes and imperialist forces, 
through a network of overlapping political and financial institutions, 
banks, corporations and economic projects. It has a government, prisons, 
ministries and embassies, particularly following the establishment of 
the Palestinian Authority in 1994.

This authority, which targets the armed resistance and cooperates with 
the Zionist enemy and foreign intelligence services, is a tool for both 
the Zionist occupation and this group, which we could call the Oslo 
class. It has a dual function – to consecrate the interests of the 
Palestinian minority and to protect the enemy in order for it to be 
“accepted” in its institutions, security and economic system. It 
continues to derive legitimacy from the Arab and international official 
recognition of it as the sole legitimate representative of the 
Palestinian people. And the Zionist entity responds to the needs of this 
class which is dependent upon it, strengthening its position within 
Palestinian society, and dealing with it as a junior follower or 
partner, giving it a share of the market in “Palestinian areas in Judea 
and Samaria.” This is formalized in the framework that has been 
officially labeled “economic peace.”

In other words, the class of the ruling Palestinian minority is a puppet 
of the occupation that consists of hundreds of big capitalists, their 
agents, business owners and subcontractors of projects with the 
occupation. The “Palestinian Authority” is a local administration for 
the projects of these large bourgeois interests.

Criticism of the positions of the PLO and Palestinian Authority 
leadership is, in essence, a critique of the dominant Palestinian 
interests that established the “wasta” system (“mediators” between the 
occupation and the masses), serving as a comprador class inside occupied 
Palestine. These sectors have tightened their control over the 
Palestinian political decision since 1974, when they seized control of 
the “revolution” and the Palestinian establishment, gradually moving 
toward the era of “Authority.” This transition has come about through 
the acceptance of the “self-rule” framework, through undemocratic and 
twisted machinations of the traditional Palestinian leaders and forces 
and through their largest political party, the Fateh movement.

*Who is the Palestinian popular majority?*

Since 1948, we have no longer been one coherent society living on our 
land, but many dispersed contingents, societies and communities inside 
and outside occupied Palestine, that have no bridges to connect them or 
meaningful economic, political and organizational connections.

The most prominent of these are the Palestinian refugee camps, numbering 
over 60. Some of these have been destroyed by continuous wars, Zionist 
and official Arab massacres at times and economic siege at other times. 
Their suffering continues daily with racist laws, negation of the 
refugees’ identity and ongoing resettlement projects. They are like 
“cantons” groaning under siege and poverty in the occupied homeland and 
in exile, and forming with the working classes and other marginalized 
sectors the popular Palestinian majority. These Palestinian belts of 
misery stretch from the Naqab to Jabalya, through Shatila, Baqaa and 
Yarmouk, to the faraway lands of migration, facing isolated struggles as 
if they are islands and filled with a sense of disappointment, anger and 
rage at the ongoing deceptions.

*Who are they, and who are we?*

So, we see two contradictory forces. While the Palestinian majority 
lives with isolation, marginalization and impoverishment, the minority 
strives for a fortune of $40 billion, lives a safe and protected life, 
lives in palaces, accumulates wealth, sends its children to prominent 
universities and institutions in the United States and Europe and pays 
no human price in the national liberation struggle, in comparison to the 
work and sacrifices of the masses.

As the class conflict intensifies between the dominant minority and the 
overwhelming majority, the minority attempts to resolve its own problems 
and its economic and political crises at the expense of the national 
rights of the majority: undermining the right of return; confiscating 
the rights of martyrs, prisoners and the wounded; plundering public 
property. This class attempts to deceive the majority politically, 
especially through the slogan of the so-called “independent Palestinian 
state,” which is, ultimately, the project of the Palestinian large 
bourgeoisie. However, this project is doomed to failure after its 
results have been made clear: the failure to prevent intensified 
settlement construction, the Judaization of Jerusalem, the imposition of 
the siege on Gaza and the continued denial of refugees’ return. The 
policies of the enemy, and even its bulldozers and aircraft, in some 
sense create a reality that destroys the icon of the “Palestinian state” 
created by this enemy itself.

The Palestinian popular majority has lost almost everything, including 
its natural position in the “revolution,” the PLO and the Palestinian 
national project, in favor of the large capitalist class that has taken 
control of everything. If the popular classes are those who have built 
the pillars of the revolution and the PLO, today, they find themselves 
cast to the side of the road. Yes, the struggling and working classes in 
occupied Palestine – workers, peasants, fishermen, lawyers, engineers, 
teachers, students, artisans and even the owners of small factories, 
workshops and projects – carried all the burdens of the revolution, the 
intifada and the armed struggle. They are the historic opponents of the 
Palestinian palaces and the Zionist entity. They are, especially in the 
camps, the primary stakeholders in the completion of their struggle: 
return and liberation.

This large popular Palestinian bloc that built the revolution is not 
looking for a fictitious “state.” It is fighting for the restoration of 
the land, the rights and the property that has been usurped. How can the 
popular classes, impoverished communities and marginalized groups be 
able to resume their role and reclaim the revolution that has been 
dispersed and degenerated?

Achieving this goal requires that this majority be aware of its 
historical role in the revolution and the movement for social change. 
This role can not only defeat the American-Zionist-reactionary 
liquidation project, but also defeat the project of the Palestinian 
minority of the imaginary “state,” instead moving toward a process of 
revolution and a movement for comprehensive change. This time, it must 
be led by the popular classes, for the first time in the history of the 
Palestinian national liberation struggle.

Phrases and slogans like “national reconciliation,” “ending the 
division,” “sole legitimate representative,” “Palestinian state,” 
“national project,” “independence,” “freedom,” “legitimacy,” 
“Jerusalem,” “popular resistance” and “the right to self-determination,” 
among others, have been exploited relentlessly. If put to the test 
today, you will find that each Palestinian party has its own definition 
of these concepts. The degradation of Palestinian political discourse in 
general and the use of deceptive language and concepts that are directed 
to justify the current political situation are constant policies of the 
ruling class, its intellectuals and its tools in the media.

*Internal contradictions and the “peace process”*

Nothing reveals the internal Palestinian contradiction more clearly and 
defines its parties more precisely than their positions on the “peace 
process.” This is because the conflict between the Oslo class and the 
Palestinian popular classes is revealed clearly in the stages of this 
deceptive project. For the Palestinian people, the “peace process” means 
a comprehensive liquidation of their cause, through colonization, ethnic 
cleansing, and the pacification of their movement; for the Palestinian 
financial class, it is a profitable process and a way of life!

A quarter of a century has passed since the signing of the Oslo accords, 
which constituted the major turning point in the Palestinian struggle 
for the occupation, imperialist powers and the large Palestinian 
bourgeoisie. It marks the beginning of the material transformation from 
the stage of the intifada/popular revolution to the phantom 
authority/pseudo-state. And on the shoulders of the Palestinian popular 
majority and the popular and armed resistance movement, rests the task 
of creating a revolutionary alternative that can confront the attempted 
liquidation of the Palestinian question and protect the unity of the 
people, the land and their rights.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 https://freedomarchives.org/
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