<html>
<body>
<font size=3>
<a href="http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article9036.shtml" eudora="autourl">
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article9036.shtml<br>
</a></font><font size=3 color="#191919">Opinion/Editorial <br>
Nonviolent resistance a means, not the end <br>
Ben White, <i>The Electronic Intifada,</i> Oct 12, 2007 <br>
<hr>
<br>
In a recent article on the <i>openDemocracy</i> website
</font>
(<a href="http://www.opendemocracy.net/terrorism/article/palestine_muqawama">
http://www.opendemocracy.net/terrorism/article/palestine_muqawama</a>
)<font size=3 color="#191919">, the rewritten Palestinian Authority
policy document that replaced "<i>muqawama</i>" (resistance)
with "popular struggle" was hailed as having "the
potential to dramatically transform a conflict whose just resolution has
continually eluded diplomats and militants." [1] The writer Maria
Stephan may be admired for her optimism about the possibility of
large-scale mobilization in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT)
for a program of nonviolent resistance, but there is a twofold failure of
contextualization that compromises her analysis.<br><br>
The first problem is that the article does not do justice to the rich
tradition and contemporary practice of nonviolent resistance, or popular
struggle, in Palestine. The first intifada and the protests in Bil'in are
cited, but the Palestinians draw on a far deeper reservoir of experience,
dating at least as far back as the 1936 Revolt against British occupation
and creeping Zionist colonization. As writer Mazin Qumsiyeh has noted,
part of the Revolt included "a conference of 150 delegates
representing all sectors of the population calls for a general strike and
refusal to pay taxes to the British occupation authorities."
[2]<br><br>
Whether under the British, Jordanians or Israelis, Palestinians have
always frustrated their would-be overlords with non-cooperation and
resistance. The first intifada is rightly seen as a watershed moment,
when, as one nonviolence expert has estimated, around 85 percent of
resistance was of the nonviolent form, including "commercial
boycotts, labour strikes, demonstrative funerals, the hoisting of
Palestinian flags, the resignation of tax collectors, and many types of
political noncooperation." [3]<br><br>
The second intifada has been noticeably more militarized, but also not
without widespread examples of popular struggle, from physically
preventing settlers vandalizing Palestinian farmland to marching en masse
to "closed military zones" or land marked for confiscation. If
Abbas and Fayyad are sincere in calling for "popular struggle"
therefore, we would expect them to have a track record in supporting
nonviolent resistance to date.<br><br>
In fact, the opposite is true, and so the second error in Stephan's
assessment is to misread Abbas' intentions, naively believing that the
Fatah leadership is interested in pioneering such a strategy. The
Electronic Intifada published an
<a href="http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article7005.shtml">interview</a>
earlier this year with Abd al-Nasser Marrar, a coordinator of the
popular resistance committee formed to confront the wall in Budrus, who
complained that "the PA didn't help at all," not even with
"the simplest thing." [4] Moreover, the PA had "lapsed in
its responsibilities toward all the villages west of Ramallah generally
and in fact, in the entire West Bank," a failure he described as
"abnormal and unnatural." "The PA just doesn't have the
interest," Abd al-Nasser concluded.<br><br>
Stephan shows that she is indeed aware of how, post-Oslo, the newly
formed PA channeled resistance into cooperation, and dynamic struggle
into corruption and personal advancement. It is not quite correct,
however, to describe this as a result of the PLO's inability to achieve
gains at "the negotiating table." The agreements on paper and
the PA's subsequent disinterest in "mobilizing people to challenge
the economic, political, and military pillars underlying the
occupation" were intrinsically related, representing capitulation
first in word then in deed.<br><br>
The PA's lack of support for popular struggle at the official level is
reflected in a general apathy amongst a middle-upper class, who are
financially prospering and do not wish to rock the boat. This is to be
sharply distinguished from the multitude of jobless, hungry, and
exhausted Palestinians, whose "apathy" towards popular struggle
is the outcome sought by the cumulative effect of the Israeli
occupation's siege, humiliations and life-draining injustices.<br><br>
It is not just contentment (for the few) or sheer fatigue (for the many)
that makes mass mobilization a challenge. Palestinians also fear that two
critical elements for the success of nonviolent popular struggle are
missing in their case: international coverage and limited repression on
the part of the oppressor. As previously mentioned, "popular
struggle" has always been a part of Palestinian resistance to
occupation and colonization -- but receives only a fraction of the press
coverage afforded to violent resistance.<br><br>
Not only do nonviolent actions get no or minimal coverage, but when
Israeli occupation forces retaliate with violence, and even deadly force,
the international outcry barely rises above a whimpered plea for
"restraint." In the first month of the second intifada, 141
Palestinians were killed even before Palestinian resistance groups had
begun serious militarized self-defense. [5] Or recall the massacre in
Rafah in May 2004, when Israeli helicopters fired on a peaceful march.
[6] Despite the chaotic, bloody aftermath being captured on film, the
most the "deeply troubled" US State Department could muster was
an expression of "concern." [7]<br><br>
</font>Mark LeVine provides further examples in an article on
CommonDreams.org, citing the famous forcible deportation of Mubarak Awad,
founder of the Palestinian Centre for the Study of Nonviolence in 1988,
as well as the more recent jailing without charge of Ahmed Awad, a leader
of the "nonviolent Committee for the Popular Struggle against the
Separation Fence." [8] In a detailed piece in Middle East Report in
2002, Lori Allen quoted Elias Rishmawi, "a leader of the tax
resistance movement during the first intifada," explaining the
difference between then and now: <br>
<dl>
<dd>Palestinians were able to present the Palestinian nation to the world
as being a civilized nation applying the human values determined by the
international community, including the American community. As a result,
there was clear international sympathy with the Palestinians on both the
official and popular levels ... [Now] the circumstances are driving every
Palestinian into a corner. To be realistic, how can you think rationally
in an irrational situation? How do you expect someone being treated worse
than a dog to behave? Is he expected to send you a kiss? [9]<br><br>
</dl>"Popular struggle," in its broadest possible context, has
as many meanings as the rich, resolute Arabic word sumud</i>
(steadfastness) suggests. It is the Palestinian farmer who returns day
after day to his confiscation-threatened land, works the soil in the
blazing heat, and lives out his stewardship to the moment when his body
lies outstretched before the bulldozer. It is also the mother who makes
it through the checkpoint, over the dirt mound, and sells enough fruit at
the market to feed and clothe her children for another week. In effect,
Palestinian popular struggle is a refusal to give up hope, and a
determination to live life on the land coveted by the
colonizers.<br><br>
More specifically, as Stephan noted, "popular struggle" in
Palestine is "a method of prosecuting conflict by mobilizing civic
pressure where the 'foot soldiers' are ordinary civilians and the
'weapons systems' include boycotts, strikes, demonstrations, sit-ins, and
other forms of non-cooperation and organized defiance." She is right
to stress that "such methods ... do not compromise a meek submission
to oppression" but rather a way of struggle that "actively
challenges oppressive practices using widespread civic
disruption."<br><br>
But seen in this light, the essence of Palestinian popular struggle is
directly contrary to the methods of Abbas and Fayyad -- the way of
diplomatic privileges, backroom compromises and appeasement of Washington
and Tel Aviv. Their track record has been to muzzle the collectively
expressed desires of their people, from Oslo to the boycott of the
elected Hamas government. Additionally, just as popular struggle has
nothing in common with the Abbas-Fayyad regime, so too the November
"peace conference" has little to do with securing Palestinian
self-determination.<br><br>
Stephan views US policy towards Palestine/Israel as having shifted
(temporarily) during the first intifada, inferring that this was a result
of the Palestinians' embrace of popular struggle. Thus, "a similar
shift could occur if Palestinians can show that being 'pro-Israel' and
'pro-Palestine' are mutually reinforcing goals." This smacks of Road
Map logic; if the Palestinians only "do" enough, or jump
through the right hoops, then maybe, just maybe, their right to freedom
and protection under international law might be acknowledged and acted
upon.<br><br>
The problem has never been a Palestinian failure to meet the demands set
by the US or international community, a display of colonial arrogance
that repeats itself in every successive "negotiation." Popular
struggle, like violent resistance, is not an end in and of itself; it is
a method, a strategy. It is the end goal, decolonization and liberation
from occupation and Zionist apartheid, that is ferociously opposed by the
self-declared international guardians of the "peace process"
and their friends in the Palestinian elite. The rest is just smoke and
mirrors.<br><br>
Ben White is a freelance journalist specializing in Palestine/Israel. His
website is at
<a href="http://www.benwhite.org.uk/">www.benwhite.org.uk</a> and he can
be contacted directly at ben@benwhite.org.uk<br><br>
<br>
</i>Endnotes<br>
</b>[1] Stepha, Maria, "Dropping 'muqawama,'" openDemocracy, 27
September 2007.
(<a href="http://www.opendemocracy.net/terrorism/article/palestine_muqawama">
http://www.opendemocracy.net/terrorism/article/palestine_muqawama</a>)<br>
[2]
<a href="http://qumsiyeh.org/palestiniannonviolentresistance/" eudora="autourl">
http://qumsiyeh.org/palestiniannonviolentresistance/</a>, accessed 10
October2007.<br>
[3] Gene Sharp cited by Maxine Kaufman-Lacusta, "Some Thoughts on
Nonviolence and on the 'Imperative of Joint Struggle' Against the Israeli
Occupation of Palestine," Tikkun</i>, 13 February 2007.
(<a href="http://files.tikkun.org/current/article.php?story=2007021321115376">
http://files.tikkun.org/current/article.php?story=2007021321115376</a>
)<br>
[4] Audeh, Ida, "A Village Mobilized: Lessons from Budrus," The
Electronic Intifada, 13 June 2007.
(<a href="http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article7005.shtml">
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article7005.shtml</a>)<br>
[5] MIddle East Policy Council,
<a href="http://www.mepc.org/resources_counts/00_10_2.asp">
http://www.mepc.org/resources_counts/00_10_2.asp</a>, accessed 10 October
2007.<br>
[6] BBC News, "Gaza town in shock at bloodshed," 19 May 2004
(<a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3730197.stm">
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3730197.stm</a>) and Al Jazeera
English, "Isreli forces massacre protesters in Rafah," 20 May
2004<br>
(<a href="http://english.aljazeera.net/English/archive/archive?ArchiveId=3867">
http://english.aljazeera.net/English/archive/archive?ArchiveId=3867</a>
)<br>
[7] US Department of State Daily Press Briefing for 19 May 2004.
(<a href="http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2004/32624.htm">
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2004/32624.htm</a>)<br>
[8] LeVine, Mark, "The Death of Arafat and the Myth of the New
Beginnings," 13 November 2004.
(<a href="http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1113-24.htm">
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1113-24.htm</a>)<br>
[9] Allen, Lori A., "Palestinians Debate 'Polite' Resistance to
Occupation," MIddle East Report Online</i>, Winter 2005.
(<a href="http://www.merip.org/mer/mer225/225_allen.html">
http://www.merip.org/mer/mer225/225_allen.html</a>) <br><br>
<br><br>
<x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
<font size=3 color="#FF0000">Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#008000">415 863-9977<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#0000FF">
<a href="http://www.freedomarchives.org/" eudora="autourl">
www.Freedomarchives.org</a></font><font size=3> </font></body>
</html>