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<font size="1"><a href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20201207-long-live-the-dead-peace-process-abbas-prioritises-us-ties-over-palestinian-national-unity/">https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20201207-long-live-the-dead-peace-process-abbas-prioritises-us-ties-over-palestinian-national-unity/</a>
</font><h1 class="gmail-reader-title">'Long live the (dead) peace process': Abbas prioritises US ties over Palestinian national unity</h1>
<div class="gmail-credits gmail-reader-credits">Ramzy Baroud - December 7, 2020</div></div>
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<div class="gmail-moz-reader-content gmail-reader-show-element"><div id="gmail-readability-page-1" class="gmail-page"><div id="gmail-post-content"><p>No one seemed as excited about the <a href="https://time.com/5907973/donald-trump-loses-2020-election/" target="_blank">election</a>
of Joe Biden being the next President of the United States as
Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas. When all hope seemed
lost, where Abbas found himself desperate for political validation and
funds, Biden arrived like a conquering knight on a white horse and swept
the Palestinian leader away to safety.</p><p>Abbas was one of the first
world leaders to congratulate the Democratic President-elect on his
victory. While Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/after-hours-of-silence-netanyahu-and-rivlin-congratulate-biden-on-election-win/" target="_blank">delayed</a>
his congratulatory statement in the hope that Donald Trump would
eventually be able to reverse the results, Abbas suffered no such
illusions. Considering the humiliation that the Palestinian Authority
experienced at the hands of the Trump Administration, Abbas had nothing
to lose. For him, Biden, despite his long love affair with Israel, still
represented a ray of hope.</p><p>But can the wheel of history be turned back? Despite the fact that the Biden Administration has <a href="https://apnews.com/article/47c2d807cbb563b747cee29aaefeda5a" target="_blank">made</a>
it clear that it will not be reversing any of the pro-Israel steps
taken by the departing Trump Administration, Abbas remains confident
that, at least, the 'peace process' can be restored.</p><p>This may seem
to be an impossible dichotomy, for how can a 'peace process' deliver
peace if all the components of a just peace have already been
eradicated?</p><p>It is obvious that there can be no real peace if the US government insists on <a href="https://www.israelhayom.com/2020/11/08/biden-is-a-zionist-he-wont-move-the-us-embassy-back-to-tel-aviv/" target="_blank">recognizing</a>
all of Jerusalem as Israel's 'eternal' capital. There can be no peace
if the US continues to fund illegal Jewish settlements, bankroll Israeli
apartheid, deny the rights of Palestinian refugees, turn a blind eye to
de facto annexation underway in Occupied Palestine and recognize the
illegally-occupied Syrian Golan Heights as part of Israel, all of which
is likely to remain the same, even under the Biden Administration.</p><p>The
'peace process' is unlikely to deliver any kind of a just, sustainable
peace in the future, when it has already failed to do so in the past 30
years.</p><p>Yet,
despite the ample lessons of the past, Abbas has decided, again, to
gamble with the fate of his people and jeopardize their struggle for
freedom and just peace. Not only is Abbas building a campaign involving
Arab countries, namely Jordan and Egypt, to revive the 'peace process',
he is also walking back on all his promises and decisions to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/19/world/middleeast/abbas-palestinians-israel-west-bank.html" target="_blank">cancel</a> the Oslo Accords, and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/19/world/middleeast/abbas-palestinians-israel-west-bank.html" target="_blank">end</a> 'security coordination' with Israel. By doing so, Abbas has betrayed national unity talks between his party, Fatah, and Hamas.</p><p>Unity talks between rival Palestinian groups seemed to take a serious turn last July when Palestine's main political parties <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/7/2/rival-factions-fatah-hamas-vow-to-fight-looming-annexation" target="_blank">issued</a>
a joint statement declaring their intent to defeat Trump's 'Deal of the
Century'. The language used in that statement was reminiscent of the
revolutionary discourse used by these groups during the First and Second
Intifadas (uprisings), itself a message that Fatah was finally
re-orienting itself around national priorities and away from the
'moderate' political discourse wrought by the US-sponsored 'peace
process'.</p><p>Even those who grew tired and cynical about the
shenanigans of Abbas and Palestinian groups wondered if this time would
be different; that Palestinians would finally agree on a set of
principles through which they could express and channel their struggle
for freedom.</p><p>Oddly, Trump's four-year term in the White House was
the best thing that happened to the Palestinian national struggle. His
administration was a jarring and indisputable reminder that the US is
not – and has never been – 'an honest peace broker' and that
Palestinians cannot steer their political agenda to satisfy US-Israeli
demands in order for them to obtain political validation and financial
support.</p><div id="gmail-attachment_321730" class="gmail-wp-caption"><p><img src="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/ww3-1200x332.jpg" alt="" style="margin-right: 0px;" width="427" height="118"></p><p class="gmail-wp-caption-text">Trump and the Middle East – Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]</p></div><p>By <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-palestinians-idUSKCN1L923C" target="_blank">cutting off</a> US funding of the Palestinian Authority in August 2018, followed by the <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20180914-palestinian-mission-washington-closes-after-us-orders-shutdown" target="_blank">shutting down</a>
of the Palestinian mission in Washington DC, Trump has liberated
Palestinians from the throes of an impossible political equation.
Without the proverbial American carrot, the Palestinian leadership has
had the rare opportunity to rearrange the Palestinian home for the
benefit of the Palestinian people.</p><p>Alas, those efforts were
short-lived. After multiple meetings and video conferences between
Fatah, Hamas, and other delegations representing Palestinian groups,
Abbas <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/palestinians/.premium-palestinian-authority-resumes-cooperation-with-israel-minister-announces-1.9314412" target="_blank">declared</a>,
on November 17, the resumption of 'security coordination' between his
Authority and Israel. This was followed by the Israeli announcement on
December 2 to <a href="https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/israel-transfers-tax-revenues-to-palestinian-authority/2063156" target="_blank">release</a> over a billion dollars of Palestinian funds that were unlawfully held by Israel as a form of political pressure.</p><p><strong><a title="Hamas and the other factions must act to stop Abbas destroying the Palestinian cause" href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20201201-hamas-and-the-other-factions-must-act-to-stop-abbas-destroying-the-palestinian-cause/">OPINION: Hamas and the other factions must act to stop Abbas destroying the Palestinian cause</a></strong></p><p>This
takes Palestinian unity back to square one. At this point, Abbas finds
unity talks with his Palestinian rivals quite useless. Since Fatah
dominates the Palestinian Authority, the Palestine Liberation
Organization (PLO), and the Palestine National Council (PNC), conceding
any ground or sharing leadership with other Palestinian factions seems
self-defeating. Now that Abbas is reassured that the Biden
Administration will bequeath him, once again, with the title of 'peace
partner', a US ally and a moderate, the Palestinian leader no longer
finds it necessary to seek approval from the Palestinians. Since there
can be no middle ground between catering to a US-Israeli agenda and
elevating a Palestinian national agenda, the Palestinian leader opted
for the former and, without hesitation, ditched the latter.</p><p>While
it is true that Biden will neither satisfy any of the Palestinian
people's demands nor reverse any of his predecessor's missteps, Abbas
can still benefit from what he sees as a seismic shift in US foreign
policy – not in favor of the Palestinian cause but of Abbas personally,
an unelected leader whose biggest accomplishment has been sustaining the
US-imposed status quo and keeping the Palestinian people pacified for
as long as possible.</p><p>Although the 'peace process' has been <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/mahmoud-abbas-calls-peace-process-clinically-dead/" target="_blank">declared</a>
'dead' on multiple occasions, Abbas is now desperately trying to revive
it, not because he – or any rational Palestinian – believes that peace
is at hand, but because of the existential relationship between the PA
and this US-sponsored political scheme. While most Palestinians gained
nothing from all of this, a few Palestinians accumulated massive wealth,
power, and prestige. For this clique, that alone is a cause worth
fighting for.</p><div id="gmail-attachment_435494" class="gmail-wp-caption"><p><img src="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/IMG_1573-1200x750.jpg" alt="The PA announced the resumption of security cooperation with Israel, what does this mean for Palestine? - Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]" style="margin-right: 0px;" width="427" height="267"></p><p class="gmail-wp-caption-text">The
PA announced the resumption of security cooperation with Israel, what
does this mean for Palestine? – Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]</p></div> </div></div></div>
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