7 August 2011
Since the start of the Arab uprisings in January, Palestinians have been hotly debating how they can break out of their own political impasse and rebuild their national movement.
This resulted in some direct action on the ground – such as the March 15 calls for protest in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
There’s also little doubt that the Nakba Day marches by Palestinian refugees in May drew inspiration from the uprisings in other Arab countries.
But the burning questions remain unresolved: should Palestinians try to reform or rebuild the PLO and if so how? If not, how can they reconstitute an inclusive national movement and what should it look like?
Achieving a Palestinian spring
Recently, Al-Shabaka, The Palestinian Policy Network, a “virtual think tank” for which I am a policy advisor, curated a roundtable called “Achieving a Palestinian Spring” (The roundtable is also available in Arabic).
It started off with an issue brief by Palestinian political scientist Jamil Hilal, and was followed by written contributions from Hani al-Masri, Will Youmans, Mezna Qato, Beshara Doumani, Rana Barakat, Toufic Haddad and myself. It was then rounded off with a response from Jamil Hilal.
Everyone took a slightly different approach to the problem, and while we did not come up with definitive answers, the result is a conversation that certainly pushed my own thinking. I highly recommend taking the time to read the essays.
My own contribution raised the question of whether Palestinians should pursue an “institution-centered” revival of their movement with all the costs and risks that would entail, or focus on building a looser, “agenda-centered” movement around the BDS call and deal with institutions at a later phase.
Politics can’t exclude economics
Several authors raised questions that have been on my mind recently – how to bring economics back into Palestinian political language and action. This is particularly relevant in light of the false claims by the Palestinian Authority and its Israeli and Western sponsors of a West Bank “economic boom” that are being used to bolster equally fictitious claims of “state-building.”
Arguing for a bottom-up movement, Toufic Haddad observes:
We cannot fool ourselves that democratization can come without reasserting power from below against those who have taken it from above. The undemocratic, neoliberal agenda of PA prime minister Salam Fayyad is the best place to start, as it asserts the power of Palestinian, Israeli, and international capital over the people.
Putting the same issue in the broader regional context, Beshara Doumani warns:
Surely the Arab Spring would quickly turn to winter if the answers [to people’s demands] call for a liberal political order that does not challenge the neo-liberal economic order.
These questions have to be at the center of Palestinian discourse and struggle as a neoliberal elite dominates the Palestinian national agenda ever more completely and substitutes privatization and profit for national liberation and rights.
A Palestinian Tahrir Square?
A key question is where and how Palestinians can organize. Unlike Egyptians, Tunisians, Syrians, Greeks or Spaniards, Palestinians are geographically dispersed in a way that precludes or limits the potential of the kinds of mass mobilizations that have occurred elsewhere. In his final response, Hilal does a very good job of summing this up:
The distinctiveness of the Palestinian case lies not only in the fact that Palestinians have, throughout their long history of national struggle, undertaken a number of uprisings, some of which went on for years. Its distinctiveness also lies in the overlapping of the national cause, the cause for democracy, and many social issues. The national movement has failed to address this multidimensional reality and allowed the national cause to obscure all other issues. Palestinians live in a number of countries (or political fields) with differing political, social, legal and cultural conditions.
Therefore, they must manage their activism in each country in a manner that combines their struggle for self-determination and their struggle for other rights in accordance with the conditions of each community (in Israel, in the areas controlled by the PA, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and so on.)
They have different statuses within these political entities – as refugees, as citizens to varying degrees, as immigrants, as residents without the right to permanent residency or the right to citizenship, among others. In other words, Palestinians do not have one Tahrir Square where they can gather, nor do they have unified social demands to present, nor a single democratic transformation to unite them. Their conditions vary according to the state in which they reside. Conditions differ from in Israel to Jordan, Lebanon and Syria; they are different in the West Bank under occupation and in the Gaza Strip under a stifling siege; and they differ between the refugee camp, the village and the city.
I found this, and the other views put forward in the roundtable to be very compelling food for thought.
Comments
Why not learn from the "oppressor revolution"?
Permalink The Dod replied on
> Palestinians do not have one Tahrir Square where they can gather
True, but luckily - the #j14 "oppressor revolt" you mock (for reasons that I hope will disappear once the movement evolves, but I'm no prophet) - has created the opportunity to circumvent this problem (don't worry - I'm not asking you to join them).
If Palestinians start their own tent movement (disregarding the Israeli one, I'm only talking about the technique), it can have 2 advantages:
1) You can have it simultaneously in many places (both in Palestine and abroad). In some places it will be big, in others it will be violently dispersed, both cases are worth documenting. Also the offline-mind-hive effect is awesome. Don't knock it until you've tried it.
2) Israelis who see these tents (via media/internet, or even as the soldiers sent to disperse it) - will see the symbol of what *they* are fighting for. This deviation from the well-known pattern may cause *some* of them to stop and think - "hey, they're like us". Not *all* of them will, but indoctrination ( http://ht.ly/5X9Z6 ) is the main problem to address.
I'm not talking about the far future. It's no secret that whatever the UN decides in September, many Palestinians will either condone or oppose the decision by demonstrations/gatherings in many places, the Israeli regime will pump this in the media as "here comes the worst intifada of them all and the end of Israel", reserves will be recruited, public opinion will start leaning to the right, yada yada bloodbath.
I don't say this can be *entirely* avoided, but the only way to minimize the damage is a paradigm shift that will confuse people and force them to stop and think (I know it's not easy against an army that attacks clowns and kids with kites, but still).
Maybe my idea is not the best answer, but whatever it is - it shouldn't look like something Bibi/IDF/settlers/hasbara have seen before and have drills against.
Power to the people doesn't come with a standard plug.
they tried that, dod
Permalink concerned replied on
PA thugs come in and violently dispersed tent protests they don't agree with. the manara in ramallah is too small for such kinds of protests, and PA is sure to crack down double in locations like nablus or jenin that might want to follow suit.
Isn't it obvious?
Permalink Michael Dunn replied on
Isn't it obvious?
Unlike any other area in the middle east, Palestine (Gaza and the West Bank) is unique in that it is a territory occupied by a brutal foreign (Israeli) military force and so therefore isn't allowed the same privilege to demonstrate aka Tahir Square against its autocratic government.
A terribly ironic situation seeing, as in my opinion, Palestinians even more so deserve freedom/self-autonomy due to the terrible injustices they have experienced over the decades.
I learn as I go along
Permalink The Dod replied on
I've learned something important from "concerned":
When I wrote my previous comment, I thought IDF was the only obstacle for Palestinian protesters, and didn't take PA into account.
This makes me wonder (I don't know - just asking): if there *could* be mobilization of Israeli volunteers to show solidarity in such protests, could this deter PA's brutality (or at least give it more international exposure)?
There are many ifs here:
* Will they want to come (AATW et al are already there, but I wonder whether at least a small fraction of the #j14 crowd can join the solidarity).
* Will the israeli regime manage to stop them (or most of them) physically/"legally"/etc.?
* Most important: will the Palestinians accept help from the "puppy revolution"?
My question is: if it *did* happen - could it help against PA?
I didn't learn anything new from Michael Dunn's reply, though. He's right: there's no equality, and Palestinians can't expect to be treated with "kid gloves" by Israeli/PA regime.
I've added the quotes because when an Israeli gets trampled by a horse or repeatedly kicked in the kidneys by a group sadistic policemen - it's hard for her to think "at least I don't live in Nebi Saleh". I *do* understand the difference, though: I no longer live in the area, but I've had my share of tear gas, "rubber" bullets, and even police brutality in Tel Aviv *without* any sympathy from my "fellow welad el kalb" :)
The question is not "who was guilty in the past" but "what shall we do next". Israelis were also victims once, and this is why their national psyche resembles that of an abusive child who grows up to become an abusive parent. Palestinians: please don't go down that road. *Hatred* is the enemy, and haters (no matter how justified their hate may be) are merely its pawns.