By Cliff May
Thursday, February 07, 2013
Ramallah, West Bank — It’s difficult not to like Salam
Fayyad. The prime minister of the Palestinian Authority has an avuncular
demeanor and old-fashioned professorial charm. He boasts a doctorate in
economics from the University of Texas at Austin and remains loyal to the
Longhorns. He speaks in charmingly accented, rapid-fire English. In a spacious
conference room in the palatial government complex where he maintains his
offices, he is generous with his time, answering questions from me and other
members of a delegation of American national-security professionals on a wide
range of issues.
One need not agree with everything Fayyad says to
appreciate that he is the kind of Palestinian leader with whom Israeli leaders
could make peace — if Israeli leaders could negotiate with him, and if he could
deliver a majority of Palestinians willing to accept a compromise solution to
the conflict. Fundamentally, here’s what that would mean: Palestinians would
have to unambiguously recognize Israel’s right to exist within secure borders.
In exchange, Israel would do everything possible to facilitate the development
of a free and viable Palestinian state.
What are the chances that Fayyad can achieve that?
Roughly zero to none.
Fayyad has few supporters in the West Bank — and even
fewer in Hamas-controlled Gaza. He was not elected prime minister; he was
appointed in 2007 by Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas who claimed
the power to do so on the basis of “national emergency.”
As for Abbas, he was elected to his position in January
2005. His four-year term ended in 2009. New elections have been postponed
indefinitely. Similarly, the Palestinian Legislative Council, which sits in
Gaza, was elected to a four-year term in January 2006. The following year,
Hamas staged a bloody coup against the P.A. in Gaza. New legislative elections
also remain unscheduled.
American and European diplomats value Fayyad’s skills and
trust his integrity. So long as he is prime minister, they feel better about
pouring in aid — more per capita than to any country in Africa, Asia, or Latin
America — that keeps the P.A. afloat. Israelis respect Fayyad, too. You do
understand that all this makes him less popular — not more — with the broad
Palestinian public?
Of course, popularity is not the only source — or even
the primary source — of power in the Palestinian territories. But Fayyad does
not command a militia. And, presumably because he is seen as a moderate, he
receives no financial backing from such oil-rich Muslim countries as Iran and
Qatar.
Hamas leaders — who do receive support from both Iran and
Qatar — openly detest Fayyad. Finally, though Fayyad was appointed by Abbas, he
is not close to Abbas, who, in addition to heading the Palestinian Authority,
leads the Fatah faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization which holds
the reins — more or less — on the West Bank.
Halfway through our conversation, Fayyad asked not be
quoted, so I’ll respect that. But I’m revealing nothing new if I say he gets
that Hamas’s openly declared threat to exterminate Israel is not conducive to
peace processing. He understands, too, that there is a desperate need for
political reform and institution-building in the Palestinian territories. He
has been working toward that goal determinedly, if not entirely successfully.
As we leave the prime minister’s offices, we see that
demonstrators have gathered outside, mostly civil servants peacefully
protesting the fact that it has been a long time since they have received their
paychecks.
Ramallah, the de facto capital of the West Bank, lies six
miles north of Jerusalem in the Judean Mountains. By the standards of non-oil
producing Middle Eastern countries, it is neither depressed nor depressing.
Buildings are of white Jerusalem stone with red tile roofs. There are mosques
with tall minarets and green domes; palm trees and stone walls; modern hotels
and good restaurants that serve cold, locally brewed beer. A fair amount of new
construction is underway, but there also are empty lots, strewn with rubble. In
some of them, goats graze.
Ramallah may not be the ideal Palestinian city of the
future, but, as it happens, an attempt to build that metropolis is underway on
hilltops less than six miles to the northwest. It’s called Rawabi and it’s the
first planned city in the West Bank, a project that will cost $1 billion, most
of which is coming from Qatar. The first residents are to begin moving in
within a year. In five to seven years, it is to have homes for 10,000
Palestinian families, as well as a commercial center, a cultural center,
medical facilities, stores, cafes, and a giant amphitheater.
Bashar Masri, the elegant and eloquent entrepreneur
behind this project, acknowledges that, to succeed, Rawabi will need businesses
and jobs — high-tech would be his preference. That will require foreign
investors confident that their money will not end up in the foreign bank
accounts of corrupt officials. It would help, too, if Rawabi and all of what
Masri calls Palestine were to enjoy not just peaceful but cooperative relations
with the little start-up nation to its west.
Both Masri and Fayyad favor that outcome — of that I have
little doubt. But with Palestinian power divided between a jihadist Hamas and a
vacillating Fatah, and with Islamists who are committed to Israel’s
extermination ascendant throughout much of the Middle East, I have no idea how
they get there from here.
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