Time to do away with the PA
By Gideon Levy
Ha'aretz
9 November 2003
This farce should have been ended long ago. If the
leaders of the Palestinian Authority had been blessed
with a greater measure of self-respect, readiness for
personal sacrifice and political audacity, they would
have long since declared the PA liquidated and left
all the responsibility solely in Israel's hands.
If they were more concerned about the subjects they
are supposed to be in charge of - the well-being of
their nation - they would have resigned and thereby
torn the mask from the false impression of the
supposed government and the "state in the making."
They would have ceased to be the fig leaf that serves
and perpetuates the Israeli occupation. Instead, they
cling to the few honors and benefits that Israel
continues to confer on a few of them, and they go on
lending a hand to the great deception that a sovereign
Palestinian Authority and a government with powers
exist.
Under a cover of empty titles, they continue to take
part in the fraud while many in Israel and elsewhere
find it convenient to go on believing that the Israeli
occupation of the territories has not reverted to
being total, and that there is a Palestinian
government. "Ministers," "director-generals," "deputy
ministers" and "governors," whose titles are empty and
lack any authority, and who cannot rule or make
decisions about anything except for the official cars
and the VIP cards that enable them to go through
checkpoints, continue to make a mockery of their
nation and the international community.
Is the Palestinian minister of internal security
capable of seeing to the security of even one
Palestinian in the face of the assassinations, the
helicopters, the soldiers and the troops who burst
into homes in the middle of the night? Is the health
minister capable of seeing to the health of his
nationals, when every soldier at every checkpoint can
delay ambulances and patients and when the cities and
villages are under lengthy curfew? And what can the
agriculture minister do when settlers cut down and
uproot hundreds of olive trees without interference or
prevent the harvesting of the olives, and when the
Israeli army defoliates thousands of dunams of fields
and vineyards? And how will the minister of labor
ensure jobs for the people, when they cannot even
leave their places of residence? What can the
transportation minister do when his country is strewn
with checkpoints and the Israel Defense Forces is the
exclusive sovereign that decides which roads are for
Jews only and which Palestinian bus lines will be
allowed to operate? The list goes on and on.
On the streets of Ramallah, a passerby joked this
weekend: "While the Palestinians were arguing over
whether Nasser Yusuf would be appointed interior
minister or not, the Israelis finished building the
separation fence." The majority of Palestinians have
no idea who their cabinet ministers are, and for good
reason: most of the small amount of aid they receive
comes from organizations such as UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency) and from the local
governments, not from the imaginary government.
The most wretched situations of all are the meetings
of Palestinian ministers with Israeli ministers. A
case in point was the meeting between the finance
minister, Salam Fayad (who suspended himself last
Thursday), the favorite of the United States and
Israel, and Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, which was
intended solely to smooth Mofaz's visit to Washington.
It's hard to understand why the Palestinian official
agreed to meet with Mofaz - who more than any other
Israeli is responsible for the cruel policy toward his
nation - only to serve the political needs of the
Israeli minister. Why is Israel allowed to boycott
Palestinian leaders, above all Yasser Arafat, whereas
Palestinian ministers have no similar red lines? While
European and American officials decline to visit the
office of the Israeli justice minister, which is located in East Jerusalem, the outgoing Palestinian justice minister, Abd al-Karim Abu Salah, together with the minister responsible for prisoners, Hisham Abd al-Razak, met with Justice Minister Yosef Lapid in his office. The Palestinian public has only contempt for such cabinet ministers.
This deception in the form of a supposedly autonomous
government and Authority serves the Israeli government
above all. The Palestinian Authority's existence
allows Israel to accuse it and demand that it fight
terrorism, and Israel can also tell the world that its
occupation is not full.
In the past three years Israel has done much to harm
all of the PA's bases of power. Little remains of it,
and the zombie-like entity that continues to exist in
Ramallah should now depart the world. This is not only
an internal Palestinian matter: Israel, too, bears heavy responsibility, which it is trying to shake off. If the Palestinian cabinet ministers were to declare together that the game is over, that there is no longer a Palestinian Authority and no longer a Palestinian government, the entire weight of responsibility for the occupation would devolve on Israel.
