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Friday, 29 March. 2024
 
Your Key to Palestine
The Palestinian Initiatives for The Promotoion of Global Dialogue and Democracy
 
 
 
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Overview: Afif Safieh, the newly-assigned top Palestinian diplomat to the United States, spoke at a recent Palestine Center briefing about the history and challenges the PLO Mission Office faces in Washington, DC. As head of the Mission, Safieh stressed the importance of U.S. relations with Palestinians at home and abroad. He urged the U.S. Administration to follow a policy of "nonalignment" toward regional conflicts, and called on Arab Americans to be more vocally involved in American politics. Formerly in London, Amb. Safieh took office in DC in October 2005. Samar Assad, Executive Director of The Palestine Center and its parent organization, the Jerusalem Fund for Education and Community Development, introduced the speaker. The Palestine Center Washington, DC 29 November 2005 [Begin Transcript]

I feel extremely privileged to be invited by The Palestine Center to give my first public lecture here since I arrived in Washington. This invitation stirs in me many memories because I still remember in November 1991, just a few months after the Center was established, I was invited by [the late Palestine Center Board Chairman] Professor Hisham Sharabi and [former Executive Director] Dr. Mohammed Hallaj to give a lecture on the Madrid Peace Conference.

I remember saying then that we, the Palestinians, had decided to give peace a chance but that we had been "unreasonably reasonable." We accepted to go to Madrid as half a delegation, representing half the people, and seeking half a solution. You probably remember that we accepted, because we were "unreasonably reasonable," to be part of a Jordanian- Palestinian delegation. The Israelis stubbornly insisted that the delegation should be from the West Bank and Gaza only-no Jerusalem residents, no Diaspora Palestinians, and no PLO officials-seeking half a solution, meaning an interim self-governing authority on the road to final status.

I remember Akiva Eldar, a senior Ha'aretz editor, asking me at that time a pertinent, legitimate, and mischievous question. He said, "Mr. Safieh, don't you think that the role of the PLO is changing from the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people into becoming the sole legitimizer of Palestinian representatives?" My answer to him was, "Mr. Eldar, I have always believed that the PLO is at the same time an idea and an institution. Only a few thousand may work in the institution, but the nine million Palestinians are the powerful vehicles of the idea." We the PLO have represented Palestinians for so long that I have no problem seeing Palestinians representing the PLO today.

I would like to tell you that I have never belonged to the optimistic ideologies that promise victory and salvation to the oppressed as a sort of inevitable, predetermined outcome. I believe that history is a cemetery of oppressed people who remained oppressed until they vanished into historical oblivion. I personally believe that the moral dilemma-the political dilemma-in the Middle East and around the world concerning the issue of Palestine was the following-there was either one people too many, this time we the Palestinians, or a state that was missing and needed to be created.

I know the verdict of the international community was that there is a state that is missing that needs to be created. However, on the ground, I believe that history is still undecided. And, I invite you in your variety of capacities to help history make the right choice.

Speaking to Palestinian audiences, I often refer to the playwright Bertolt Brecht who-in his play on Galileo-has a marvelous scene in which a disciple says, "Unhappy are the people who have no heroes," to which Galileo answers, "No, unhappy are the people who still have a need for heroes." Obviously, our people still have a need for heroes. However, I would like to say that I have profound respect for the collective Palestinian hero, which is the Palestinian people, for their steadfastness and capability to endure pain and suffering. I bow in respect to this collective hero. I would say that we are now in a juncture in our history where we need to define and refine the concept of heroism.

I believe that any people should seek to be a subject of history and not only an object of history. Making history is extremely important. But I also believe that explaining history and disseminating one's version of history is of equal importance. We have not given this dimension sufficient attention-irrigating our narrative, our version, our interpretation of history. A few examples-people still believe that 1948 was a confrontation between a David and Goliath, even though all historical records say that the Jewish community in Palestine had 60,000 armed troops, meaning 10 percent of society, and the seven armies of the Arab world had 45,000 troops combined. One had unity of command, we had multiple rival commands. Yet the version of history that was propagated around the globe was "David against Goliath."

Many believe that we initiated the war of 1967. I will not go through the Camp David talks of 2000. However, the world public opinion still believes that there was a generous offer by [former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud] Barak. I still remember that the words bold, courageous, audacious, generous, magnanimous, innovative, creative, imaginative, were all used. Now, English is not my first language-it is not even my second language-but I have never seen so many concepts used in such a questionable manner.

Again, we lost the historical initiative during the last year because of [Israeli Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon's interesting endeavor of the unilateral disengagement from Gaza. Many believed he did it as a first move in implementing the peace process. I agree with Dr. Naseer Aruri who said a week ago at the Palestine Center that this was a "disengagement" from the peace process. I believe that Sharon has been scoring points in the last year, like [the Argentinean soccer player Diego] Maradona with his feet and hands. Sometimes I have the impression that there is not even a goal-keeper on our side to contain and limit the damage.

The world has not noticed that Sharon and his team look at Palestinians as a demographic threat. They believe that they have gotten rid of 1.4 million Palestinians in one shot, gaining 30 years in the demographic race and proliferation. They gave us 1.3 percent of Mandatory Palestine, which is the area of the Gaza Strip. The world saw how traumatic and difficult the removal of 8,000 illegal settlers was, forgetting that this number is less than 2 percent of the illegal settler community, which numbers 440,000 in the West Bank. A wonderful maneuver by General Sharon-but again, one felt that there is no goal-keeper on our side. So, making history is important; disseminating ones interpretation of history in the making is of equal importance.

Where do we stand today? I will share with you my personal reading of the political landscape. If our goal is a two-state solution and this has been the goal since the October, Ramadan, Yom Kippur War of 1973, I believe the Palestinian people have already won diplomatically and politically. The challenge remaining for us, and it is a monumental, Herculean challenge, is how to translate that victory geographically and territorially.

Why do I say we won diplomatically if the goal is a two-state solution? We won diplomatically because we have in the United Nations Security Council a unanimous vote, voted upon including by the United States, on Resolution 1397, which speaks of ending the occupation that started in 1967 and creating a Palestinian state. Mercifully the article "the" is also in the English version of that resolution. So, there is a unanimous U.N. Security Council Resolution ending the occupation and calling for the birth of the Palestinian state.

The Road Map and [U.S. President George W.] Bush's vision speak in terms identical to the U.N. Resolution on these two issues. So if that is the goal, and it is, then I say we have won diplomatically. I say we have also won politically because in the influential countries. Here I am thinking of the Europe Union and the United States, where there is a comfortable majority in support of this goal.

When I left Europe a month ago, all the opinion polls across continental Europe, including the United Kingdom, showed that 2 to 1 were in favor of the Palestinian political position, compared to those in support of the Israeli position. It is no longer a left-wing phenomenon, but across the board. In Britain, for example, polls show that we have a comfortable overwhelming majority among the voters and supporters of the Labor Party, the Liberal Party, and also the Conservative Party. We no longer are a marginal minority. From now on, we are the mainstream.

Often our friends are unaware of the new reality, that we are no longer marginal but the mainstream. I think that the battle in America is also winnable. An important opinion poll will be conducted in December by Zogby International, with results known in January. I think this poll will be our compass in guiding the themes that we need to approach and address.

Now, we need to translate this political, diplomatic victory territorially and that is a big challenge. I did not say it was a mission accomplished. We all know the territorial appetite of Israel. I still believe that the Nakba was not a frozen moment in history that happened sometime in 1948. Unfortunately, it is still an ongoing process. I believe the Israeli policy to date is still how to acquire as much Palestinian geography as possible with as little Palestinian demography as possible. That is the summary of the scheme, the plan, and the enterprise.

I personally believe that international perceptions, including American perceptions, have improved from 1948 onwards. Yes, our Nakba, our tragedy, occurred with the world applauding the other side. Edward [Said] explained it superbly when he said, "the fact that we were the victims of the victims of European history deprived us of the legitimate sympathy, solidarity, understanding and support that we deserved." However, I believe that from 1967 onwards, Israel was seen as an occupier. The 1973 war, a war to reactivate the diplomatic front which was accompanied by an oil crisis, was also an eye-opener for many a country.

The 1977 defeat of Labor in Israel and the arrival of Likud to power was another eye-opener. It was an important date in the evolution of perception. Likud's raw ideology and provocative, sometimes nauseating, discourse alienated many. Many began to discover that Israel is not a social, democratic paradise on earth, and that the Kibbutz movement, used to seduce public opinion, was failing and crumbling. People discovered that those Kibbutzim were on confiscated property and at best, never represented more than 3 percent of the society and economy.

Another important date was the 1982 invasion of Lebanon. That war, even in Jewish and Israeli circles, was extremely controversial. Within Israeli and Jewish circles, the discussion was that this war was not a war out of necessity but a war out of choice. The first Palestinian Intifada, mainly nonviolent, was another eye-opener.

The Anatomy of the Palestinian Mission in Washington, DC

The Palestinian diplomatic mission has all the duties and more of a normal embassy without having any of the immunities, facilities, or the financial capabilities of a normal embassy. I define my task as having to work on ten different layers, all very important, all feeding one another. Those layers are first, the government and the Administration. Second, political parties. Third, Capital Hill. Fourth, the media-American and international-and the Arab media. Fifth, the diplomatic corps. Sixth, the NGOs-that is the big category: the churches, the think tanks, the trade unions, the humanitarian organizations, the solidarity movement, university campuses, et cetera. Seventh, the Palestinian Community. Eighth, the Arab community. Ninth, the Muslim Community. Tenth, the Jewish community. And of course there is the task of reporting back to your leadership. A diplomat is the eyes and ears of the leadership.

We will also be devoting a lot of time to the Palestinian American and Arab American communities. In our contemporary world, there is the concept of a global tribe. We are a global tribe. Our demographic, physical, geographic dispersion is the symptom of the injury that was inflicted on us, and if we are smart-and we are smart-we can turn it into a source of empowerment.

There are three players that, in my opinion, are important for the future of the peace process. They are, in a triangular approach, as follows.

The Israeli Arena

Commentators have described recent evolutions that have, in a way, transformed the political landscape in Israel as an earthquake, a volcano. I would be more modest in my description and call it an "interesting fluidity." There are two changes: a change in leadership within Labor and the fact that Sharon has defected from his party and taken with him the majority of members with him.

Let me mention that I have never been an admirer of the Israeli Labor Party. I have always said that the Israeli Labor Party enjoyed an undeserved good reputation around the world. When talking to Israelis, I always say that it is Labor that made Palestine unlivable for Palestinians and that what Likud usually does is make Israel unlivable for many Jews. The ethnic cleansing of 1948, 1956, and 1967, the illegal settlements, and the idea of a wall of separation are all Labor.

From 1948 onwards, Labor has been in a historical decline and their parliamentary Knesset representation has decreased with every election. I believe this was for tribal, anthropological, and sociological reasons. Labor is known not to have attracted a significant number of "oriental," Sephardic Jews. Up to 1990, the oriental Sephardic Arab Jews of Israel became over 50 percent of society. A party that has not politically captivated a significant number of oriental Jews, in relative percentage terms, is shrinking. Furthermore, Labor did not succeed in politically attracting the wave of Jewish and non-Jewish immigrants from Russia, shrinking even further.

The second reason for Labor's decline is that they too often accepted to be a junior partner in a national coalition with Likud, serving at best as a fig leaf, giving acceptability and respectability abroad to policies they did not take part in shaping. This was mainly due to the political appetite of leaders like Shimon Peres and Ben Elizer, who were afraid that moving from power to opposition may move them from Who is Who, to who is he?

The third reason for Labor's historical decline was the complex character of Barak. He convinced himself and his society that he made a generous offer to which we irrationally answered with a military response, revealing that we had a hidden agenda and not the two-state solution. So, people decided it would be better to have Likud rather than a pale imitation of Likud, and voted for Sharon.

However, I believe that today Labor has a window of opportunity for resurfacing and reinvigorating itself through the election of [Amir] Peretz. Being of Moroccan origin, he will give pride to a community that feels it had been treated as second class citizens. Peretz might be an attractive option, bringing to Labor the oriental Jews who never joined. In Israel, those who vote for the left are the privileged, educated, and the haves, while those who vote for the right are the under privileged, the oppressed, and the have-nots. Peretz might normalize Israeli society at that level.

However, as far as we are concerned, he has already made negative commitments by saying that Jerusalem is the united and eternal capital of Israel. He has approved the expansion of the Ma'ale Adumim settlement in Jerusalem, all this to win votes from the center on the expense of his principles at the origin.

Sharon moving out of the Likud Party was a move to get rid of a nuisance called Bibi [Netanyahu] whose political appetite is exasperating. He got rid of a paralyzing factor who does not understand the changing realities of the world. Sharon, what ever we may think of him, is a smart man and a brilliant strategist and tactician.

The Palestinian Arena

In my keynote speech at the memorial service for the late President Yasser Arafat in London, I said Max Weber, the German sociologist who is considered the founding father of contemporary political science, had an interesting idea about societies, leaderships, and legitimacy. He said societies pass through three phases of leadership and legitimacy: the traditional phase, the institutional phase, and the charismatic phase. Weber's model applies to us. Prior to 1948, we had a traditional leadership with the urban families and their rural extensions. We have just witnessed the end of the charismatic era, and now comes the institutional phase. What we need in Palestine is a managerial revolution. In the diplomatic service, we are seeing the start of the managerial revolution. The diplomatic service was suffering from complete stagnation, to the point where I was thinking of early retirement. Fifteen years in London is a little too much and you lose the element of challenge. Ten years in the Vatican, I had no more sins to confess. So, we have seen the injection of new blood, rotations, and retirements within the diplomatic service.

Everyone speaks of reform and democracy. I would like to tell you, with great pride, having accompanied the Palestinian national movement from its beginnings in the mid-1960s, that we have always had Palestinian pluralism and a multi-party system. Maybe sometimes chaotic, but it was a multi-party system. The leadership has never succumbed to multiple pressures to eliminate certain factions. Certain regimes wanted to eliminate certain factions that belonged to other regimes. We had pluralism, we had a form of democracy, it may have been chaotic, but we always resisted the temptation for physical elimination of trends or individuals within the movement. So, democracy and pluralism is not novel. We had a fantastic presidential election in January [2005], but it was not the first presidential election. Yasser Arafat, besides his revolutionary legitimacy and his historical legitimacy, also had his democratic, electoral legitimacy in a competitive election in 1996. His competitor was a charming, powerful woman who headed the most important NGO in Palestine, Mrs. Samiha Khalil. We should not speak about things as if they are happening anew. There are traditions that we are proud of.

Elections

I am fully in favor of what is currently taking place in Palestine. We are entering the institutional phase which should be accompanied by a managerial revolution. What are the predictions? Elections are always unpredictable. What do opinion polls tell us? They tell us that Hamas, in moments of pessimism, can reach a 30 percent approval rate whereas in times of optimism, its approval rate can go down to 20 percent. Opinion polls tell us that the left-wing factions and some independent personalities, like Mustapha Barghouthi and Hanan Ashrawi, will make up a total of some 20 percent. So, for Fateh, there is a basket for 50-60 percent support if they put their house in order. Will they? I do not know, but I hope so. Within Fateh there is the challenge of how to reconcile internal democracy with external discipline.

Another issue on the Palestinian scene is that sometimes the debate around the Palestinian issue is simplified as if the choice is between resistance and non-resistance. I believe that that is the wrong question. We are condemned to resist an unacceptable status quo of occupation, subjugation, and humiliation. The issue for debate should be what the models and methods of expressing our resistance and rejecting the status quo are. Here, I agree with the late Faisal Husseini, who beautifully said "If I need to defy [Mike] Tyson, I would not invite him to the boxing ring, but to another game."

I believe we are not offered the luxury of resistance or non-resistance, but we have to choose what method of expression for our resistance. I am in favor of popular nonviolent resistance. This choice is for ethnical considerations, but also for pragmatic and Machiavellian considerations as well. The wisest military decision we can take is to avoid a military confrontation, as a military decision as well as an ethical decision. By opting for a non-violent struggle, you neutralize all the military arsenal of the other side. Yes they will kill and coerce; yes, they will use bullets, be they sugar-coated, rubber-coated, or not at all. All of which are lethal. What they won't use against non-violent struggle is the Merkava tanks, the Apache helicopters, and the F16's.

I believe it is a challenge for the Palestinian political factions. It is much more difficult to choreograph and coordinate the struggle of 3.6 million people than to manage 15 cells of three people. Our factions should be invited to mobilize the totality of our society, including the elderly, the women, and children who, in a non-violent struggle, are extremely powerful. In a military struggle, only 0.005 percent of people participate. I see this as a challenge and a window of opportunity for the Palestinians from Israel, the Palestinians of the Diaspora, the Israeli peace camp, and the international solidarity movement can embrace that struggle and even join it on the ground.

The Role of Third Parties

When I was still in Europe, my message used to be that the Europeans are an actor in search of a role. In the Middle East, we have a role but are in search of an actor. If we can merge the two, we will all live less unhappily-ever-after. I always remind the Europeans that if the Oslo back channel did not put Palestine fully on the map, it has put Norway on the map. I would say this as an incentive to get them to play a dynamic, vocal, visible role as a third party.

But I am no longer in Europe, so what should be the theme in the United States, which I am told is totally different? I believe that our battle for justice and peace is winnable in the United States. I believe that only optimists make history and pessimists who still succumb to the mentality of defeat and the psychology of failure will never achieve anything.

I am fascinated by American society. I believe America is a nation of nations. Today in the uni-polar world in which we live, I personally believe nonalignment should be what characterizes American foreign policy. If America aligns itself with one belligerent player in a regional conflict, not only does it antagonize the other players in the regional game, it alienates, antagonizes, and ghettoizes a component of its own domestic national fabric. You, more than me, know how difficult it must have been to be an Arab-American or a Muslim-American in America because of the American foreign policy vis-à-vis the Middle East.

I believe that in America, there is a growing sector that knows that it was the perception of American complacency toward Israel's territorial appetite that put America on a collision course with the Arab and Muslim world. And it is the Palestinians who are the key to America's lovability around the world. I believe that [U.S. Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs] Mrs. Karen Hughes, who recently toured the area, discovered the centrality of Palestine and that it is not an issue of presentation but of policy that needs to be rethought. I believe that American Arabs and Palestinian Americans-but also Jews who are concerned about peace and justice in the Middle East-should help formulate the new approach.

This morning I, along with Dr. Saeb Erekat, had an interesting meeting with [U.S. Secretary of State] Condoleezza Rice. I think that she was not uninterested by the results of the agreement she helped broker and I hope that she is interested in being more involved in the game because what is acceptable to Israel is not acceptable to us and what is acceptable to us is not acceptable to Israel. There is a need for a third-party role and in our contemporary world. That is the U.S. administration.

Hegel, in the nineteenth century, in his diagnosis of the trajectory of mankind, said that from history we have learnt that we have not learned from history. I am sure he would not mind if we were to prove him wrong. Let me assure you that in the bleakest of moments I always remained confident that Palestine will resurrect itself. And as you know, we in Jerusalem, we have had some pervious experience in resurrection.

[End of Transcript]

This transcript is distributed by The Palestine Center, an educational program of the Jerusalem Fund for Education and Community Development. It can be accessed online at http://www.thejerusalemfund.org/palestinecenter/fortherecord.php.

This transcript is based on remarks delivered by Afif Safieh on 29 November 2005 at The Palestine Center in Washington, DC. The speaker's views do not necessarily reflect those of The Palestine Center or The Jerusalem Fund.

This transcript may be used without permission but with proper attribution to The Palestine Center. This transcript will be reissued in the annual compendium of Palestine Center publications, entitled "Palestine after Arafat: Abbas and the Politics of Reform" (Washington, DC: The Palestine Center, forthcoming). To receive a hard-copy by mail, email info@palestinecenter.org.

The Palestine Center / 2425 Virginia Avenue NW / Washington, D.C. 20037 USA Tel. 202.338.1290 / Fax 202.333.7742 / www.thejerusalemfund.org

 
 
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