What are the Political Prospects for the Palestinian Authority?

While more than 30,000 people have died in the Gaza Strip according to the Hamas Ministry of Health, the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority, Mohammad Shtayyeh, announced his resignation on Monday 26 February 2024. Between inaction and a loss of confidence among its population, the legitimacy and influence of the Palestinian Authority are increasingly being called into question. What political scenarios can be envisaged following his resignation? What could be the consequences of this decision for a resolution of the conflict in Gaza, which is currently hard to envisage? Interview with Didier Billion, deputy director of IRIS and Middle East specialist.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh has tendered his resignation to Mahmoud Abbas. What is the background to this resignation?

First and foremost, of course, we are at a time of heightened tension between Israel and the Palestinian people. International attention is rightly focused on the absolute catastrophe that characterises the situation in Gaza, but the current course of events in the West Bank must not be ignored.

In Gaza, for the record, there are certainly well over 30,000 victims, the majority of them women and children, at least 60% of the buildings destroyed, and the health situation deteriorating daily. In short, everything that constitutes the foundations of life in society has been destroyed. These are terrible facts, and it was against this backdrop that, on 26 January 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) handed down a provisional, legally binding ruling requiring the State of Israel to take all necessary measures to prevent and punish the crime of genocide. The Israeli authorities, deaf to this demand from an international legal authority, want to go even further in their destructive frenzy and are now threatening an offensive against Rafah, the city where more than 1.3 million refugees are crammed together. The carnage would then be at its worst.

In the West Bank, the most radicalised settlers are trying to take advantage of the situation to push forward their annexationist project, which has been asserted and claimed, and military incursions are incessant against Palestinian towns and villages under the most arbitrary pretexts. At the same time, the number of deaths – it is estimated that there have been almost 400 Palestinian victims in the West Bank since 7 October – and the number of Palestinian prisoners continues to rise – 8,000 have been arrested since the same date. In September, Benyamin Netanyahu presented a map of a future Israel encompassing the whole of Palestine to the UN General Assembly. Similarly, ministers Bezalel Smotrich, Itamar Ben Gvir and others have made no secret of their annexationist plans, denying any prospect of the creation of a Palestinian state.

At a time when the Palestinian Authority is losing legitimacy among the Palestinian population, what does this decision reflect? Does it contribute to any prospect of « reform » of the Authority? How has this resignation been received by the population?

The decision is certainly one of the consequences of Washington’s insistent demands for the « revitalisation » of the Palestinian Authority, supposedly in an attempt to find ways of resolving the conflict. We also know that within Fatah itself, the party of the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, informal meetings were held in Qatar between Palestinian political leaders to discuss the possibilities of his succession. The immobilism and authoritarianism of the leader, who is now 88 years old, seem to be less and less tolerated, and his silence since 7 October is a source of concern for many activists. An aggravating factor is that Mahmoud Abbas is also trying to control, in order to oppose as far as possible, the growing number of contacts between Fatah and Hamas leaders with a view to reconciling the Palestinian factions.

One of the stakes in these contacts is the prospect of Hamas finally being integrated into the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), the historic political and organisational framework for the political representation of the Palestinian people. One of the first milestones could be the appointment of a new Palestinian National Council, the PLO parliament, which is supposed to represent all the components of the Palestinian people and which could therefore include Hamas. Then there would be the question of the programme and the concrete initiatives to be taken or supported. In this context, the question of organising new legislative elections will be a major issue as it could potentially rebalance the balance of power between the different Palestinian political currents, most certainly to the advantage of Hamas. As you can imagine, Mahmoud Abbas and those close to him are not very keen on this prospect. However, they have little room for manoeuvre, as they are now cut off from the concerns of the population they are supposed to represent and, worse still, are often considered to be willing collaborators of the Israeli occupying forces.

This is why the Palestinian population of the West Bank has greeted Mohammad Shtayyeh’s resignation with indifference, because at this stage it in no way represents a tangible reform of the Palestinian Authority, but rather a manoeuvre by its current leaders to preserve their prerogatives.

Will this partial recomposition of the Palestinian Authority have any real political consequences, particularly with regard to post-war prospects in Gaza and the situation on the West Bank?

At this stage, we cannot speak of a political recomposition of the Palestinian Authority, but at most of an attempt to patch things up, the effects of which will certainly be almost non-existent. Washington, which wishes to « revitalise » the Palestinian Authority, is exerting strong pressure for the formation of a government of technocrats likely to collect massive Western aid, implement fundamental reforms, proceed with the reconstruction of devastated Gaza and even prepare for new elections. But this plan is likely to remain highly theoretical, given the Israeli leaders’ opposition to any prospect of the Palestinians taking control of their own destiny.

This raises the question of a hypothetical international diplomatic initiative to avoid an Israeli-Palestinian tête-à-tête, which we know will be futile given the asymmetrical balance of power between the two adversaries. In addition, the political centre of gravity of the current Israeli government is on the extreme right, making it strictly impossible to make any progress worthy of the name in satisfying Palestinian demands, in other words, in applying international law.

In the light of these few parameters, it is clear that the real issue is not to replace the resigning Prime Minister with a flimsy technocrat who would have the support of Washington and the backing of Tel Aviv. It is a question of being able to bring about a radical political change embodied by a leader with strong popular legitimacy. The name of Marwan Barghouti, who has been imprisoned in Israel since 2002, immediately springs to mind. He would also be the only person capable of uniting the various Palestinian factions around a minimum common programme. It is precisely for these reasons that the Israeli authorities are unlikely to release him from their jails.

As we can see, we are not far from squaring the circle… but the primary demand remains that of an immediate ceasefire. It is vital. Then, and only then, can the political scenarios be put in place.

 

Translated by Deepl.