State of Failure

by Jonathan Schanzer

  So, what can be done in the future? Quite a lot. In the spirit of President Woodrow Wilson, the Palestinians and supporters of Palestinian independence should consider the following 14 points:

  The West should begin to make Palestinian aid conditional on meeting objectives of state building, transparency, and good governance. Aid should not be based solely as a reward for the Palestinians engaging in the peace process, as it has been until now. Funding the peace-based process makes international donors feel good, but what has it accomplished? Aid needs to be conditional and performance-based. This is not to say that international donors should tolerate the presence of incitement or jihadism in the public discourse. That is a serious problem that should be constantly monitored. But that should not be the yardstick for aid. Good governance must be the top priority.

  The West must keep expectations high. Too often the West is guilty of what US president George W. Bush termed “the soft bigotry of low expectations.” The right approach is not to simply cheerlead for the Palestinians when they start to do things right. The goal is to push them harder. A good example of this was a critical essay penned by George Washington University professor Nathan Brown, who challenged openly the notion that Fayyadism was winning the day.24 Fayyad supporters roundly booed Brown’s “glass is half empty” approach. But, in the end, Brown was right. Despite Fayyad’s thoughtful and productive approach, not enough progress had been made. And it should be reasonable to make these criticisms when they are deserved. If the Palestinians are serious about their statehood project, such criticisms should be viewed as challenges that need to be met.

  The West must insist that, if further aid is to be furnished, Palestinian economic development must be based on sustainable practices, not on political patronage. As Dennis Ross notes, “People need to get contracts based upon a legitimate process, not based on favoritism.”25 The process needs to be a completely objective one in which the best and most transparent companies are awarded contracts. This cannot be tainted by political objectives. Nepotism, waste, and corruption have already eroded Palestinian growth.

  To accomplish points 1 through 3, we must take the “peace processors” away from the economic process. Economic development must be left to the economists. Too many sweetheart deals were cut during the heyday of the peace process. The prevailing thinking appeared to be that if the most important Palestinians were sated by lucrative business deals, then they would not have the stomach to engage again in hostilities. That thinking was wrong. When the peace process unraveled, so did the Palestinian economy.

  Conversely, it will also be imperative to leave the economists out of the peace process. In fact, along the lines of point 4, diplomats should now know the importance of leaving all economics out of the peace process. This is what led to corruption—on both the Palestinian and Israeli sides—during the Oslo years. To paraphrase Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, the Palestinians must pursue peace as if there were no state-building process and pursue state-building as if there were no peace process.

  The international community must cease placing its trust in former or recovering terrorist organizations to create viable economic and political systems. As Aaron David Miller asks, “Can a national liberation organization make the jump from terrorist organization, or violent organization, to a bureaucracy, and a functioning one at that?”26 While there may be exceptions, public administration has never been the strong suit of subnational guerrilla groups. It is not their core competency and likely never will be. It was a huge mistake to expect the PLO to turn into a government overnight. The Palestinians must seek out trained public administrators to help build their state. Failure to do so will invite further failure.

  The Palestinians must consolidate all of their armed and security forces. The West must demand this for two reasons. First, it is imperative for peace with Israel. Second, it is critical to do this if a future Palestinian state is to be viewed as stable by the donor community. All investors seek stability and predictability. Conversely, no outside investor will truly trust Palestine as an investment as long as Hamas, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Popular Resistance Committees, and other jihadi groups roam the streets.

  Foreign aid should not be the primary source of income for a Palestinian state. That’s not to say that foreign aid is wrong. It just means that the Palestinians need to develop private enterprise. The Israelis need to allow for it, too. On this score, the Israelis will need to think long and hard about a good number of their restrictive policies—particularly those not directly tied to security—in the West Bank (and maybe even the Gaza Strip). Israeli cooperation is critical for allowing the Palestinian economy to thrive.

  Foreign aid, if and when it flows, must flow through a single treasury account. That account must be governed by legitimate accounting practices, ensuring that the funds go to public administration, not special interests. This is a central tenet of Fayyadism. It remains as necessary today as it was when Fayyad began his project.

  The Palestinians must have a free press. A free press is crucial to maintaining a free society. But in the case of the Palestinians, a free press can also serve as a much-needed corruption watchdog. Until now, the Palestinian leadership has largely frowned upon such reporting, both domestically and internationally. This must end.

  Similarly, there must be freedom to protest, which is currently lacking in Palestinian society. This lack of freedom is a symptom of larger problems created by a government that does not provide its people with other fundamental rights.

  To address these problems, the Palestinians must maintain an independent judiciary. As Ross notes, “This is the most fundamental thing . . . if that was done, a lot of other things would fall into place.”27 Real checks and balances would ensure that Palestinian governance is clean and functioning. An independent judiciary should also be able to prevent the PA security forces from abuses of power, which continue unabated. For example, a report in March 2013 indicated that the documented cases of torture in the West Bank rose from 112 to 116.28

  In keeping with some of these fundamental issues, the Palestinians also need to allow for new parties and leaders to emerge. As former George W. Bush administration official Michael Singh notes, “We’ve got to cultivate relationships with a broader swath of the Palestinian polity . . . who are one way or the other going to represent the future of a Palestinian state. . . . We have to know who they are. We have to have relationships with them.”29 The Palestinians need a clash of ideas to take place for the right kind of governance to emerge. Right now, political challengers are crushed. This portends poorly for the future of the system.

  The PLO needs to go. As Syracuse University’s Osamah Khalil notes, “The PLO’s institutions were designed for a national liberation movement in the context of the Cold War and were deliberately constructed to limit broad-based representation until victory was achieved. In the absence of victory, the same institutional structures have been used to hinder potential reforms and distance the Palestinian leadership from the population it purports to represent.”30 The PLO has also made it difficult for the international community to hold the Palestinian leadership accountable. For example, Mahmoud Abbas is the president of the PA and also the head of the PLO. When he undertakes decisions, it is not always clear which hat he is wearing. Additionally, the PLO has no oversight. One US Treasury official notes, “The PLO is not the business of the Treasury.”31 But then, whose business is it? The PLO finances are a black box, as is much of its decision making. This is a huge impediment to Palestinian transparency.

  The Palestinians need to bring back their best people. Many Palestinians have been trained to help implement these 14 points. They have studied at the top schools and worked at the top companies in the diaspora. They know how to implement good governance and good business practices. But they have fled. Some of them came back with the promise of the Osl
o Accords in the mid-1990s, but many of them took flight again. There has been a brain drain. Not only that, there has been a cash drain, too. The economic mismanagement, political suppression, and overall dysfunction have pushed some of the best, wealthiest, and brightest away. But even a glimmer of hope can bring many of them back to take part in their national project.

  The good news is that the Palestinian leadership can still make these changes and right the ship. But this will not happen in a vacuum. World leaders must begin to make their demands heard. The United States and Europe will need to lead the charge. And when they do so, they should make it clear that these demands are not punishment for past transgressions. Rather, they are heightened expectations that can help the Palestinians actualize their dream.

  Notes

  Chapter 1 Collapse or Statehood?

  1.“The Elders Welcome UN Recognition of Palestine as an Observer State,” The Elders, November 29, 2012, www.theelders.org/article/elders-welcome-un

  -recognition-palestine-observer-state.

  2.Ibid.

  3.Bernard Avishai, “EXCLUSIVE: Former Israeli PM Olmert Supports Palestine U.N. Bid,” Daily Beast, November 28, 2012, www.thedailybeast.com/articles

  /2012/11/28/exclusive-former-israeli-pm-olmert-supports-palestine-u-n-bid.html.

  4.“Statement by Mr. Ahmet Davutog˘lu, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey at the UN General Assembly,” Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, November 29, 2012, www.mfa.gov.tr/statement-by-mr_-ahmet

  -davutoglu_-minister-of-foreign-affairs-of-the-republic-of-turkey-at-the-un-general

  -assembly_-29-nov-2012.en.mfa.

  5.“China Reaffirms Support for Palestinian UN Bid,” Reuters, November 13, 2012, www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/china-reaffirms-support-for-palestinian

  -un-bid-1.477441.

  6.“Statement by Egypt on Palestine’s Obtaining the Status of an Observer State to the United Nations,” Arab Republic of Egypt, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, December 2, 2012, www.mfa.gov.eg/English/Minister/Articles/Pages/ArticleInterviewDetails

  .aspx?Source=6781921f-3993-444a-859e-ee26ce851de8&articleID=ac518ad8

  -0895-40e6-a457-24fbc7eeb432.

  7.“Roger Waters’ Speech at the UN General Assembly,” The Russell Tribunal on Palestine, November 29, 2012, www.russelltribunalonpalestine.com/en/sessions

  /future-sessions/videos/roger-waters-speech-at-the-united-nations-on-29-november.

  8.Jonathan Schanzer, “Gaza Prepares to Declare Independence (From Palestine),” New Republic, September 10, 2012, www.newrepublic.com/blog/plank/107081

  /gaza-prepares-declare-independence-palestine.

  9.Email correspondence with Hussein Ibish, May 2, 2013.

  10.See Virgil Hawkins, Stealth Conflicts: How the World’s Worst Violence Is Ignored (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008).

  Chapter 2 The United States and the Question of Palestine

  1.John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008).

  2.Rashid Khalidi, Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), p. 11.

  3.“President Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points,” The Avalon Project, January 8, 1918, http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/wilson14.asp.

  4.“The King-Crane Commission Report,” Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information, December 21, 2012, www.ipcri.org/files/kingcrane.html.

  5.Kathleen Christison, Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001), pp. 27–33.

  6.Ibid., p. 28.

  7.“U.S. Congress Endorses the Balfour Declaration,” Jewish Virtual Library, December 21, 2012, www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Congress_Endorses

  _the_Balfour_Declaration.html.

  8.“Remembering the Hebron Riots, 1929,” Forward, August 20, 2004, http://

  forward.com/articles/5186/remembering-the-hebron-riots-/.

  9.“The Neutrality Acts, 1930s,” US Department of State—Office of the Historian, December 21, 2012, http://history.state.gov/milestones/1921-1936/Neutrality_acts.

  10.Rachel Bronson, Thicker Than Oil: America’s Uneasy Partnership with Saudi Arabia (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 17.

  11.Baruch Kimmerling and Joel S. Migdal, Palestinians: The Making of a People (New York: Free Press, 1993), p. 123.

  12.Ann Mosely Lesch, “The Palestine Arab Nationalist Movement Under the Mandate,” in The Politics of Palestinian Nationalism, ed. William B. Quandt, Fuad Jabber, and Ann Moseley Lesch (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973), pp. 36–39.

  13.David G. Dalin and John F. Rothman, Icon of Evil: Hitler’s Mufti and the Rise of Radical Islam (New York: Random House, 2008), p. 43.

  14.Ibid., pp. 50–57.

  15.Christison, Perceptions of Palestine, pp. 47, 53.

  16.Ibid., p. 55.

  17.Charles D. Smith, Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992), p. 129.

  18.Sheldon L. Richman, “U.S. Conduct in the Middle East Since World War II and the Folly of Intervention,” CATO Institute, August 16, 1991, www.cato.org/pubs/pas

  /pa159.pdf.

  19.Christison, Perceptions of Palestine, p. 78.

  20.Richard Holbrooke, “Washington’s Battle over Israel’s Birth,” Washington Post, May 7, 2008, www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/06/AR20

  08050602447.html.

  21.Christison, Perceptions of Palestine, p. 90.

  22.Khalidi, Palestinian Identity, p. 178.

  23.“Highlights of Main Events 1947–1974,” Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, December 21, 2012, www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Foreign+Relations/Israels+Foreign+Relati

  ons+since+1947/1947-1974/HIGHLIGHTS+OF+MAIN+EVENTS-+1947-1974.htm.

  24.Khalidi, Palestinian Identity, pp. 181–182.

  25.“Special Message to Congress on the Situation in the Middle East,” The American Presidency Project, January 5, 1957, www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php

  ?pid=11007.

  26.Christison, Perceptions of Palestine, p. 105.

  27.Abraham Ben-Zvi, John F. Kennedy and the Politics of Arms Sales to Israel (London: Frank Cass, 2002).

  28.Christison, Perceptions of Palestine, p. 114.

  29.Michael B. Oren, Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), p. 52.

  30.“Resolution Adopted at the Arab Summit Conference in Khartoum,” Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, December 21, 2012, www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Foreign+Relations

  /Israels+Foreign+Relations+since+1947/1947-1974/31+Resolution+Adopted+at

  +the+Arab+Summit+Conferenc.htm.

  31.Caroline Taillandier, “Middle East Connected Attacks on Americans,” Middle East Review of International Affairs 5, no. 4 (December 2001), www.gloria-center

  .org/2001/12/taillandier-htm-2001-12-05/.

  32.“Jordan and PLO Turn Page on ‘Black September,’” Al-Arabiya, September 16, 2010, www.alarabiya.net/articles/2010/09/16/119411.html.

  33.Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu, “Abbas Eulogizes Munich Massacre Mastermind,” Arutz Sheva, July 4, 2010, www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/138398.

  34.Scott W. Johnson, “How Arafat Got Away with Murder,” Weekly Standard, January 29, 2007, www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/013/192

  ioiwy.asp.

  35.“The Seizure of the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Khartoum,” US Department of State—Office of the Historian, December 21, 2012, http://history.state.gov

  /historicaldocuments/frus1969-76ve06/d217.

  36.“US Agency
Helped Uncover 1973 NYC Plot to Kill Golda Meir,” Associated Press, February 3, 2009, www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3665848,00.html.

  37.“The President’s News Conference,” The American Presidency Project, March 2, 1973, www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=4123.

  38.See Abraham Rabinovich, The Yom Kippur War: The Epic Encounter That Transformed the Middle East (New York: Random House, 2004).

  39.William B. Quandt, Decade of Decisions (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977), pp. 233–257.

  40.Mark Tessler, A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994), p. 485.

  41.“A/PV.2282 and Corr.1,” United Nations, November 13, 1974, http://unispal

  .un.org/unispal.nsf/9a798adbf322aff38525617b006d88d7/a238ec7a3e13eed1852

  5624a007697ec?OpenDocument.

  42.Christison, Perceptions of Palestine, p. 142.

  43.Ibid., pp. 142–146.

  44.Tessler, A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, p. 481.

  45.Taillandier, “Middle East Connected Attacks on Americans,” www.gloria-center

  .org/2001/12/taillandier-htm-2001-12-05/.

  46.Tessler, A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, p. 488.

  47.Mohamed Heikal, Secret Channels: The Inside Story of Arab-Israeli Peace Negotiations (London: Harper Collins, 1996), p. 248.

  48.Smith, Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, p. 252.

  49.Tessler, A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, p. 508.

  50.“Highlights of Main Events 1977–79,” Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, December 21, 2012, www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Foreign%20Relations/Israels%20Foreign%20

  Relations%20since%201947/1977-1979/HIGHLIGHTS%20OF%20MAIN%20

  EVENTS%201977-1979.

  51.Smith, Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, pp. 252–253.