Palestine - Political Leaders
No Palestinian leader has near the prestige and support that Arafat had, notwithstanding the fact that Arafat was increasingly unpopular. There isn't any natural successor. Arafat took great pains to avoid grooming a successor. The best way to ensure a permanent successor, who has respect and legitimacy, would be for the Palestinians to hold elections. They want elections, and Arafat had agreed to the beginning of an election process. Arafat's death provides an opportunity to reengage in diplomacy with a new Palestinian leader representing the Palestinians, who doesn't have the onus that Arafat had in the eyes of the Israeli public and the Americans.
The West Bank and the Gaza Strip have been divided into approximately 10 separate territorial units that maintain semi-independent micro-political/ economic environments bearing little accountability to central Palestinian governance in Ramallah. There are grassroots and internal challenges to the leadership of the Palestinian Authority. However, it will likely take a certain amount of time—some say at least 2-3 years—before a new leadership gains power, with credibility and legitimacy. Furthermore, there is no guarantee as to what kind of leadership will ultimately emerge. The vacuum that is created by the disintegration of the Palestinian Authority is being filled by new local power holders, based on local clans or power barons, creating an overall environment of fragmentation. In addition, the IDF is gradually and reluctantly assuming civil functions over the Palestinian population.
Local political legitimacy is gained through the role local leaders play in providing support services to the Palestinian community and their ability to provide a voice to Palestinian resistance to occupation. For a considerable period of time, this meant affiliations with the Palestine Liberation Organization, considered the “sole and legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.” After the elections for a Palestinian legislature and president in 1996, a new cadre of Palestinians gained some legitimacy through a democratic process for the first time. Today however the situation is much more complex, with two major organizations outside the PLO and the Palestinian Authority structure -- Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad -- playing prominent roles in providing services as well as promoting and supporting attacks on Israeli civilian and military targets.
During the Persian Gulf War of 1990-91, Arafat and many other Palestinian leaders sided with Saddam Hussein. The Oslo Peace Process was begun in September 1993 by Israel and the Palestinians. A declaration of principles outlined in a letter from Chairman Arafat committed his movement to the right of the State of Israel to exist, accepted UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338, and renounced the use of terrorism and other acts of violence. In response, Israel recognized the Palestinian Liberation Organization as the representative of the Palestinian people and agreed to negotiate with it.
In accordance to Palestinian reform efforts, Palestinian Ra’is Yasser Arafat nominated a new Prime Minister, Dr. Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). The Palestinian Legislative Council met and agreed to changes in the Palestinian Basic Law, which serves as a Palestinian interim constitution until independence, to ratify the Ra’is’ proposed changes. The Prime Minister in turn has selected a new Cabinet that was submitted to the PLC along with a government program for reform including an endorsement to put an end to violence. But within a few weeks of Aqaba, Chairman Arafat decided that he didn't want Abu Mazen around. Arafat and Abu Mazen, previously comrades-at-arms, could not co-exist peacefully, although they had long retained the same goals. Arafat accused the Palestinian premier of betraying the interests of the Palestinian people. Abu Mazen resigned in September 2003 because Arafat refused to cede him the powers he needed to conduct his office, and no help was coming from his Israeli counterpart Ariel Sharon, to establish an independent Palestinian state. He was replaced by the new Palestinian prime minister, Ahmed Qurei, who had been Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council.
Israel wants to negotiate with responsible Palestinians and sign a mutually beneficial agreement. To achieve this, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said his country was ready to make “painful concessions.” But from the Israeli point of view, the current Palestinian leadership is incapable of being a partner for negotiations because they believe they can successfully wage war rather than attempting to wage peace. Israel is waiting for a leadership that fights terror. President Bush stated in June 2002 that the Palestinians need “leaders [who] engage in a sustained fight against the terrorists and dismantle their infra-structure.”
Israel is conducting a war against terrorist acts, and changing the Palestinian leadership. Such actions take into account four groups. The first is the international community, particularly America, but also Europe, which is less significant. The goal is the creation of a situation in which Arafat and people around him lose their legitimacy, which was gained mainly after Oslo. The second group includes Arab leaders — most importantly in Egypt, and the "Arab street," especially in Jordan. They were allied with Arafat, although many came to realize that he must be replaced. The third is the Israeli public, many of whom after Oslo accepted Arafat as a leader who deserved trust. Although the recent terror campaign changed their views dramatically, some were not convinced that Israel should wait for an alternative. The fourth group is the Palestinian people who accepted Arafat not only as a revolutionary leader and head of the Palestinian Authority, but also as a symbol. Palestinians regard victory differently from Israelis or those in West. They measured success not by achieving positive results for their people, but rather by the amount of suffering inflicted on their enemies. By early 2003, with Yasir Arafat isolated in Ramallah, the hard-line HAMAS faction aimed to take over Palestinian leadership. With despair radicalizing Palestinians across the West Bank and Gaza Strip in Jerusalem, HAMAS was beginning to dominate the political agenda. Israel’s directed killings of Palestinian leaders in the Palestinian territory included Hamas spiritual leader Ahmed Yassin and others. It was not clear to many Palestinians that they were losing the war. Israel was trying to make this reality apparent, under the theory that only then will a change in leadership become more likely.
