For now, the PA is working with Israel, not Hamas

RAMALLAH — On Wednesday, a day after a rally was held to mark ten years since the death of Yasser Arafat, all was calm at the Muqata compound here.

There was no sign of the multitudes who had gathered a day earlier to pay tribute to the man who was the leader of the Palestinian people for nearly 40 years — a man viewed by Israelis, until the day of his death, as one of the most ruthless terrorists in history. The only remnant of the event was a huge banner across the entrance to the compound, showing an image of “the old man,” Abu Ammar, alongside the heir Mahmoud Abbas, with the caption “Lift your heads, for you are Palestinians” inscribed above their heads.

Abbas, at the Tuesday rally, had launched a scathing attack against both Israel and Hamas. He accused the Gaza-based organization of attempting to sabotage the rehabilitation process of the Strip and of undermining efforts to maintain a functioning reconciliation government. At the same time, Abbas also promised to thwart “extremist and settler efforts” to “defile” the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Simultaneously, official Israel continued to churn out its messages against Abbas. The prime minister did not mince words with regard to the Palestinian leader, nor did his Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman or Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon. Everyone in the Israeli leadership had found the common enemy, the “real reason” for the security deterioration in the region. None of them saw fit, heaven forbid, to point the main finger of blame at Hamas, or Israel’s northern branch of the Islamic Movement, despite the fact that those organizations are clearly responsible for the major escalation of anti-Israeli sentiment and violence in Jerusalem and across Arab parts of Israel.

At the same time that Netanyahu and his coalition partners were launching their scathing attacks against Abbas, the prime minister and defense minister also sent reassuring messages to the Palestinian leader

Why does the Israeli government insist on ignoring the responsibility of Hamas for the violence and instead focus solely on Abbas? Firstly, probably because it is easier to criticize Abbas than to risk another war in Gaza. Secondly, Israel is preparing for a difficult diplomatic campaign at the UN Security Council. The Palestinian Authority is expected to turn to the Security Council within two weeks, and demand that the council recognize a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders. The Palestinians expect that a majority of Security Council member countries will support their bid, but are aware that the US government may impose a veto on the motion. But following such an American move, Ramallah plans to approach the UN General Assembly as well as many other international organizations, including the International Criminal Court.

Such diplomatic moves have led officials in the Muqata to brace for punitive measures, both from the administration in Washington and the Israeli government, and to prepare a response.

“We will halt all security coordination [in the West Bank],” a senior assistant to Abbas warned The Times of Israel.

“True, we see the security coordination [with Israel] as a Palestinian interest. It is also for us, not just you,” he said. “But if the political horizon is completely blocked to us, if Israel will impose sanctions on us, we do not intend to maintain security coordination which caters mainly to your needs.”

The Palestinian official stressed, however, that “in the meantime, the security coordination will remain. Abbas gave explicit instructions, he said. Anyone who fires, even one bullet, anyone who attempts to ignite an intifada, must be arrested immediately.”

Unfortunately, it turns out that there is sometimes a certain gap between such statements and the realities on the ground. Nonetheless, on Tuesday evening, following the rally in memory of Arafat, senior Israeli officers met with all the heads of the Palestinian security services, as first reported by the Times of Israel. The meeting itself, it must be said, came as no surprise. Security coordination has continued even throughout this tense period.

What surprised the Palestinian side, however, was the high rank of the army officers who were at the meeting, bringing with them a clear message from above: Israel does not want an escalation.

In other words, at the same time that Netanyahu and his coalition partners were launching their scathing attacks against Abbas, the prime minister and defense minister also sent reassuring messages to the Palestinian leader, explaining that they did not wish to exacerbate tensions any further. The message included a clarification that the Israeli army has no intention, for the time being, of undertaking any drastic measures against the Palestinian Authority in light of the security deterioration. Instead, the army officials said, Israel will act to calm things down.

If you are confused, you are not alone. It appears that Netanyahu has not quite decided whether Abbas is a partner or an enemy. That seems to depend on how far we are exactly from the Likud primaries.

RIP, unity government

The tensions with Israel, surprisingly, aren’t improving relations between Hamas and Abbas. Assertions of Palestinian unity and reconciliation sound especially forced these days.

Abbas and his circle blame Hamas for the explosives placed at the entrances to the homes of 15 Fatah members in Gaza, only days before a planned ceremony there Sunday to mark the Arafat anniversary.

They are probably right. In the Strip, there is no organization except Hamas that could carry out such a complex simultaneous operation. In the Muqata in Ramallah, they are pointing their fingers at Fathi Hamad, Hamas’s former interior minister, who is now affiliated with Mahmoud al-Zahar, one of the main Hamas figures against the unity agreement with Fatah.

Hamas, not unlike the Israeli government in this respect, seems confused and hasn’t decided where it is heading. It allegedly gave up the governance of Gaza, but certainly not the power. It claims that it will allow the PA to rehabilitate Gaza, but at the same time detonates explosives at the homes of Fatah members.

According to Palestinian officials, a triumvirate is setting Hamas policies in Gaza these days: Zahar, Khalil al-Haya, and Ismail Haniyeh. The first two are emphatically not supporters of Palestinian unity.

“They laughed at us,” a senior Fatah member told The Times of Israel, referring to Hamas, this week. “They wanted us to rehabilitate the Strip, but without giving anything up. They will continue to rule, they will determine the future of the Strip, and we will just pay the salaries of their people. A few days ago, the Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu called Abu Mazen [Abbas] and said that [Khaled] Mashaal [the head of Hamas’s political wing] wants to hold a ceremony in Gaza marking ten years since the death of Arafat. The president told him that 15 minutes earlier he had received a message from the Hamas leadership that it opposed any such event, and would not protect the participants. Davutoglu said that he would check and get back to Abbas; he hasn’t called back. We understood after the explosives were found that they planned to attack the participants in the Gaza ceremony, so we cancelled it.”

Since then, contacts between Abbas and Hamas have been almost entirely cut off. The rehabilitation of Gaza is only getting further away.

How Deif’s inner circle turned away from Hamas

This week, the season premiere of “Uvda” aired, dealing with the Israeli attempts to assassinate Hamas’s Gaza terror chief Muhammad Deif. The Times of Israel asked the same senior Palestinian official if the PA knows what happened to Deif during the war, when his home was bombed by Israel, and his wife and two children were killed. He said that the working assumption of the PA, like in Israel, is that Deif appears to have survived, but his health situation is still unclear.

During the research for the program, anchor Ilana Dayan and I met with Samir Masharawi, one of the heads of the Preventative Security Forces in Gaza who, years ago, was responsible for negotiations with Deif about stopping terror attacks on Israel and instead joining the PA security forces.

This may sound highly implausible, but there are precedents. At least three of Deif’s partners in establishing Hamas’s Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades crossed over in 1996 and joined the PA forces. And there was a period before that, claimed Masharawi, in which Deif suspended attacks on Israel. He said that the Hamas leadership abroad was angry at this, and decided to establish a rival organization: “The Secret Force.”

This body operated as an armed rival to Izz al-Din al-Qassam and its members and, with Hamas founding veteran Ibrahim Makadme at the head, went back to carrying out attacks against Israel, under Deif’s nose and against his orders. It could be that this is why Deif reacted so strongly to the assassination by Israel of his associate, the Hamas bombmaker Yahye Ayyash, in January 1996.

“Deif called me and told me about the assassination of Ayyash. He was the first to know about it, and I heard about it from him. We immediately went there – me, Fatah’s Muhammad Dahlan, and Sami Abu Samhadana. We went in with Deif, the four of us, into the house where Ayyash’s body was lying, and we understood the situation was about to deteriorate.”

Masharawi said in the interview that Arafat demanded that he bring Deif to him, and he did so. “Abu Ammar tried to convince him not to respond to the assassination of Ayyash. But after we left the office in Gaza, Deif said to me that he must respond.”

Masharawi says that the attacks continued for more than a year, and the Americans and Israelis applied immense pressure on Arafat to arrest Deif. “Abu Ammar would say to us, ‘Don’t say Sabah al-Kheir (good morning), say Sabah al-Dief (Deif morning).’”

In March 1997 Masharawi and his men succeeded in convening the men closest to Deif, including Abd a-Fatah a-Sutri, Kamel Khalifa, and Salam Abu Maroof. “Deif was not there. But they agreed to stop the attacks. I dropped them off in central Gaza before dawn, and I went home. I took a shower, then heard on the radio that there was another suicide bombing, at a coffee shop in Tel Aviv, and I understood the agreement was over before it had begun.”

And still, surprisingly, a-Sutri, along with Khalifa and Abu Maroof, left Hamas’s military wing and joined the Preventative Security Forces in Gaza. A-Sutri, then the number two man in Hamas’s military wing, is today a PA diplomat in Africa.

Deif, on the other hand, remains Israel’s most wanted man.