. - How do you explain the calm that prevailed in the West Bank? Hassan Balawi. - There are movements of protest and acts of solidarity, but there are also a lot of bitterness, frustration and fatigue among residents of the West Bank. Palestinians spend their time watching television without finding a form of political expression to translate their anger. The disarray and powerlessness in the face of events causing deep concern. Because people are aware that the entire Palestinian national project is in jeopardy.
Can we speak of a political failure of the Palestinian Authority? We have the impression of a step backwards. The achievements of Oslo have gone up in smoke with the second intifada, which has failed to lead to new achievements at the end of the fight. The structures of the Palestinian Authority have been destroyed, militants have died, others are still imprisoned. And we now have a wall of separation that has swallowed 40% of our territory.
A reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas possible? The Palestinians are responsible for what happens to them. They have no common strategy and engage in small calculations with ambitions faction. Mahmoud Abbas led international negotiations that lead nowhere. The Palestinian president will fail to defeat the greater good of Israel. He expressed wishes to remain a dead letter. The strength of Hamas is much more productive. It is unrelated to the search for genuine political progress but for reasons which are intended solely to bolster his own seat. The inter return to dialogue is indispensable, but the more time passes more Hamas will increase its level of requirement. A compromise was missed in February 2007 when Hamas had agreed to a minority government. He also recognized the principles of the Charter of the PLO, an organization that could ultimately be integrated.
We going forward to two separate Palestinian entities? 80% of the economy of the Gaza Strip depends on Israel, which wants to get rid of this burden. For some in Tel Aviv, the seizure of power by Hamas is a historic opportunity to cut the bridges once and for all in Gaza to Egypt, leaving the responsibility to provide oil, gas and everything else with aid to Gulf countries. Those perfectly s' two mini-states, one in the West Bank and the other consists of the Gaza Strip. This solution would draw a line on the issues of Jerusalem, return of refugees and the creation of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders. But it faces fears of Egyptians and Jordanians. Cairo is afraid of an Islamist contagion. President Mubarak does not need to manage its doors to an entity dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood. Amman and fears of being forced to intervene in case of disorder in the West Bank.
Hamas have interest to accept a cessation of hostilities? It has everything to gain from an agreement that would allow for the first time to be recognized by the international community as an interlocutor. It would emerge from this adventure weakened militarily, but politically grown on the Palestinian scene. It required in the Arab world in the buyer torch of Palestinian resistance, like the PLO in the 1970s.
(1) Author of "Gaza. Behind the scenes of Palestinian national movement "(Denoel).
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