Ethan Bronner contributes an analysis of the rescue of the Hilles clan by Israel. He gives one explanation why Abbas didn’t want to receive the Hilles clan.
In truth, the relationship between the Fatah leadership in the West Bank and the Hilles clan was poor. President Mahmoud Abbas, the head of Fatah, who is allied with other former Fatah leaders in Gaza, was angry that the Hilles clan stood on the sideline when street fighting broke out between Hamas and Fatah in Gaza in June 2007. Some Hilles members are with Hamas. And generally the clan cares about itself more than about either party. Send them back, Mr. Abbas told the Israelis.
The results of this incident?
So for now, the Hilles clan has been neutralized, Hamas has increased its power, Fatah leaders are seen as two-timing and indecisive, and Israel helped save the lives of some of its enemies. The streets of Gaza were deserted Monday night as Hamas police officers raided apartment buildings where Fatah loyalists lived.
So it does appear that Abbas’s claim about wanting more of a Fatah presence in Gaza had some truth. Still it’s hard to say that he comes of as looking good.
Finally Bronner concludes with two interpretations of the episode:
Israel felt it was not getting the credit it deserved. As Avi Benayahu, an army spokesman, said on Army Radio, “There is no other army in the world that would take such a humanitarian approach to help Palestinians, some armed, being chased and fired at by Hamas.†He added that “Israel has not received any praises for its actions. Yet this is the kind of army we have.â€
Sufian Abu Zaida, a Fatah lawmaker, told Army Radio he had a slightly different interpretation of what the Hilles drama meant from a Palestinian perspective.
“When a person is faced with the choice of being killed by his own people or arrested by his enemy, he will prefer to be arrested by his enemy,†he said. “And this gives you a pretty good picture of how bad and cruel the situation is in Gaza.â€
(“[B]ad and cruel,” do you think that Gershom Gorenberg stays up at night ravaged by his conscience? More on the Israeli army’s view here.)
Khaled abu Toameh (h/t Elder of Ziyon, Daled Amos) writes that it wasn’t simply a rejection of the Hilles clan that led Abbas to hesitate before allowing them in, it was a general prejudice against Palestinians from Gaza.
Past experience has shown that the Palestinians in the West Bank have never been enthusiastic about the presence of their brethren from the Gaza Strip among them.
Shortly after the establishment of the PA in 1994, former PA Chairman Yasser Arafat deployed dozens of policemen from the Gaza Strip in a number of West Bank cities. This resulted in an “intifada” by the residents of these cities, many of whom openly rejected the presence of the Gazans in their communities. In many cases, West Bank families refused to rent out apartments to the “undesirables” from the Gaza Strip.
The experience was repeated in June 2007 when hundreds of Fatah members fled the Gaza Strip following Hamas’s violent takeover of the area. Most of those who arrived in Ramallah are still finding it impossible to rent apartments in the city.
The reporting on this incident has, of course, used the word “clan.” There’s a story behind it.
Back in 1997, IMRA republished an article by Graham Usher, Arafat revives tribal power. After describing the lethal results of a clash between two clans in Gaza, Usher wrote:
“Since the PA was installed in 1994, Arafat has based his rule on two crucial constituencies. One was his Fatah movement, many of whose cadres were absorbed into the PA’s burgeoning and often lawless security forces. But the other was Arafat’s deliberate reempowerment of Palestine’s traditional or tribal families, like the Abu Samhadanahs or, for that matter, the Al-Dhairs. In Rafah, the two constituencies have become one, with tribal and political loyalties so interwoven as to be inseparable.
“For Palestinian analysts like the sociologist, Isah Jad, the PA’s “revival of tribal structures” is not only inimicable to Palestinian hopes for a law based and democratic society. It is corrosive of the modern national consciousness Palestinians have forged out of their conflict with Israel. For 30 years, says Jad, “the national movement conducted a long struggle to weaken loyalty to the family and the tribe and strengthen the concept of nationalism and loyalty to the homeland. Any rebuilding of tribal structures will reinstate the family and the tribe as the individual’s first loyalty.”
Arafat’s revival of the clans was done to ensure his hold on power, even at the expense of national aspirations. The events over this past weekend show how corrosive Arafat’s effort has been. My guess is that identification with clans also is behind the disdain shown towards Gaza’s Palestinians by their brethren in the West Bank.
More on clans here.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
