Gaza accepts no half-solutions and respects no half-leaders! / Eng. Tayseer Muhaisen

The contemporary Palestinian revolution has not yet achieved the goals for which it set out. Yet it has left behind a record full of sacrifices and of moral and political achievements. The 48th anniversary of the launch came this year in a dynamic and complex historical context, in which the region is witnessing one of the greatest processes of transformation in its history towards a new map, with enormous shifts in the balances of power that will draw the features of the future of the region and its peoples for a long time to come. It also comes while the Palestinian arena is divided against itself, the features of the national project are fading, and the state of exposure and impotence is manifest in its starkest form after a historic decision at the United Nations that we do not know how to invest in and build upon, and a legendary steadfastness in the face of a fierce aggression that we fail to translate into a real political victory and over which we bargain with “failed states” that have not yet risen to the level of the promising political selfhood carried by the millions in the squares and public spaces. So we aspire to no more than the opening of the Rafah crossing and the reception of solidarity delegations, and we do not take a single step towards anything that rises to the level of historical responsibility, national necessity and sound political awareness. Neither has the President been able to spread the wing of his cloak to halt the rapid slide towards the abyss and prevent the bleeding of Gaza, drop by drop, towards its scorching desert south; nor has Hamas dared to generalise the supposed Gaza model in order to halt the bleeding of the West Bank, inch by inch, towards its usurping Zionist neighbour. Above all this, the anniversary came bearing a number/date that in individual and collective memory carries connotations pointing not only to the Nakba as a defining event, but reviving anew agonies and sorrows that time has not been able to efface: “We shall not forgive and we shall not forget!” So should anyone be surprised, after all this, that Gaza should declare the second launch of the Palestinian revolution in its resurrection-like and sudden outpouring. No one can understand the significance of what is happening in Gaza except by returning to an understanding of Gaza itself. Perhaps the Israelis alone have offered deep readings that help to reveal the truth of this narrow strip, and on that basis they have built their policies towards it from the beginning. It is the end of the desert and the beginning of the sea, the road of Horus, the embrace of the Levant and the land of Egypt. Above all this, it is the largest camp of Palestinian refugees on the face of this earth, in Israel's flank, where the refugees have gone to sleep and woken up, for six decades, within a stone's throw and within sight of land that was usurped, homes that were demolished and a memory that was stolen; the pain sleeps and wakes with them, so that they hand over their leadership, every so often, to whoever undertakes to treat this pain. In this sense Gaza has constituted a great dilemma for the Israelis: the ancient Maccabees cursed it and expelled it from the mercy of the Lord when its impregnable walls proved beyond them, and the new Maccabees wished the sea would swallow it up when it rose against their invincible army. In return, it has borne a special character, a mixture of its longing for freedom, its inclination to rebellion and its sense of a permanent wound, so as to bear titles and decorations: the Palestinian Noah's Ark, the forward trench of the national struggle, Gaza the land of dignity. The well-known Israeli journalist says of it: “Gaza will remain a thorn in Israel's throat, neither swallowed nor spat out, neither dying nor living.” It brought down the resettlement project, and constituted an incubator for the birth and launch of the national liberation movements in all their shades; it occupied the enemy with infiltration, with the stone and the knife, with martyrdom operations, with the rocket, and then with the mass surges towards the lines of contact, and always by establishing nuclei of statehood of many forms and at every stage of the struggle. And it is always Gaza the free, the rebellious, the wounded! Impossible to break or tame, it has rebelled even against itself and surprised everyone who wagered on its disappearance or its drowning in the sea! It rebelled against Abdel Nasser in some of his policies, against Arafat in some of the practices of his authority, and against Abu Mazen in some of his positions. And here it is today declaring its rebellion against Hamas, and always in the same way: it sends message after message, and if it receives no answer it goes out, spontaneously and peacefully, free and rebellious and wounded! In the course of our reading of this event, we say that brother Ismail Haniyeh has no cause to regret giving his approval after mediations and dialogues, despite the opposition of some within Hamas, for he touched the spirit of the city and grasped its greatness and appreciated that the Gaza that asks permission today may not do so tomorrow. Perhaps his wise decision rises to the level of decisions that reflect a high sense of responsibility at this critical moment in the history of our cause! It is a decision that closely resembles, in its substance, President Abu Mazen's decision to hold the elections (2006) despite the opposition of some within Fatah!.

And we say to the brothers in the Fatah movement: beware of misreading the message and of letting the joy of the resurrection-like outpouring divert you from the general national responsibility. Gaza is not with anyone and not against anyone! Gaza is today recovering, together with you, its splendour, its essence and its function. So attribute the enormous success to none but Gaza and its people. The tactical and logistical success in organising a festival of this size without it ending in catastrophe. The moral success in every party freezing its desire for point-scoring and opening its mind, its breast and its heart to the other who differs, not to the other who is an enemy. The political success in delivering a clear message to everyone who wagered on the dissolution of the national project, on Gaza's withdrawal from it and its withdrawal as a separate island into confusion and loss. And a strategic success represented in Gaza remaining, as it always has been, a dilemma before the Zionist project. It is a success shared by Hamas, Fatah and the other organisations, because it is Gaza's success and therefore a success for all Palestinians.

And if brother Yahya Moussa, a member of the Legislative Council for the Hamas movement, has offered a bold reading of this resurrection-like outpouring, calling on his movement to draw the lessons from it, then I call on the leadership of Fatah to follow that example and not to be content with the “political theatricalisation” of an event that goes beyond the bounds of politics. In my estimation, this event could not have taken place, even had the efforts of all the factions been combined, were it not for the following reasons, connected, as we have said, with the nature of Gaza, that is, the dilemma of geography and demography and the Sisyphean struggle against the impossible:

First: in its extremely narrow space and its crowding with tormented souls, Gaza has found in freedom and the quest for it a way to treat the spirit. It has refused repression whatever its causes, motives and justifications and whatever the party imposing it. It would fall silent for a long time, groaning and complaining, so that some imagined it had been subdued and had submitted. The worst kinds of repression are those that come from close kin, or those that lack moral, national and political justification. And the basest form of it is that whose practices are accompanied by a measure of humiliation and degradation. Gaza took revenge on behalf of Hamas on the day it was subjected to abuse, gagging and shackling, and some imagined at the time that it was siding with Hamas at the expense of others. And here it is today taking revenge on behalf of Fatah for the abuse, gagging and shackling it has been subjected to, to tell everyone that it is only restoring the standing of its own free and rebellious self, and that it does not side with any of its sons against another, even if it pinches the ear of one of them or slaps another in the face, for it is correcting the sons' mistakes and guiding them to the right path.

Second, Gaza detests injustice. It was wronged for a long time: in the time of the occupation through the theft of resources, forced labour and the obstruction of development and renaissance, and through the great disparity in incomes, opportunities and capacities in the time of the Palestinian Authority. But the “system of injustice” in the time of the occupation deliberately included a set of concessions, within the context of a malicious project of “improving the living conditions of the Palestinians” from an economic perspective, which for a time obstructed an uprising for the sake of national dignity rather than in search of a loaf of bread. Likewise, the weight of the “system of injustice” in the time of the Palestinian Authority was lightened by the great promise of freedom and independence, by the continuation of negotiating efforts on the one hand and the return of resistance operations on the other. But in the time of the division, the system of injustice has been stripped of everything that softens its impact on the spirit and the body. It is bare injustice, justified by nothing but illusion. Gaza has been deprived of the care, services and attention to the details of its people's lives that it deserves. It appeared as though it had grown used to living on an artery passing through secret tunnels and aid that does not always reach those who deserve it. The Hamas authority failed to bind most people to its rule through the provision of services and the enactment of policies; and while it wagered on its revolutionary legitimacy, which it renews each time at exorbitant prices and a high cost paid by the people of Gaza, it did not give great attention to the affairs of these people (even if that was because of the blockade, the peg on which to hang things that no longer convinces anyone). The Ramallah government contented itself with paying salaries with a great deal of humiliation, degradation and threats to cut them off, and left thousands of minds imprisoned in their homes, not working, not renewing, not creating and not advancing in their careers. For years Gaza has lived in real darkness, or in intermittent light, with which the rhythm of normal life is cut off in the home, the clinic, the grocery, the family diwan, the factory and the petrol station. So Gaza sought help against its darkness with candles that burned some of its sons, and with generators that exhausted its environment and poisoned its air. And Gaza remained ignorant of the real cause and of who stands behind it: Ramallah accuses Gaza, Gaza accuses Ramallah, and Israel accuses everyone and laughs at everyone.

The Hamas government, while exempting itself from most responsibility — no salaries to pay and no bills to settle, for there is someone else who pays — did not notice that some of its conduct departs from the familiar, including the preservation of its authority: it is conduct that has not fed anyone from hunger nor secured anyone from fear. The prices of land and real estate rose, money accumulated in the hands of the tunnel traders, and a stratum of new rich was formed. The weight of the collection of fees and taxes intensified, burdening shoulders that were already exhausted, and excuses and justifications were issued in defence of the besieged government, while the citizen (the worker who lost his job, the farmer whose land was bulldozed, the business owner whose factory was destroyed) was required to be a citizen on the side of duties only, with few rights. And some forgot that the second Caliph Omar ibn al-Khattab suspended one of God's prescribed punishments in the Year of Ashes (the year of famine). So how can these people not expect rebellious, free and wounded Gaza to rise up against injustice, even if it endured it for a while?

Third, in breaking its long silence Gaza wanted to send an eloquent, powerful and national message. It could no longer accept the falsification of its awareness with idle talk, however loudly its speakers raised their voices, or with the bombast of speeches, however hoarse the orators' throats became. Gaza endured years of torment while it resisted and did not surrender. Since the second Intifada it has been subjected to the most hideous process of systematic destruction by the occupation, accompanied by the most appalling processes of self-destruction through internecine fighting and security chaos, so as to live through the worst nightmares under the weight of crushing air strikes, counting all of that as patience on the road to freedom and independence. And then the orators promise the opening of the Rafah crossing, and the militants cheer the new Egyptian guardianship; and Gaza looked around and there was Jerusalem being lost, the West Bank being nibbled away, the Organisation fading, the Authority collapsing and unity growing more fractured, and Beit Hanoun growing poorer and its land more barren, while Sderot returns each time to live its life as if nothing had happened. So who has been victorious, and over what? What is the political objective in a region that is disintegrating, with alliances built on sectarian foundations, states becoming failed states, armies drowning in seas of spilled blood, other armies being rebuilt according to the American security doctrine, and a third kind of army being turned into a police force. Israel enters the region through its widest gates, an effective party awaiting its share of the cake; Iran lies in wait; and Turkey grows angry for Gaza and does not lift a finger regarding what is happening in the West Bank and Jerusalem. Gaza, having just emerged from an aggression that it met with its patience, its steadfastness and the sacrifices of its sons, and being itself the history of resistance, its glory and its price, goes out, ironically, in the colour yellow to declare its alignment with the line of political realism adopted even by the Muslim Brotherhood leadership of Egypt. It is not for Gaza to carry the burdens of the nation alone, and this nation must not be given the opportunity to be absolved of our blood, for the solidarity visits of a humanitarian character only add to its exhaustion. Therefore it declares its alignment with the most important idea in confronting the brutal Zionist project: exposing it morally, politically and legally; preserving existence on this land and strengthening the attachment to it and steadfastness upon it; occupying the enemy whenever that is possible without pushing him into the folly of revenge, of which he is capable, and without providing media and moral cover for his aggressive and criminal practices, and without granting others, Arabs and non-Arabs, a free absolution from our blood through showy solidarity visits that are no different from fundraising in any Arab city; and without granting the mad machine of occupation the pretext and the argument. And whoever wants otherwise, let him tell us how! Does it help, for instance, to embroil Egypt now in a war it is unable to wage? And what if the escalation reaches a point that drives the enemy's leaders to inflict another Nakba? Does anyone really believe that a few rockets can deter Israel from its hellish plans, when it is brandishing a war against a powerful Iran?

Gaza endured the aggression, but it could not endure the mistaken readings of it. This time the nature of the conspiracy and the Israeli plan became clear to it, and it discovered the extent of the anxiety Egypt is living through, as the questions poured in on Mr Khaled Meshaal from the Egyptian press about the truth of the “alternative homeland”, followed by anxious Jordanian questions about the truth of confederation; and everyone forgot that there is an Israeli solution that Giora Eiland calls the “regional solution” on the ruins of the two-state solution. The Palestinian Noah's Ark took notice, and went out to remind the world that its first popular uprising, when “its feet were in Shuja'iyya and its head on the seashore” in the words of Gaza's great poet and one of the leaders of that upsurge, the late Mu'in Bseiso, was in fact against the plan of resettlement in Sinai.

For these reasons Gaza went out, not as a victory for Fatah over Hamas, but as a victory for the project of Palestinian nationhood (at the heart of which are Fatah, Hamas and the others), at a time of the great crossing into the future of a region in transformation. It is the emergence of a Palestinian political selfhood that has nothing to do with the colours yellow and green, but with the blend of the spectrum represented by the flag of the revolution and the flag of Palestine; and nothing to do with ideological alignments, factional calculations or regional wagers, but rather restores things to their original state without retouching. This outpouring, for those who do not know Gaza, is a first attempt to redefine the Palestinian cause and to recover its essence, lost in the crush of divisions, alignments and petty calculations. And if Israel in its latest aggression wanted, through the Egyptian gate and under American sponsorship, to reserve itself a seat at the negotiating table over the fate of the region, and to exclude the Palestinian people, divided and defeated in its estimation, then the conscience of the world, expressed in a historic resolution of the General Assembly, accompanied by a purely Palestinian uprising that began this time in the West Bank and was completed in Gaza with this unprecedented gathering of a million people, reserves Palestine's seat not at another negotiating table, but as an essential part of the region's new map.

Everyone should be worried: whether Gaza clamours or falls silent. And the Palestinian leadership, of every colour, should be still more worried if it fails to understand Gaza's message. Gaza awaits an end to the swallowing of the bitterness of division, the suppression of freedom, the theft of the vote, the forging of the will and the succession of “victories” that only increase its siege, its darkness and its slide towards the south; and the “national emptiness” it has lived through for a stretch of time is costing it its capacity for patience. It could have commanded you all, from amid the crowd, to come from Ramallah and from Doha to declare the end of the division, but it relies on your good sense and grants you sufficient time to translate what you signed in Cairo into practical and swift steps. And if you do not do it together, then it appeals to you, Mr President Mahmoud Abbas, to show courage, wisdom and responsibility and to hasten to invest the heroic steadfastness, the historic decision, the resurrection-like outpouring and the magnificent upsurge in the West Bank, in order to impose national unity by force. And if you do not, then Gaza calls upon you, Abu al-Walid, to halt the bleeding of this steadfastness which is being credited to the account of presidents and kings who have no sound judgement over their own affairs and who have not given Palestine and its people what they ought to give; and it calls upon you at once to move forward towards seizing the banner of leadership in full, in a genuine partnership with the new Fatah and the others, so as to halt the slide, restore cohesion and generalise the model of resistance that you assume will restore to the land its splendour. For Gaza, on behalf of all Palestine, does not want half-solutions, just as it has no liking for half-leaders!