Where Is the Intifada Heading?
GREENBERG, JOEL
Where Is the Intifada Heading? On a rocky hilltop in the WtM Bank. re-iidem-. of the village of M.r/raa Sharki\a rrrrmh staged a rarrfullv rhorrograplird dim-orwtralioii on the anniversary ol the...
...All this can be done immediately, independent of any progress in the overall peace process...
...Only such negotiations, it is said, can produce an agreement that will be truly binding on Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, whose allegiance is overwhelmingly to the PLO leadership abroad...
...Free political activity could also produce an atmosphere more conducive to political dialogue with Israelis, and, possibly, with the government, so that interim measures could be agreed on to reduce the level of confrontation...
...Elections and self-rule could perhaps be discussed, but only as part of an overall plan for a final settlement, whose goals are known in advance...
...Groups of young activists have also been circulating in Palestinian shops and businesses, confiscating and burning tax forms delivered by the Israeli government to increase revenues that have fallen off during the uprising...
...Palestinian spokespersons in the territories note with satisfaction that the PLO has, under their pressure, and as a result of their sacrifices in the intifada, come around to adopting a more pragmatic political platform...
...The PLO's current positions have drawn Palestinians in the territories even more tightly to the organization because PLO leadership has finally adopted the realism of local Palestinians, born of first-hand contact with Israel...
...Palestinian leaders in the territories reject Rabin's attempt to divide Palestinian leadership inside the territories from their leaders outside...
...Despite the Israeli controls, however, money continues to come in, often as funds channeled through Israeli banks whose real origin cannot be traced...
...The meetings caused a furor in Israel because contacts were being made with known PLO supporters...
...Major demonstrations are now held in remote villages, far from the eyes of the army...
...Mutual gestures of goodwill could be discussed, violent protest could be reduced, and tough Israeli responses could be scaled down accordingly...
...Husseini, in remarks made after his release from prison, formulated a similar approach...
...They wore khaki, and had maik* over their face* in the color* of ihr Palr*linian (lag: red...
...In addition, they argue, the PLO represents the whole of the Palestinian people and is the proper address for negotiations...
...On every wall, logo* of ihr DK1.P...
...Israeli defense minister Yitzchak Rabin recently proposed that in exchange for a period of calm in the territories, Palestinians be allowed to elect representatives for negotiations with Israel...
...And the violence in the territories is likely to go on, claiming both Palestinian and Israeli lives...
...and Dr...
...With a reduction in political repression, the need for violent confrontation would decline...
...Leading Palestinians in the territories also realize that while the violence of the uprising had in the past drawn international attention, it must now be followed by constructive political initiative and diplomatic results that will provide hope for change to a population that has been bearing the burden of the uprising for the past 16 months...
...At the earliest, they say, there can be a lull in the uprising only when an international Middle East peace conference is convened, with PLO participation...
...Husseini and the underground leadership of the uprising, in their leaflets, describe the Palestinian offer of dialogue as a move taken from a position of strength, a gesture by a people who have won significant victories during the uprising and who are now able to come forward with pragmatic proposals because they have gained the confidence needed to make concessions...
...One day, masked youths hauled Israeli merchandise out of shops, piled it high in the central square and set it aflame...
...Youths who have organized themselves in groups called "strike forces," to enforce commercial strikes and work boycotts, are now calling themselves the "Popular Army," marching in uniform, routinely attacking persons suspected of cooperating with Israel, interrogating them and sentencing them to punishment in underground "courts...
...In any event, the troops stayed away, there were no dashes and the march remained peaceful...
...Rabin's proposal remains the most authoritative offer to date from an Israeli leader to Palestinians in the territories, but it falls far short of even the minimum conditions for transforming the uprising into constructive and fruitful political action...
...the idea is to create a home-based economy that can exist independently of Israel and survive curfews and closures by the army that limit food supply...
...The Israelis [who have taken a hard-line position] have in the past few months climbed up a very high tree," he said...
...At about the same lime as these grass-roots activists were staging (heir march in the West JOEL GREENBERG Bank, a group of Palestinian political leaders were holding a series of meetings in Jerusalem with key Israeli politicians in the Labor party...
...For Palestinians and increasing numbers of leftist and left-leaning Israelis, the answer is to start negotiations with the PLO...
...It has also become more institutionalized, striking stronger roots...
...On the ground, the army and Palestinian protesters appear to have achieved a balance of mutual deterrence in which neither paYty can win, and both can wage a protracted battle that can be escalated occasionally by either side...
...Nusseibeh and Husseini, in an interview in the Palestinian At-Fajr newspaper, explained that their meetings were designed to broaden the circle of Israelis having dialogues with nationalist Palestinians and to widen the legitimacy in Israel of talks with PLO supporters and, ultimately, of talks with the PLO...
...said one teenager with pride...
...A suggestion by Bethlehem mayor Elias Freij several months ago that the United Nations supervise a "cease-fire," which would include a cessation of violent protests in exchange for Israeli conciliatory moves (such as the release of Palestinian prisoners and the return of Palestinian deportees), was flatly rejected by PLO chief Yasir Arafat, who implied that anyone proposing such a plan would be assassinated...
...Such talks, it is argued, will provide the hope and prospect of progress that can drastically reduce the violence and frustration in the occupied territories...
...Palestinian and DFI.P lhit> tluiirrrd from telephone polo, forming a rolumn of banners lx*litling a MM vi»it...
...Patah and ihr Commuiiist party win- stem illrd (jr.illlti si«urtl In other Palestinian lac linns shared the wall space At the appointed hour, three column* of uniformed south* marrhrd out of the alley*, a* their leader marked time with a whittle...
...The future, it seems, holds more of the same as the uprising settles into a holding pattern, pending - a diplomatic breakthrough abroad...
...The military-style march in Mazraa Sharkiya and the political meetings in Jerusalem reflect two sides of the Palestinian uprising and are strong indicators of where it is going: toward increasing political sophistication, and deeper, far-reaching grassroots organization...
...In some hot spots, like the casbah (marketplace) of Nablus, youths and troops clash daily, and reports of dead and wounded are an everyday occurrence, not always noticed by the outside world...
...Woe to the nation that eats what it does not plant,"said one slogan...
...The youthful activists of the uprising have intensified their efforts to promote self-reliance and civil disobedience through a well-orchestrated campaign to boycott Israeli products and stop paying taxes to the Israeli government...
...Funding for such activities, including stipends for families of "martyrs," arrives in roundabout ways from the PLO, although the flood of money promised by the Palestinian leadership did not materialize, due to tight Israeli restrictions on the influx of money from abroad...
...The aim, he said, was to increase the number of meetings with Israeli politicians so that in the end "whoever talks with Faisal Husseini can also talk with [PLO official] Khaled al-Hassan...
...The goal, for the Palestinians, remains an independent state that could be federated with Jordan...
...Mahdi Abdul Hadi, who heads the Palestinian Academic Society for the Study of International Affairs (PASSIA), an East Jerusalem think tank, reflects the new, sophisticated pragmatism of the uprising when he describes the intifada as "not just rocks and Molotov cocktails, but the process of building a new Palestinian society...
...Graffiti warning shopkeepers to clear their shops of Israeli products was painted on walls...
...green, blark and white...
...Palestinian observers all agree that there can be no end to the intifada, or cease-fire of violence, until Palestinians feel they have moved significantly toward their goal of independence...
...makeshift "police forces" that guard shops and homes against thieves (to replace Palestinians who resigned from the Israeli police...
...Yossi Beilin, deputy to Finance Minister Shimon Peres...
...Freij promptly withdrew the suggestion...
...Shopkeepers were told to fill out a weekly report of progress in selling out their Israeli products, accompanied by a warning that if they did not get rid of the merchandise, the "popular committees" had ways to do so...
...We should remember," Nusseibeh said, ' 'that the path taken by man)- Israelis toward contacts with the PLO began with talks with Palestinians here, whose positions are known [to be supportive of the PLO...
...Thry rarrird Palev tinian banners and posters, and were followed by crowds ol t banting residents on .1 man h thai wound its way through the village streeiv "There's the Palestinian army...
...Army raids on such isolated hamlets often result in heavy fighting between stone-throwing youths and Israeli troops, producing a steady stream of casualties...
...Molotov-cocktail and rock attacks on Israeli cars traveling in the territories have also become a fixture of everyday life, and no longer command the attention of even the Israeli public, except when they cause death or injury...
...Can anything be done to promote progress and break the new status quo...
...Underground leaflets, meanwhile, have urged Palestinians to grow their own vegetables at home and raise chickens and goats...
...In another West Bank town, Tulkarm, shopkeepers were given a mimeographed chart by members of local "popular committees" that contained a schedule for clearing their stocks of Israeli goods...
...Any move to end the uprising, it seems, must provide the intifada leadership with a means to translate their struggle into political gains...
...The Palestinians in the territories and abroad are one people, they say, and a settlement with only part of that people will in the end be no settlement because it will leave the rest of the Palestinians unsatisfied...
...The violence of the uprising is slowly becoming banal, no longer an object of consuming foreign interest and of increasingly less concern to Israelis, who have grown numb to the daily tallies of dead and wounded and are becoming increasingly adept at repressing the disturbing reality...
...A special leaflet issued by the Unified Leadership in the town of Ramallah included a call to participate in the meetings, and an unprecedented appeal not to throw stones at Israeli cars if they were part of the Peace Now convoy...
...The abyss between the Israeli and Palestinian positions is wide...
...Peace Now leaders say they have been talking with Palestinians about a total one-day cease-fire of violent protest in the West Bank, as part of another day of peaceful meetings between Palestinians and Israelis throughout the area...
...Israeli arms troops were nowhere to be seen...
...The leaflets repeatedly contrast the progress of the uprising with the growing "crisis" and confusion in Israel in the face of Palestinian achievements and newly won international support...
...From the Palestinian side, however, the aim of meeting with Israelis is to address not only the left side of the Israeli political spectrum, but also people in the center and on the right...
...Leaflets call for a tax revolt, and non-cooperation with Israeli plans to issue new-identity cards to Palestinians in the West Bank...
...In the meantime, they argue, continuation of the intifada is necessary to constantly register rejection of the Israeli occupation, and fight it in what is now being dubbed "The Palestinian War of Independence...
...Pupils shut out of classrooms are working at home, studying from books and worksheets distributed by their schools, or being taught by their parents...
...But from the Palestinian standpoint, the meetings were part of the PLO's "peace offensive,"' an attempt to storm the bastions of Israeli public opinion and bring it around to accepting talks with the PLO as the only way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict...
...Palestinians would be able to pursue their struggle through more normal, non-violent means, and devote their energies to political initiatives rather than to fighting in the streets...
...Sari Nusseibeh, a philosophy-professor at Bir Zeit University^and Ziad Abu Zayad, editor of the Palestinian Hebrew-language newspaper, Geslur, met with Israelis such as Haim Ramon, the Labor party whip in the Knesset...
...This was a demonstration 111 a rrlalitrh remote village: It did not aliii 1 iraltii on am main roads and the arms may not have known that it was taking place...
...no quick progress in the peace process is likely...
...llrvs I rout thr minaret...
...Anti-Zionist, ultra-Orthodox Jewish groups, such as the Neturei Karta organization, have been mentioned as one conduit of Palestinian funds, although no hard proof of this has been produced...
...Politically, the uprising leadership has clearly opted to work hand in glove with the PLO's diplomatic "peace offensive" abroad and bombard Israelis with a pragmatic readiness for dialogue that they hope cannot be resisted for long...
...There is, however, one way to steer the uprising in a different direction to reduce the violence and facilitate a constructive political dynamic in the territories that could also promote the peace process...
...We cannot provide a leadership, but maybe we can give the Israelis a ladder by which they can climb down to the warmth of the international community, where the PLO is now sitting...
...College seniors, in an attempt to finish their degrees, are meeting with their professors, completing course work needed for their diplomas...
...and dispatch of supplies to communities under military curfew or closure...
...In early March, grass-roots Palestinian leaders working with the Israeli Peace N.ow movement planned a day of mass meetings between Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank, but were blocked by the army...
...Palestinian protests are no longer the mass riots that characterized the early months of the uprising, but they have spread to more remote villages and are no less fierce...
...A recent leaflet by the "Unified National Leadership of the Uprising" included an endorsement of the recent meetings with Israelis...
...Husseini recently met with Knesset member Amnon Rubinstein of the Shinui/Center Party and said that he seeks dialogue with ever-wider circles of the Israeli public, including Likud and government representatives...
...The political aims of the uprising have been formulated in the leaflets in a way that corresponds to the PLO's new pragmatic platform...
...Palestinian leaders in the territories, he said, could provide a bridge for Israelis to talk with the PLO...
...An opportunity for such political activity could provide a peaceful outlet for the tensions in the territories and enable the uprising to take an increasingly political course, reducing the need for violent protest...
...The means: an international Middle East peace conference attended by the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and all parties to the Middle East conflict, including the PLO, on an equal footing...
...of the village of M.r/raa Sharki\a rrrrmh staged a rarrfullv rhorrograplird dim-orwtralioii on the anniversary ol the Inundation of ihr Democratic Kronl for the Liberation, of Palestine DFLP), a radical lai ikhi of the Pl.O headed In NayrfHawatmrh...
...In towns, villages and refugee camps, "popular committees" provide rudimentary social services: free health care volunteered by doctors and paramedics...
...We Palestinians have been there, and know that it is very cold up there...
...The army's closure of schools and colleges in the West Bank after they became centers of protest has generated a quiet, little-noticed program of alternative Palestinian education...
...The stated goals of the uprising leadership are an end to Israeli occupation, realization of self-determination through the establishment of an independent Palestinian state led by the PLO with Jerusalem as its capital, existing beside Israel...
...The idea, they said, was to increase the isolation of the Israeli government, to create pressure at home and abroad for the Israeli cabinet to change its positions and agree to start a substantive dialogue with the PLO...
...fund-raising and food collection for needy families or relatives of Palestinians killed, wounded or jailed during the uprising...
...The attempt to build a new, independent Palestinian society has in many ways become the focus of the uprising's grass-roots activities...
...In Nablus, the West Bank's largest city, activists have gone door-to-door in the commercial district, ordering shopkeepers to get rid of Israeli goods or face the torching of their stores...
...Rabin flatly ruled out any talks with the PLO, asserting that he wanted to initiate talks with elected Palestinians from the territories as an alternative to the PLO...
...As large-scale protests have been increasingly stifled in towns and refugee camps by a more effective deployment of Israeli troops, the uprising activity has gone deeper underground, become more secretive and spread to more remote locations...
...In some locations, makeshift classes are held secretly in private homes and in mosques to avoid detection by the army, which has, in the past, prevented attempts at such alternative education...
...Palestinians in the territories could be allowed free, non-violent political expression and organization, including political meetings with Israelis...
...Nimrod Novik, Peres's special adviser...
...Meanwhile, in the streets, the rhythm of strikes and occasional violent protests has become routine as the intifada has become a way of life, a state of mind...
...Palestinian figures such as Faisal Husseini, considered the leading PLO activist in the territories and only recently released from detention...
...This would be followed, he said, by an interim period of Palestinian self-rule, leading to a final settlement that could produce a confederation between the territories and Jordan...
...The uprising is not aimed against Israel, but against the occupation," he says...
...The local moviur nit lrsit»ncd vsith plaitir Palestinian pennants, and a largr Halcviiuian ll.ii...
Vol. 14 • June 1989 • No. 4
