The New Power in the PNA

By George Friedman

Hamas has beaten Fatah in a key election and
is now the dominant political party among the Palestinians. Many observers
expressed surprise at the outcome, but the only thing that should have
surprised anyone is that there was surprise. Hamas was facing a corrupt
Fatah faction that had been driven into the ground by Yasser Arafat.
Arafat's successor, Mahmoud Abbas -- who was widely celebrated by Western
leaders -- is in fact an obscure party functionary whose primary claim to
leadership was his relationship with Arafat. While Arafat, the icon of
Palestinian nationalism, could not be repudiated, repudiating Abbas was
easy. Like the political wing of Fatah, he stood for nothing but the
perpetuation of Fatah and the system of patronage that Arafat created. When
it came to Abbas, Western media and leaders confused political exhaustion
with virtue.

But it was not simply internal Palestinian politics
that drove the Hamas victory. A wave of Islamist politics is sweeping the
Muslim and Arab worlds, and the Palestinians are far from immune. The
Islamist movement is doing far more than simply challenging the West: It is
challenging the secular Arabists who were the heirs of the Nasserite
tradition. The Islamists are confronting figures like Hosni Mubarak in
Egypt. In many ways, Fatah was the embodiment of secular Arabism -- the
purest form of Nasserism. The Palestinians were among the most secular in
the Arab world. Therefore, challenging and defeating Fatah represents a
critical moment in the history of the Arab and Muslim world. It represents a
new high-water mark for Islamists.

There was yet another process at
work in the election. Arafat and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA)
that he essentially created and dominated have existed in a complex
relationship with Israel. In many ways, the PNA was a creation of Israel,
living within boundaries that Israel defined. Whatever its level of
involvement in the suicide bombing campaign against Israel, via Marwan
Bargouthi and the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, Fatah still accepted the
existence of the state of Israel. As a secular movement, it had no inherent
moral objection to Israel's existence -- only a political objection, and
political objections are inherently flexible.

Hamas has a moral
objection to Israel's existence, deriving from its understanding of Islamic
texts. But it also had serious political objections to Fatah's approach to
Israel. From Hamas' point of view, once Arafat had negotiated the existence
of a quasi-state -- the PNA -- he became casual about negotiating the two
critical things: first, the definition and rights of the Palestinian nation
and, second, the transformation of the sort-of-state the PNA represented
into an authentic state. An authentic state, by Hamas' lights, meant a state
with an army that it was free to deploy in a clearly defined territory.


Even if Hamas accepted the existence of Israel in some sense, its
view was that the other side of the equation had not been fulfilled. Only
the illusion -- not the reality -- of a Palestinian nation-state had been
created. Hamas' objection to Fatah was that it had accepted an illusion. Its
objection to Abbas was that he was content to preside over an illusion.
Corruption, the decline of Arab secularism and the inability of Fatah to
articulate the interests of the Palestinians led it to defeat after decades
of dominating and defining the Palestinian cause.

The issue today is
what Hamas will do with its power. It must be understood that Hamas has not
yet reached an unassailable position among the Palestinians: It defeated but
did not blow out Fatah. Fatah is still there and can, particularly after a
defeat like this, recover. Moreover, Hamas has never faced the problem of
governing. Its unity is the unity of an opposition party, and its purity is
the purity of a movement that has never had to award contracts for paving
roads. There is a vast difference between opposing the rascals in power and
taking power yourself. A party unused to ruling can very quickly become
everything that it has opposed -- a bureaucratized, patronage-driven entity
more interested in holding onto power than in governing.

It is very
possible that this will happen to Hamas. Certainly, this is what Israelis
hope will happen. There is a strand of thinking among Israelis that argues
that Hamas' victory is the best hope there is for peace in the Middle East.
The logic runs thus: Negotiating with the PNA under Arafat or Abbas was an
exercise in futility. Arafat was duplicitous and Abbas powerless. No
settlement reached by Fatah would ever have any meaning because Fatah could
not deliver the rejectionists among the Palestinians. Hamas embodies the
rejectionists. If Hamas were to enter into an agreement -- even if it had
opposition on its flanks, like Ariel Sharon did on the Israeli side -- it
ultimately would be able to deliver. And since peace is always made with
enemies, better to deal with your worst enemy than with hapless moderates
like Abbas.

Moreover, this line accepts that Hamas rejects the right
of Israel to exist, that it has waged and can continue to wage suicide bomb
attacks in Israel, and that it intends to govern by whipping up religious
sentiment that must, by definition, be anti-Israeli. Nevertheless, this
reasoning goes, the experience of government will affect Hamas in two ways.
First, Hamas has come into power on a tidal wave of hope -- but those hopes
inevitably will be dashed. Hamas will, in a fairly short period of time,
come under criticism for failing to deliver on those hopes. And second, as
we have said, because Hamas is ill-prepared for the mechanics of governing,
it will commit a series of amateurish errors, further dulling its bright
credentials. Therefore, Hamas -- a radical Islamist movement with a
rejectionist policy -- simultaneously will embody the most radical position
among Palestinians while transforming into a normal political party. Not
only will it be able to negotiate from a position of authority, but its
appetite for confrontation will be dulled.

This is a view shared by
many Western observers as well as Israelis, but there is, as one can see, a
deep contradiction in the thinking. On the one side, Hamas is valued as a
powerful revolutionary force -- therefore, it can negotiate authoritatively.
On the other, it will be moved to negotiate because the experience of
governing will exhaust it sufficiently that it will move from radical to
routine politics.

Before this question of what Hamas will do with its
power can be answered, two immediate challenges are posed to both Israel and
the West. Western countries funnel a great deal of aid to the Palestinians.
One of the charges made against Arafat was that he, in effect, stole a great
deal of that money. It was one of the charges leveled by his Palestinian
critics, and one of the ways they wound up in Palestinian jails. At this
point, depending on how the PNA reconstitutes itself, that money is likely
to be passed to the control of Hamas functionaries. In effect, Hamas will be
the recipient of Western aid.

Israel has a similar problem. The
Israelis collect a good portion of Palestinian taxes and pass them back to
the PNA -- one of the reasons we call the PNA a pseudo-state. When the
Israelis remit the funds to Palestinian accounts, those accounts will be
controlled by Hamas. Hamas has announced its intention to take its own
militias and designate them as a Palestinian army. The Israelis have
accepted the concept of a Palestinian police and security force, but
accepting the existence of a Palestinian army -- let alone a Palestinian
army that is in reality Hamas' militias -- and passing tax funds to them to
spend as they wish would challenge the Israeli understanding of what a
Palestinian state will mean. Sharon certainly didn't envision that -- and
with his incapacitation, he has come to embody the gold standard of the
Israeli position on the Palestinians.

But forget the Israelis for a
moment. Consider the position of the Americans and Europeans. First, all
sides have agreed that there should be a Palestinian state and have provided
funding to the PNA. Second, all sides believe deeply in the concepts of
national self-determination and free elections. Third, all sides oppose
terrorism and the kind of suicide bombing campaigns carried out by Hamas.
Even those governments most sympathetic to the Palestinians have opposed
Hamas' rejection of Israel's right to exist and the suicide campaigns.


So then, we have an ongoing flow of money to a PNA that is seen as
the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, and what appears to
be a free and honest election of a group that is regarded by virtually
everyone outside the Muslim world as among the least savory of terrorists. A
decision must be made fairly quickly. Does the world honor the principle of
national self-determination, even when the nation determines it wishes to be
governed by people who are regarded as morally reprehensible?

Those
who argue for national self-determination and free elections always seem to
think that the outcome will be the election of nice folks who'd be at home
in Wisconsin. This is as true of the Bush administration as of Amnesty
International. It is the universal self-delusion of the West. OK, so now the
Palestinian people have spoken, and they have spoken for Hamas. Since Amnesty
International has no power, it will be able to finesse its position more
easily than the Bush administration -- which does have to make a
decision.

The decision to be made is clear and must come soon: Does
the United States continue to provide funds to the PNA, even if those funds
wind up in Hamas' coffers? This question has broad ramifications. One of the
goals the United States has set itself in the war against jihadists is to
create an environment in which free elections can be held in the Muslim
world. We guess the assumption has been that, given a choice, Muslims would
vote for pro-Western, secular regimes. The Palestinians have voted for an
anti-Western, religious regime. Which gives -- the doctrine of the absolute
right to self-determination, or the absolute opposition to groups designated
as terrorists?

The Bush administration does not have the luxury of
ignoring this one. Unless action is taken, the money will continue to flow.
Sending money to Hamas will surely cause the administration to say, "Does
not compute, does not compute." Cutting off the money will signal to the
Islamic world that the United States is absolutely committed to democratic
institutions, unless it doesn't like the outcome.

The Israelis, for
their part, will have to figure out whether they want to rupture relations
with the PNA by cutting off tax funds collected from the Palestinians. Doing
that could result in the resumption of the intifada and suicide bombings. The
Israelis have no appetite for this. Thus, the United States and Israel will
be regarding each other with fairly blank looks on their faces, wondering,
"What do we do now?"

Meanwhile, Hamas will be moving rapidly to take
control of the mechanisms of the PNA. They have made a lot of bold promises,
and they need to turn their election into a psychological victory. At the
moment, their minds are not on international relations, but on consolidating
their political and psychological position among the Palestinians. To the
extent they are looking beyond their immediate realm, they are looking at
the Islamic world.

That means that they will be saying and doing
things that increase the fervor of their followers and give opponents a
sense of their relentless inevitability. Personnel shifts, particularly the
replacement of officials known to be close to the West or Israel, will take
place quickly. Statements will be made that will be frightening to the West
and exhilarating to the Palestinians. In the United States, Israel and
Europe, the blank look will turn to serious concern, and the pressure to act
will grow.

That will be the critical point. Hamas benefits from a
sense of embattlement -- the sense that it is confronting the enemies of
Islam. As it backs the Israelis and Americans into a corner, and both start
reacting, Hamas will increase its strength and authority. It will also look
to countries like Saudi Arabia -- a fellow Sunni entity, rather than Shiite
Iran -- and the other Gulf states for support. Some European countries will
continue funding Hamas under the theory that engagement will moderate the
movement. And that will be the tipping point.

We have never believed
that a long-term solution to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis could be found.
It is certainly true that if Hamas, in becoming a governing party, is forced
by its circumstances to negotiate a settlement with Israel, then our theory
would be wrong. But the other possibility is that Hamas, due to internal
political considerations as well as the reaction of Israel and the United
States, will become more inflexible. We tend to believe that is the likely
outcome. But even if it turns out to be the first case, we long
have argued that the geographic realities of the Israelis and
Palestinians preclude the existence of two viable states. Hamas, even if it
enters the peace process, knows the problem and will demand more than Israel
could possibly concede.

The peace process is not in worse shape than
it was before the Hamas win, because the situation was never any good. The
new constellation is interesting, but not all that different. There will be
hints of improvement followed by disappointment, coupled with spasms of
violence. We don't see how this can change.