The conventional wisdom says Mahmoud Abbas will walk away today with the presidency of the corrupt Palestinian Authority. Various "experts" -- optimists, double-talkers, and the self-deluded -- claim he will be a force for moderation and peace. Charles Krauthammer asks: "Has no one learned anything?"
How has President-to-be Abbas been campaigning?Posted by Alan at January 9, 2005 08:29 AMDec. 30: Abbas, appearing in Jenin, is hoisted on the shoulders of Zakaria Zbeida, a notorious and wanted al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist. Abbas declares that he will protect all terrorists from Israel.
Dec. 31: Abbas reiterates his undying loyalty to Arafat's maximalist demands: complete Israeli withdrawal to the 1949 armistice lines, Jerusalem as the Palestinian capital, and — the red-flag deal-breaker — the "right of return," which would send the millions of Palestinians abroad not to their own country of Palestine but to Israel in order to destroy it demographically.
Jan. 1: Abbas declares that he will never crack down on Palestinian terrorism.
Jan. 4: Abbas calls Israel "the Zionist enemy." That phrase is so odious that only Hezbollah and Iran and others openly dedicated to the extermination of Israel use it.
What of Abbas' vaunted opposition to violence? On Jan. 2, he tells Hamas terrorists firing rockets that maim and kill Jewish villagers within Israel, "This is not the time for this kind of act." This is an interesting "renunciation" of terrorism: Not today, boys; perhaps later, when the time is right. Which was exactly Arafat's utilitarian approach to terrorism throughout the Oslo decade.
In the Middle East, words are actions. Never more so than in an election campaign where your words define your platform and establish your mandate. Abbas is running practically unopposed and yet, on the question of both ends and means, he chooses to run as Yasser Arafat.
During the decade of Oslo, Arafat's every statement of hatred, incitement and glorification of violence was similarly waved away. Then bombs began going off in cafes and buses, and the Middle East wise men realized he meant it all along. Now, once again they are telling us to ignore the words. Abbas does not really mean it, they assure us. This is just electioneering. We know his true moderate heart. Believe us.
Why? On the basis of their track record? And even more importantly, you do not conduct foreign policy as a branch of psychiatry. Does Abbas mean the things he says about Israel now? I do not know, and no matter what you hear from the experts — the same people who assured you that Arafat wanted peace — neither do they.
But we do know this. In Abbas' first moment of real leadership, his long-anticipated emergence from the shadow of Arafat, he chooses to literally hoist the flag of the terrorist al-Aqsa Brigades.