Hamas sees Jenin deaths as hub for unity
[ABU DIS] — Hamas and Fatah officials marching together in the funeral procession for three Palestinians killed over the weekend in a shootout with Israeli troops should not be interpreted as a sign of rapprochement between the two rival factions according to a political analyst aligned with Fatah. Abdelmajeed Sweilem told The Media Line that the image of the two factions walking together does not mean the parties are any closer to uniting. Rather, he opined, the reconciliation process remains at a complete impasse.
On Saturday, tens of thousands of Palestinian mourners marched behind the coffins of three gunmen who were killed late Friday night. Officials of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, Palestinian Authority, Islamic Jihad, Fatah, Hamas and other parties all marched in unison to the Jenin refugee camp’s cemetery. Sweilem said people should not read too much into that image, adding that the moment was “symbolic” and that in reality, the actual situation on the ground among Hamas, Fatah and other parties is far removed from feelings of unity.
Two reconciliation agreements signed in 2012 remain unimplemented and the bifurcation between the Fatah-ruled West Bank and Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip shows no sign of abating.
“None of these parties were holding the Palestinian flag,” Sweilem told said. “Everyone was holding his own flag: Fatah had their flag, Hamas had their flag, and so on. When it came to Palestinian nationalism, there was a great lack,” he said.
On a number of occasions, security forces loyal to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas would arrest Hamas operatives wanted by Israel, and the detainees would end up in the control of the Israeli army. In other instances, forces in the West Bank have arrested Palestinians who belong to parties calling for the destruction of the state of Israel prompting charges of collaboration between the PA and Israel with Abbas, himself, named as a collaborator. For Hamas and others, security cooperation with Israel – “public enemy number one – is treason.
To those charged with Israeli security, the cooperation developed between the Palestinian Authority’s security forces and their Israeli counterparts is laudable.
Maj. Guy Inbar spokesman for COGAT, the office of Israel’s military administration in the Palestinian Territories, explained to The Media Line that, “Israel sees great importance in the added value of all security coordination which is a mutual interest in order to keep the security stability. Israel does not refer on all the security coordination in the work with the Palestinian security.”
At the same time, Fatah complains of arrests by Hamas of its members in the Gaza Strip. Therefore, seeing the parties together marching side-by-side, resulted in a picture of togetherness that some found confusing and others, hypocritical. But not to Sweilem.
“The images we saw on television, in which (Hamas and Fatah) appear unified, does not reflect the feelings which actually exist,” he explained. He also said that when it comes down to it, there is “no respect [between the factions.]”
Hamas spokesperson Isra Al-Modallal – the first female spokesman for the faction — disagrees.
“It’s very important to see this image,” she told The Media Line. Al-Modallal explained that Palestinians mourn the loss of other Palestinians regardless of which party you belong to. At the same time, she suggested, this could be an opportunity.
“We need one nation to stand strongly against occupation,” he said, adding that this time should be used for the “Palestinian leaders in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to speak out in one voice to the international community.”
Hamas condemned Saturday’s killings in Jenin, and Al-Modallal was adamant in calling for President Abbas to stop all communication with Israel, “be it government, society, or organization. Especially negotiations,” she said.
Under the auspices of American Secretary of State John Kerry, the United States has been trying to secure a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians. Al-Modallal argues that those talks are actually widening the gaps between Fatah and Hamas because, she asserts, the Palestinians are only being pressured to make more concessions, while, she argued, Israel does not.
Al-Modallal charged that in Abbas’s last meeting with Obama, hope for reconciliation was “absolutely destroyed.”
But Fatah’s Sweilem doesn’t see it that way.
In order for the PA not to be blamed for the failure of talks, Sweilem says “the Palestinian leadership cannot turn its’ back on negotiations with Israelis.”
Meanwhile, at Al-Quds-Bard Honors College for Liberal Arts and Sciences in Abu Dis, second-year student Maen Radaideh, a Fatah loyalist, sits on a bench. The 21-year old Bethlehem resident told The Media Line that seeing the factions together in the West Bank city of Jenin made him happy and gave him hope. “National unity is our current goal against the occupation and the problems between Fatah and Hamas are beside the point,” he said.
Radaideh says it’s normal for any party to face problems.
“I see that the problems are not problems which cannot be resolved,” he said.
Hamas and Fatah have been locked in a dispute since 2007 when the Islamic group routed Fatah and forcibly took over control of the Gaza Strip. Prior to this, Hamas had won a landslide defeat of Fatah in the 2006 Palestinian parliamentary elections.
Radaideh said that on campus, Fatah and Hamas come together on the Student Council to help the students.
“I wish [Fatah and Hamas] would implement this reality in all of Palestine,” Radaideh said.