To understand what the Palestinian cause will look like without Yasser Arafat, consider the various titles that he held. Arafat was chairman of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) Executive Committee, president of the Palestinian National Authority, commander-in-chief of the Palestinian forces, and head of the Fatah movement.
The PLO embodies Palestinian national aspirations for independence and statehood. It is the highest political body for all Palestinians, both those living in Palestine and the refugees and other Palestinians in the diaspora. Arafat's successor will need to juggle between negotiations with Israel, which will require concession on refugees' "right of return" to Palestine, and the aspirations of more than 3 million Palestinians who wish to come back to the homes from which they were expelled in the wars of 1948 and 1967.
Arafat's successor as president of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) will be bound by the Oslo Accords, which created an interim government, now headed by Prime Minister Ahmad Qurei, that is responsible for the day-to-day lives of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. Palestinians will have to decide whether to make the position of PNA president a powerful one or merely symbolic, as it now is. The latter option would make Qurei an empowered prime minister, which is what many Palestinians and others want.
The position of the commander of the Palestinian forces supposedly puts the various Palestinian military, security, and intelligence units under one leader, who is expected to ensure the rule of law. But these forces are now in disarray, with most uniformed Palestinian security agencies needing to be reorganized after four years of intensive effort by Israel to crush them.
The key factor in internal security is local paramilitary units. These units, most of which are not controlled by the PNA's central leadership, are more loyal to grassroots figures than to uniformed PNA officers. Local Fatah leaders like Marwan Barghouti have tremendous power over the nationalist armed units that are loosely organized under the title of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades.
Barghouti advocated and was trying to implement internal Fatah elections when the Israelis arrested him. As a street leader who was elected as the head of the Bir Zeit University student council, he gained legitimacy by being chosen by his peers. When the Oslo process began, he refused to accept any official position within the Palestinian Authority, choosing instead to remain close to the local Fatah cadres. Whoever fills Arafat's shoes will need to make sure that these brigades are satisfied that their status, demands, and leaders are respected.
Indeed, the power struggle that will ensue in the post-Arafat era will ultimately center on Al Fatah, the backbone of the PLO. A worldwide assembly chooses Fatah's 100-member revolutionary council, which in turn elects a 20-member central committee, where most of the power struggle will take place. Many young street leaders will insist on an emergency meeting of the revolutionary council, or even holding the sixth general assembly (which would be the first since 1988). Events in recent months show that the Al Asqa Martyrs' Brigades have forced even Arafat to take their demands into consideration.
While much of the power struggle will take place within the nationalist camp, one must not overlook the Islamist camp led by Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Although the Islamists are unlikely to interfere in the post-Arafat power struggle, they will not sit idly by if the new leadership moves in what they consider the wrong direction.
Of course, the new leadership will have to reach some agreement with the Islamists regarding the rules of the game, both domestically and vis-a-vis Israel. Without such an agreement, and if the new leadership cracks down hard on the Islamists, a violent civil war could erupt.
Most importantly, in order to consolidate his leadership, the next Palestinian leader must make some hard decisions and show some tangible results quickly. The experience of the first Palestinian prime minister, who resigned largely because of his inability to deliver any improvements to his people -- particularly personal and collective security, the rule of law, and an end to chaos in Palestinian areas -- remains fresh in the public's memory.
At the same time, a freeze on settlement activities, release of Palestinian political prisoners ? including Marwan Barghouti -- and the removal of the hundreds of checkpoints between Palestinian cities would revive a feeling of hope, without which no Palestinian leader can negotiate what the world wants: a peace settlement.
The problem is that no Palestinian leader, no matter who he is, can deliver these changes. They represent a direct challenge to the Israeli occupiers, neighboring Arab countries, and the international community, led by the US.
Daoud Kuttab is the director of the Institute of Modern Media at Al Quds University in Ramallah. Copyright: Project Syndicate
In their recent op-ed “Trump Should Rein In Taiwan” in Foreign Policy magazine, Christopher Chivvis and Stephen Wertheim argued that the US should pressure President William Lai (賴清德) to “tone it down” to de-escalate tensions in the Taiwan Strait — as if Taiwan’s words are more of a threat to peace than Beijing’s actions. It is an old argument dressed up in new concern: that Washington must rein in Taipei to avoid war. However, this narrative gets it backward. Taiwan is not the problem; China is. Calls for a so-called “grand bargain” with Beijing — where the US pressures Taiwan into concessions
The term “assassin’s mace” originates from Chinese folklore, describing a concealed weapon used by a weaker hero to defeat a stronger adversary with an unexpected strike. In more general military parlance, the concept refers to an asymmetric capability that targets a critical vulnerability of an adversary. China has found its modern equivalent of the assassin’s mace with its high-altitude electromagnetic pulse (HEMP) weapons, which are nuclear warheads detonated at a high altitude, emitting intense electromagnetic radiation capable of disabling and destroying electronics. An assassin’s mace weapon possesses two essential characteristics: strategic surprise and the ability to neutralize a core dependency.
Chinese President and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Chairman Xi Jinping (習近平) said in a politburo speech late last month that his party must protect the “bottom line” to prevent systemic threats. The tone of his address was grave, revealing deep anxieties about China’s current state of affairs. Essentially, what he worries most about is systemic threats to China’s normal development as a country. The US-China trade war has turned white hot: China’s export orders have plummeted, Chinese firms and enterprises are shutting up shop, and local debt risks are mounting daily, causing China’s economy to flag externally and hemorrhage internally. China’s
During the “426 rally” organized by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party under the slogan “fight green communism, resist dictatorship,” leaders from the two opposition parties framed it as a battle against an allegedly authoritarian administration led by President William Lai (賴清德). While criticism of the government can be a healthy expression of a vibrant, pluralistic society, and protests are quite common in Taiwan, the discourse of the 426 rally nonetheless betrayed troubling signs of collective amnesia. Specifically, the KMT, which imposed 38 years of martial law in Taiwan from 1949 to 1987, has never fully faced its
RSS