Palestinian Normalization -- With Hamas, Not Israel - By Bassam Tawil - http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/article.cfm?recent_news_id=1674#llRY50P1GdC00QsP.99
When Palestinian women took part in a march with Israeli women for peace this week, they were condemned in the harshest terms by many other Palestinians, who called for their punishment.
The Palestinian women who participated in the October 8 event, organized by a group called Women Wage Peace, have been denounced by many of their own people as and "traitors" and "whores."
Conversely, when Palestinian Authority (PA) officials held "reconciliation" talks with Hamas leaders in the Gaza Strip and Egypt during the same period, many Palestinians praised them as "heroes" and "brave."
Judging from the reactions of many Palestinians, especially on social media, they prefer peace with Hamas rather than with Israel.
The thousands of Palestinian women who participated in the march with Israeli women are being accused of promoting "normalization" with Israel. This, in the eyes of their critics, is an abhorrent and despicable act, tantamount to "high treason" -- an offense punishable by death.
Prior to the women's march, Palestinian activists waged an online bid to stop the Palestinian women from taking part in the "shameful" event. It was a vicious campaign that lasted for several days and that accused the Palestinian women of treason for promoting "normalization" with the "Israeli enemy."
One group, The Women's Campaign for Boycotting Israeli Merchandise, said in a statement that the planned march was "hurtful to Palestinian and Arab and international efforts to boycott and isolate Israel." The group pointed out that the march coincided with a "Zionist-imperialist onslaught to undermine the Palestinian national project."
Exactly which "Zionist-imperialist" conspiracy these protesters are referring to remains unclear.
Such rhetoric, however, reflects the mindset in the Arab and Islamic world. The most widespread conspiracy theory, which has been floating around for decades and can be heard in almost every coffee shop on the streets of Cairo, Amman, Ramallah and Beirut, is that Zionist Jews, together with American capitalists and imperialists, have a secret plan to take control over the Arab and Islamic countries and their resources.
What does a peaceful march of Israeli and Palestinian women have to do with Zionism and imperialism? How exactly are the "Zionists and imperialists" trying to "undermine" the Palestinian "national project"?
And what, precisely, is this project? Is it the project of Hamas and many other Palestinians that seeks the destruction of Israel? Is it the project that still talks about a phased plan to destroy Israel by demanding a Palestinian state next to Israel so that it would be used in the future as a launching pad to eliminate Israel?
Palestinian and Arab leaders have long advanced anti-Israel, anti-Jewish and anti-Western conspiracy theories. Why do these leaders do so? For one purpose: distraction.
The corrupt Arab and Palestinian leaders spread such rumors to divert attention from problems at home, such as corruption and dictatorship. These leaders want their people too busy hating Jews and Westerners to demand reform, democracy and transparency from their leaders. Those valuables, of course, are what Arab and Palestinian leaders still refuse to offer their people.
Back to the controversial women's march.
The abusive comments hurled against the Palestinian women who took part in the march are frankly embarrassing to read. Even the PLO committee that permitted the participation of the Palestinian women in the march is being pilloried by many Palestinians, with some calling for holding the PLO officials involved accountable.
The verbal abuse is reminiscent of the experience of teenage Palestinian girls who recently participated in a summer camp with Israeli girls in the US. The Palestinian girls endured a massive smear campaign for attending the summer camp, which was organized by Creativity for Peace, an organization in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Like the women from the march, the teenage girls were also cursed on social media and dubbed as "sluts" and "traitors." The abuse reached the parents of the Palestinian girls, for allowing their daughters to commit the sin of dancing and mixing with Israeli (Jewish) girls. The girls, like the women, were also accused of promoting "normalization" with Israel.
Sadly, only a handful of Palestinians have thus far dared to come out in defense of the summer camp girls or the women who participated in the October 8 march.
While many Palestinians may be opposed to the brutal and senseless attacks on the girls and women, they are terrified of voicing their views in public. No one wants to get targeted by the abusers, especially if some of these people are affiliated with terror groups such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Palestinians have an unfortunate habit of allowing thugs and terrorists to intimidate them, control the discourse and set the agenda. This is certainly not new. Most Palestinians prefer to sit on the fence instead of speaking their minds. This is what happens when you live under ruthless dictatorships such as the Palestinian Authority and Hamas that suppress freedom of expression.
Yet this most recent exhibit has an ironic twist. Just as the women were shamed publicly for taking part in an event with Jewish women, many Palestinians were celebrating the "reconciliation" between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas.
Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip took to the streets to express their jubilation over the "accord," and when the PA Prime Minister and his delegation arrived in the Gaza Strip from the West Bank, scenes of kissing and hugging were easy to spot.
What does all this teach us?
First, that many Palestinians continue to consider any form of contact with Jews and "normalization" with the "Zionist entity" an act of treason.
Second, that Palestinians do not hesitate to designate their own women as prostitutes and traitors for engaging in the most basic activities with Jews. Such disrespect for women is not, by the way, something that should surprise us about conservative Arab and Islamic societies.
Third, that for many Palestinians, the priority remains making peace with Hamas and not Israel. Why do they prefer peace with Hamas? Because they identify with Hamas's dream of destroying Israel and killing Jews. It may be an unpleasant a truth, but that is the bottom line.
Israel asks US to plumb real motive behind Sisi-sponsored Palestinian talks -
Israel was startled by the Egyptian president's comment that the Palestinian reconciliation process he is brokering would lead to peace with Israel.
Abdel Fatteh El-Sisi put it this way in an interview on Sunday, Oct. 8: "The Egyptian moves aimed at helping the Palestinian brothers to start a new stage of unity of the Palestinian ranks would pave the way for a just peace between Palestine and Israel." He defined his goal as being: "The establishment of an independent Palestinian state to meet the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people for a secure, stable and prosperous life."
El-Sisi added no further details, but he said enough to finally rattle the Netanyahu government. The Palestinian reconciliation process was clearly intruding on terrain that properly belonged to negotiations with Israel. Jerusalem's policy of standing aside from Cairo's efforts to broker the internal Palestinian rift between |Hamas and Fatah had left Israel without a say in the process as it advanced. It was becoming clear that Cairo was no longer briefing Israel, despite its promises to do so, on the directions to which Egyptian intelligence officials were leading the Palestinian negotiations for burying the hatchet. (On Oct. 3, DEBKAfile warned that Israel would pay a price for standing aloof from the process.)
The Netanyahu government had finally begun appreciating that trusting the Egyptians with closed eyes might lead to untoward circumstances and loss of control. The Trump administration was therefore asked to find out what was going on. As a result Jason Greenblatt, the president's special envoy for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, is due to arrive in Cairo Monday, Oct. 9, to ask the Egyptians what they are up to.
That is why the round of Cairo talks between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas was put back - albeit by just one day - from Monday to Tuesday.
The Trump administration was also taken by surprise by the direction indicated in the Sisi interview. His mediation effort was perceived in Washington as designed to remove the meddling hands of Iran, Turkey and Qatar from the Gaza Strip. The Egyptian effort was now revealing a quite different motivation.
Hamas negotiators, too, are preparing to land a couple of surprises on the next round of talks in Cairo. DEBKAfile has received exclusive information on this nature of those surprises. They are clearly ploys to "pave the way for a just peace between Palestine and Israel," in keeping with the Egyptian president's words Sunday, while at the same time not giving an inch on their interests.
Hamas will give Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and the Egyptian mediators a pledge to rescind its claim to representation in the future Palestinian unity government. In the absence of Hamas ministers, Israel will have no grounds for refusing to deal with a Palestinian administration which has no terrorist component.
Hamas will also promise not to run as a movement against Abbas' Fatah party in future elections to the presidency and parliament when it is called by the Palestinian Authority. Hamas is offering to establish a new party under a new name - such as the "Palestinian Justice Front" - for its adherents to elect, and assure Abbas and his party of victory in a general election.
By these stratagems, the extremist Hamas movement places itself on the road to achieving its two main objectives: One is to hand over full budgetary responsibility for administrating the Gaza Strip to the Palestinian Authority and Abbas; and other is to preserve the operational autonomy of its armed wing and arsenal.
Palestinian unity deal signed - but partial -
Gaza's Rafah crossing passes from Hamas to the Palestinian Authority on Nov. 1; the enclave's central administration - on Dec. 1
The Egyptian-brokered deal hailed by Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas as "the end of the rift," is cautiously seen in Cairo as a partial resolution of the dispute between the Fatah and Hamas rival factions.
The reconciliation accord was announced at dawn Thursday, Oct 10, by Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh after night-long negotiations at the Egyptian intelligence ministry in Cairo. The promised news conference at which details of the agreement were to be revealed by Egyptian mediators and Palestinian officials did not take place.
Egyptian sources reveal that seven points of agreement were hammered out:
The two Palestinian parties will meet in one month to set out the date and modalities for elections to the presidency and parliament.
Before then, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas will spend a few days in the Gaza Strip, his first visit there in a decade since Hamas ousted his Fatah party in a military coup..
A joint Palestinian Authority-Hamas commission will determine procedures for the merger of the PA and Gaza governing administrations. The future of the 60,000 people employed by the Gaza administration must also be decided.
In the next two weeks, Hamas will transfer into Egyptian hands control of the Rafah border crossing from the Gaza Strip to Egyptian Sinai.
The Palestinian Authority will take charge of the Rafah crossing from Egyptian officials - not directly from Hamas.
Up until the parties come to terms on Gaza Strip's electricity bill - which the Palestinian Authority has refused to cover for months - Egypt and Israel will provide the enclave with fuel for running the grid.
The main sticking point in the reconciliation process - control of Hamas' armed wing and arsenal - appears to have been left out of the deal signed Thursday. Hamas has consistently objected to foregoing or sharing control of its militia. Non-Egyptian sources report that the Palestinian Authority is to deploy 30,000 members of its security battalions to the Gaza Strip, but make no mention of coordination between the two forces. Cairo does not refer to this question.
Hamas, which calls for Israel's destruction, has fought three wars with the Jewish state and its armed wing is designated a terrorist group by Israel, the US, the European Union and other powers.
Israel has said it will not deal with a Palestinian government that contains Hamas ministers.
Hamas, Fatah, sign full reconciliation agreement -
PA to assume full control of Gaza Strip by December under agreement signed in Egypt.
The Hamas terror organization and Fatah faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization signed an agreement Thursday on ending a decade-long split following talks mediated by Egypt in Cairo, with Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas calling it a "final" accord.
Under the agreement, the Palestinian Authority is to resume full control of the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip by December 1, according to a statement from Egypt's government.
Abbas welcomed the deal in comments to AFP and said he considered it a "final agreement to end the division" -- though many details remain to be resolved and previous reconciliation attempts have repeatedly failed.
It was signed in Cairo by new Hamas deputy leader Salah al-Aruri and Azzam al-Ahmad, the head of the Fatah delegation for the talks, at the headquarters of Egypt's intelligence service, which oversaw the negotiations.
Celebrations broke out in the Gaza Strip after the announcement of the deal, with residents waving flags of Egypt, the PA, Fatah and Hamas.
Negotiations are now expected to be held on forming a unity government, with the various Palestinian Arab political movements invited to another meeting in Cairo on November 21.
An official from Abbas's Fatah movement said the PA chairman was planning to soon travel to the Gaza Strip as part of the unity bid in what would be his first visit in a decade.
Sanctions taken by Abbas against Hamas-controlled Gaza will also soon be lifted, the Fatah official said.
The deal includes 3,000 members of the Palestinian Authority's police force redeploying to Gaza, a member of the negotiating team told AFP on condition of anonymity.
The figure is however a fraction of the more than 20,000 police officers employed separately by Hamas.
Another party to the negotiations, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the agreement would see Palestinian Authority forces take control of the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt.
One of the key issues has been punitive measures taken by Abbas against Gaza in recent months, including reducing electricity payments that left the territory's residents with only a few hours of power a day.
"All the measures taken recently will end very shortly," Zakaria al-Agha, a senior Fatah leader in the Gaza Strip, told AFP.
The two sides had been meeting in the Egyptian capital this week with the aim of ending the crippling decade-old split between the rival factions.
Hamas seized Gaza from Fatah in a near civil war in 2007 and the two factions have been at loggerheads ever since. Multiple previous reconciliation efforts have failed.
Egypt has been keen to improve security in the Sinai Peninsula which borders Gaza and where jihadist rebels have fought a long-running insurgency.
An Egyptian source close to the talks said intelligence chief Khaled Fawzi had followed the negotiations closely.
Last month, Hamas agreed to cede civil power in Gaza to the Palestinian Authority but the fate of its vast military wing remains a significant issue for the two sides.
Islamist movement Hamas is blacklisted as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union.
It has fought three wars with Israel since 2008 and the Gaza Strip has seen deteriorating humanitarian conditions.
Faced with increasing isolation and a severe electricity shortage, Hamas has reached out to Egypt for help, hoping to have the Rafah border opened.
The crossing has remained largely closed in recent years.
Egypt has also agreed to provide fuel to the Gaza Strip for electricity generation.
In return, Cairo pressed Hamas to move forward on reconciliation with Fatah.
Previous attempts at reconciliation have repeatedly failed, and many analysts are treating the latest bid with caution, waiting to see if actual change will occur on the ground.
Last week, Palestinian Authority prime minister Rami Hamdallah visited Gaza for the first time since 2015 and his ministers took formal control of government departments in the territory.
But the move was seen as mainly symbolic, with Hamas still effectively in charge in the enclave of two million people bordered by Egypt, Israel and the Mediterranean Sea.
One of the key sticking points will be the fate of Hamas's 25,000-strong military wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades.
Reconciliation could also pose a dilemma for international efforts to reach an Arab-Israeli peace deal since Hamas has not recognized Israel and continues to call for the Jewish State's destruction.
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