Saturday, March 31, 2012

The New Mandela

The New Mandela

 

    Marwan Barghouti and the Third Intifada

 

By Uri Avnery

Counterpunch Weekend Edition

Mar 30-Apr 01, 2012

 

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/03/30/the-new-mandela/

 

Marwan Barghouti has spoken up. After a long silence,

he has sent a message from prison.

 

In Israeli ears, this message does not sound pleasant.

But for Palestinians, and for Arabs in general, it

makes sense.

 

His message may well become the new program of the

Palestinian liberation movement.

 

I FIRST met Marwan in the heyday of post-Oslo optimism.

He was emerging as a leader of the new Palestinian

generation, the home-grown young activists, men and

women, who had matured in the first Intifada.

 

He is a man of small physical stature and large

personality. When I met him, he was already the leader

of Tanzim ("organization"), the youth group of the

Fatah movement.

 

The topic of our conversations then was the

organization of demonstrations and other non-violent

actions, based on close cooperation between the

Palestinians and Israeli peace groups. The aim was

peace between Israel and a new State of Palestine.

 

When the Oslo process died with the assassinations of

Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat, Marwan and his

organization became targets. Successive Israeli leaders

- Binyamin Netanyahu, Ehud Barak and Ariel Sharon -

decided to put an end to the two-state agenda. In the

brutal "Defensive Shield operation (launched by Defense

Minister Shaul Mofaz, the new leader of the Kadima

Party) the Palestinian Authority was attacked, its

services destroyed and many of its activists arrested.

 

Marwan Barghouti was put on trial. It was alleged that,

as the leader of Tanzim, he was responsible for several

"terrorist" attacks in Israel. His trial was a mockery,

resembling a Roman gladiatorial arena more than a

judicial process. The hall was packed with howling

rightists, presenting themselves as "victims of

terrorism". Members of Gush Shalom protested against

the trial inside the court building but we were not

allowed anywhere near the accused.

 

Marwan was sentenced to five life sentences. The

picture of him raising his shackled hands above his

head has become a Palestinian national icon. When I

visited his family in Ramallah, it was hanging in the

living room.

 

IN PRISON, Marwan Barghouti was immediately recognized

as the leader of all Fatah prisoners. He is respected

by Hamas activists as well. Together, the imprisoned

leaders of Fatah and Hamas published several statements

calling for Palestinian unity and reconciliation. These

were widely distributed outside and received with

admiration and respect.

 

(Members of the extended Barghouti family, by the way,

play a major role in Palestinian affairs across the

entire spectrum from moderate to extremist. One of them

is Mustapha Barghouti, a doctor who heads a moderate

Palestinian party with many connections abroad, whom I

regularly meet at demonstrations in Bilin and

elsewhere. I once joked that we always cry when we see

each other - from tear gas. The family has its roots in

a group of villages north of Jerusalem.)

 

NOWADAYS, MARWAN Barghouti is considered the

outstanding candidate for leader of Fatah and president

of the Palestinian Authority after Mahmoud Abbas. He is

one of the very few personalities around whom all

Palestinians, Fatah as well as Hamas, can unite.

 

After the capture of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit,

when the prisoner exchange was discussed, Hamas put

Marwan Barghouti on top of the list of Palestinian

prisoners whose release it demanded. This was a very

unusual gesture, since Marwan belonged to the rival -

and reviled - faction.

 

The Israeli government struck Marwan from the list

right away, and remained adamant. When Shalit was

finally released, Marwan stayed in prison. Obviously he

was considered more dangerous than hundreds of Hamas

"terrorists" with "blood on their hands".

 

Why?

 

Cynics would say: because he wants peace. Because he

sticks to the two-state solution. Because he can unify

the Palestinian people for that purpose. All good

reasons for a Netanyahu to keep him behind bars.

 

SO WHAT did Marwan tell his people this week?

 

Clearly, his attitude has hardened. So, one must

assume, has the attitude of the Palestinian people at

large.

 

He calls for a Third Intifada, a non-violent mass

uprising in the spirit of the Arab Spring.

 

His manifesto is a clear rejection of the policy of

Mahmoud Abbas, who maintains limited but all-important

cooperation with the Israeli occupation authorities.

Marwan calls for a total rupture of all forms of

cooperation, whether economic, military or other.

 

A focal point of this cooperation is the day-to-day

collaboration of the American-trained Palestinian

security services with the Israeli occupation forces.

This arrangement has effectively stopped violent

Palestinian attacks in the occupied territories and in

Israel proper. It guarantees, In practice, the security

of the growing Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

 

Marwan also calls for a total boycott of Israel,

Israeli institutions and products in the Palestinian

territories and throughout the world. Israeli products

should disappear from West Bank shops, Palestinian

products should be promoted.

 

At the same time, Marwan advocates an official end to

the charade called "peace negotiations". This term, by

the way, is never heard anymore in Israel. First it was

replaced with "peace process", then "political

process", and lately "the political matter". The simple

word "peace" has become taboo among rightists and most

"leftists" alike. It's political poison.

 

Marwan proposes to make the absence of peace

negotiations official. No more international talk about

"reviving the peace process", no more rushing around of

ridiculous people like Tony Blair, no more hollow

announcements by Hillary Clinton and Catherine Ashton,

no more empty declarations of the "Quartet". Since the

Israeli government clearly has abandoned the two-state

solution - which it never really accepted in the first

place - keeping up the pretense just harms the

Palestinian struggle.

 

Instead of this hypocrisy, Marwan proposes to renew the

battle in the UN. First, apply again to the Security

Council for the acceptance of Palestine as a member

state, challenging the US to use its solitary veto

openly against practically the whole world. After the

expected rejection of the Palestinian request by the

Council as a result of the veto, request a decision by

the General Assembly, where the vast majority would

vote in favor. Though this would not be binding, it

would demonstrate that the freedom of Palestine enjoys

the overwhelming support of the family of nations, and

isolate Israel (and the US) even more.

 

Parallel to this course of action, Marwan insists on

Palestinian unity, using his considerable moral force

to put pressure on both Fatah and Hamas.

 

TO SUMMARIZE, Marwan Barghouti has given up all hope of

achieving Palestinian freedom through cooperation with

Israel, or even Israeli opposition forces. The Israeli

peace movement is not mentioned anymore.

"Normalization" has become a dirty word.

 

These ideas are not new, but coming from the No. 1

Palestinian prisoner, the foremost candidate for the

succession of Mahmoud Abbas, the hero of the

Palestinian masses, it means a turn to a more militant

course, both in substance and in tone.

 

Marwan remains peace oriented - as he made clear when,

in a rare recent appearance in court, he called out to

the Israeli journalists that he continues to support

the two-state solution. He also remains committed to

non-violent action, having come to the conclusion that

the violent attacks of yesteryear harmed the

Palestinian cause  instead of furthering it.

 

He wants to call a halt to the gradual and unwilling

slide of the Palestinian Authority into a Vichy-like

collaboration, while the expansion of the Israeli

"settlement enterprise" goes on undisturbed.

 

NOT BY accident did Marwan publish his manifesto on the

eve of "Land Day", the world-wide day of protest

against the occupation.

 

"Land Day" is the anniversary of an event that took

place in 1976 to protest against  the decision of the

Israeli government to expropriate huge tracts of Arab-

owned land in Galilee and other parts of Israel. The

Israeli army and police fired on the protesters,

killing six of them. (The day after, two of my friends

and I laid wreaths on the graves of the victims, an act

that earned me an outbreak of hatred and vilification I

have seldom experienced.)

 

Land day was a turning point for Israel's Arab

citizens, and later became a symbol for Arabs

everywhere. This year, the Netanyahu government

threatened  to shoot anybody who even approaches our

borders. It may well be a harbinger for the Third

Intifada heralded by Marwan.

 

For some time now, the world has lost much of its

interest in Palestine. Everything looks quiet.

Netanyahu has succeeded in deflecting world attention

from Palestine to Iran. But in this country, nothing is

ever static. While it seems that nothing is happening,

settlements are growing incessantly, and so is the deep

resentment of the Palestinians who see this happening

before their eyes.

 

Marwan Barghouti's manifesto expresses the near-

unanimous feelings of the Palestinians in the West Bank

and elsewhere. Like Nelson Mandela in apartheid South

Africa, the man in prison may well be more important

than the leaders outside.

___________

 

URI AVNERY is an Israeli writer and peace activist with

Gush Shalom. He is a contributor to CounterPunch's book

The Politics of Anti-Semitism.

 

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