Palestinians Need a New Leader

The Palestinians are poised for a revolution. And I am not referring to the war of resistance that has been going on against Israel since 1948. The new revolution--whose seeds were sown in the ill-fated Oslo Accords of 1993--will not be targeted at Israel. It will be against Yasser Arafat and his Palestinian National Authority (PNA).

Arafat has exhausted the patience of Palestinians from all walks of life--it is no longer only the more radical elements who consider Arafat a traitor. Allegations of high-level corruption and mishandling of funds abound throughout the West Bank and Gaza. According to a recent United Nations report, the Palestinian economy suffered a loss of $1.15 billion over the first four months of the uprising and is on the brink of financial ruin. Although the uprising itself exacted an enormous financial toll, it is widely believed that Arafat's autocratic handling of Palestinian finances has greatly exacerbated the situation.

Such failings may have been forgiven if Arafat had been able to deliver in the political arena. But after 33 years in power, all Arafat could bring the Palestinian people were an ambiguous set of treaties known as the Oslo Accords. Hailed in the West as a breakthrough, the Oslo Accords--which reaped Nobel Peace Prizes for Arafat and his Israeli counterparts--left the Palestinians worse off than ever before. The agreements virtually conceded that Palestinian refugees would give up their internationally-recognized human right to return to their homes--the right for which they had been fighting since 1948. Despite this concession, nothing was said about the 2,000 Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli prisons--many of whom have undergone various forms of torture and most of whom are being held without trial. And while the accords called for limited withdrawal of Israeli troops from some Palestinian territories, the Israeli military held absolute authority to re-deploy troops in the West Bank if it felt it was necessary--a right which it has not hesitated to use in recent months.

But Arafat's biggest failure may have been his inability to garner any kind of sympathy for the Palestinian cause outside of the Muslim world. Few people in the West aside from ultra-liberals champion the cause of the Palestinians, and even fewer support Arafat himself.

In fairness to Arafat, he may have the toughest job in the world: He must answer to the Arab world and the West--two sides whose expectations are drastically different. And in recent years, he has made an honest effort to strike that fine balance between revolutionary and moderate. He has renounced terrorism, and contrary to the wishes of many Palestinian and Arab leaders, he recognized Israel's right to existence and right to security. During the latter half of his career, he has been a staunch advocate of compromise and diplomacy. But the Western world does not think of him in this way: It remembers the Arafat of yesteryear--the one who could be linked to terrorist attacks in the 1970s and the one who associated with Saddam Hussein during the Gulf War.

Although Arafat may have made a genuine effort to appeal to both sides, the fact remains that he has failed on both counts. To the West, he is an extremist who would not agree to the Clinton-Barak peace proposal. To an increasing number of Arabs and Muslims, he is a spineless tool of the enemy who conceded to the Oslo Accords and who refused to allow the PNA police force to protect Palestinian children even as they were being mowed down by professional Israeli soldiers and helicopter gunships.

Those who argue that the Palestinians' real problem is not Arafat but rather a pitiless Israeli government are not wrong. However, they overlook the harsh reality of the situation. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is an asymmetric confrontation between the most powerful nation in the Middle East and the weakest. Any attempt to face up to Israel using violence will only bring more severe repercussions for the Palestinians--a truth to which the death toll can attest.

The Palestinians need a leader who can convince a beleaguered and impatient people that the path to emancipation lies not through violence, and who can convince the rest of the world that the Palestinian cause is worthy of its support.

Sound like a daunting task? It will be difficult, but history has shown that it is not impossible. In the 20th century, there were many such struggles in which a weaker group fought for its fundamental human rights and a dominant group violently resisted the assertion of those rights. Pre-partition India, pre-Civil-Rights-Act America and apartheid South Africa are examples that bear resemblance to the case at hand. And in each of these cases, the sympathy of the outside world eventually tipped in favor of the oppressed. But in India, America and South Africa the oppressed group was led by a leader--Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Nelson Mandela, respectively--who won the respect of his adversaries and who held the undivided loyalty of his people.

Arafat may be a Nobel laureate, but he is no Mandela. He is not associated with peace. He is not charismatic. He has the respect neither of his people nor of his adversaries. He has had his turn and now must have the courage to realize that the Palestinian struggle would be better served by someone else.

It might be unrealistic to hope that a Gandhi, an MLK or a Mandela will step forth from the Palestinian ranks, but we will never know as long as Arafat continues to cling to his autocratic regime. If I am wrong and if Arafat truly does speak for the Palestinian people, then let him re-affirm his legitimacy with a democratic election. The international community, including both Western and Arab countries, must pressure the PNA to take the question to the people. And if Arafat refuses to yield to democracy, then the world must embrace a popular Palestinian movement. Arafat's unchecked monopoly on power has endured far too long and his people have suffered because of it.

Nader R. Hasan '02 is a government concentrator in Lowell House. His column appears on alternate Wednesdays.