Towards a Solid National Unity

 

The National Unity Committee was one of several committees created by the Palestinian National Council in its session last April and charged with making preparations for statehood. However, the decision of the Council to create the committees was not taken seriously, and the committees were not activated in June as scheduled. Thus, the Palestinian National Council was not actually able to fill the legal vacuum left by the expiration of the interim agreement on May 4. This fact reflects negatively on the state of our national unity and on the working groups of the PLO, which all too often are called to meet on some issue, and then never reconvened or consulted again on the matter.

After the fall of Netenyahu, some in the Palestinian leadership thought that the declaration of statehood ought to be postponed until Baraks government had fulfilled its obligations under the Wye River Memorandum. The assumption was that the Palestinian National Council would then meet to endorse the decision taken earlier to declare statehood. However, Barak disappointed those who pinned their hopes on any quick fulfillment of his commitments.

The resulting crisis, with Baraks threatening to switch from the Palestinian to the Syrian track, dramatically changed the situation of the Palestinian factions in Damascus. Syrians were showing commitment to the peace process, and doing so required ending the appearance of an aggressive Palestinian presence in Syria. Syrian officials thus instructed some factions to rearrange their agendas to suit the new situation, since Syria could hardly support talk of armed struggle while simultaneously moving toward a peace agreement. The Palestinian factions were asked to transform themselves into bodies with explicitly non-military aims. Factions such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) realized then that the situation called for change. Previous anti-peace process slogans would have to go if these groups were to play any part at all in the final-status talks. The changed stand by these groups is a welcome answer to a call by Fateh to all other factions to participate in these talks. New initiatives for national unity are now needed, based on a specific program. The important thing at this point is not to criticize past actions, but to act together to bring about the best possible solution for the future. Moving within the national consensus, we may now begin the national dialogue aimed at solidifying national unity.

National unity is not merely a concept. It is a tool Palestinians can use to accelerate their struggle to achieve their goals to end the occupation and to establish a free and independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

The national unity session which was held in Ramallah on August 31 was an extension of other sessions which were held before the National Council was convened and which have continued during the past four months twice weekly. Those who have participated have issued several statements to the Palestinian people and several memos also to Palestinian Authority president and PLO chairman Yasser Arafat calling for activation of the committees created by the Palestinian National Council, and especially the National Unity Committee, which was to be headed by Abu Al-Adeeb (who is also head of the Palestinian National Council).

The session took place to provide support for the as-yet dormant National Unity Committee, the specific task of which was to put together a comprehensive blueprint of the means for actualizing the declaration of independence. The session agenda was aimed to promote the conduct of the national unity dialogue, with special reference to its content and mechanisms for conducting it. The resulting discussion attempted to achieve the following:

1. To activate and develop the PLO and its agencies on a democratic basis, to reinforce their role as legitimate representatives of our people, wherever they may be, and to show concern for the role of the Central Council to ensure sovereignty.

2. To increase active participation so that it involves all sectors of the Palestinian people, popular agencies, and unions in a way that strengthens the role of civil society.

3. To specify the boundaries of the national consensus so that no one oversteps them in final status negotiations, and to adopt all resolutions of international legality, including UN Resolutions 242 and 338, as well as the principle of land for peace.

4. To activate the role of the Executive Committee in the final status negotiations and to form a higher committee to supervise all final status issues taking into account experts of all specializations as the issues require.

5. To specify a new negotiating strategy for the final status negotiations. This strategy should include other options to keep the Israelis from stifling the negotiations.

6. Not to implementation of the interim agreements to be merged with the final status talks, to insist on the release of all prisoners and on withdrawal from all occupied territories as specified in the Wye Memo, and to reject any Israeli attempt to impose a new declaration of principles for the final status talks.

7. To emphasize the principle of reciprocity on the basis of the principle of land for peace. There will be no peace without Israeli withdrawal from all the occupied territories. We must confront the policy of building and expanding settlements, since their existence affects the issue not only of peace, but of security as well.

8. To ensure the participation of our people here and in the Diaspora in witnessing the negotiation of final status issues. Public referendums should be held, not only on the results of the negotiations, but also at certain points during the conduct of the negotiations. The Palestinian negotiating team must clearly feel the seriousness of their work and know that they will be held responsible for the results.

The national unity we seek should embody the principles of democracy, political plurality and the sovereignty of law. It should be the kind of unity that makes Arab and international support more effective in tilting the balance of power toward the justice of the Palestinian cause. Agreement on the importance of the sovereignty of law will help us distinguish between detention for political reasons and detention for illegal acts. Finally, our national unity will emphasize the need for freedom of expression and for ending the practice of political detention.

The power we will gain through national unity is the sharpest weapon we can have in our arsenal to achieve victory.

Revolution until victory!