Israel’s Withdrawal From the Gaza Strip and Palestinian Politics

Palestinian politics has been dominated by the conflict with Israel since the latter’s foundation in 1948, as the Israelis dispossessed the Palestinians from their homeland between then and 1967. The basis for the development and continuation of that conflict was that both sides believed that the other side did not have the right to exist, with the Palestinians wanting to regain control of the occupied territories (Hobsbawm, 1994 p. 220). The conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians also led to wars between Israel and the Arab nations, most notably in 1967 and 1973. Israel not only survived such conflicts it had increased its territory through them, the Palestinians were always the biggest losers (Pappe, 2004 p. 223).

Countries such as Egypt, Syria, and Iraq sought to destroy Israel and restore the Palestinians to having control of their own country. However, the anti-Israeli rhetoric of other Arab countries was not met by action after their defeat in 1973. Egypt and Jordan made peace with Israel, whilst the PLO leadership had been scattered and divided after its expulsion from the Lebanon. Yasser Arafat changed strategy to see if the United States could broker a settlement between the PLO and Israel (Pappe, 2004 p. 224).

Palestinian politics was dominated by the desire to regain a nation state of their own, a desire that many people believe remains unfulfilled following the Oslo Accord that led to Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza strip. The PLO presented the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza strip as a significant achievement in its own right. This was due to the Palestinians gaining autonomy for the land that Israel had given up (Fisk, 2006 p.501).

For Yasser Arafat and the PLO leadership the Oslo Accord provided the foundation of a future independent Palestinian state that could peacefully co-exist with Israel. Other Palestinian and Islamic groups such as Hamas and Hizbollah argued that making deals with Israel was a betrayal of the Palestinian people, as well as a betrayal of the Arab nations. In 1994 there seemed little prospect that these groups could end the PLO’s domination of Palestinian politics, or even threaten the peace process (Fisk, 2006 p. 1283).

It was not Palestinians that caused the peace process to falter, a lone Israeli gunman that murdered the Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin brought about changes in Israeli policies towards the Palestinians after 1995 (Raviv, 1998, p.257). Yitzhak Rabin’s successors in general, Benjamin Netanyahu and Ariel Sharon in particular, have been increasingly hard-line in their approach towards the Palestinians placing Israel’s security ahead of the peace process. Hard line measures have included air strikes and ground incursions into the Gaza strip as well as other Palestinian controlled areas. Increased Israeli military activity was both a consequence and cause of Palestinian insurrection against Israel. Israel blamed the Palestinian Authority for failing to stop attacks on Israel, whilst Israel’s retaliation undermined moderates within the PLO. Israel’s military intervention increased support for Hamas and other groups determined to resist or fight the Israelis (Pappe, 2004, p.247). Hamas has won the first democratic elections to gain control of the Palestinian Authority, leading to fighting with the Israeli military and further reducing the possibility of reviving the peace process. Hizbollah’s attacks on Israel from Palestinian territory and the Lebanon prompted the latter’s brief yet bloody incursion into the Lebanon in 2006 (Fisk, 2006 p. 1282).

Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza strip has affected Palestinian politics due to exposing the weaknesses or flaws of the PLO. The PLO from its inception during the 1960s had been anti-Israel and anti-American, yet was not militantly Islamic. As an organisation it has various factions that favour links with different Middle East states and vary in hostility to Israel and the United States (Ross, 2005 p.71). Israel had viewed Yasser Arafat and the PLO as being amongst the biggest threats to its security even launching the 1981 invasion of the Lebanon to destroy the PLO bases there (Ross p.103). The PLO began to regard its position as the main group representing the Palestinian people being undermined from the late 1980s, a trend that contributed to the decision to start the peace process with Israel. The emergence of the intifada or uprising against Israel started without the PLO involvement and led to the formation of Hamas. The PLO was still illegal at that point and suffered from having its main base in Tunis rather than in the occupied territories (Milton-Edwards & Hinchcliffe, 2004 p.29).

The leadership and membership of Hamas is stridently more Islamic than the PLO, and consequently is vehemently opposed to peaceful relations with Israel. The PLO was able at first to retain its primary position within Palestinian politics. The PLO used the intifada to its advantage in terms of gaining concessions from Israel, yet started to lose the support of radical Palestinians to Hamas. Unlike the PLO, Hamas would never settle for gaining control of some of the occupied Palestinian territory. They wanted it all back with the logical conclusion that would involve the end of the Israeli state (Milton-Edwards & Hinchcliffe, 2004 p. 28).

The withdrawal from the Gaza strip by Israel allowed the PLO to gain administrative control of the previously occupied territories. After the Oslo Accord there were no elections for the formation of a Palestinian Authority, which was simply run by the PLO. The PLO gained power and the opportunity to distribute offices, jobs, and salaries amongst its members. The control of the Palestinian authority could have offered long-term benefits, for the PLO had relations with Israel remained peaceful, unfortunately for the PLO those relations soon deteriorated (Raviv, 1998 p.257).

The problem for the PLO was that once it assumed office it was responsible for ensuring that no attacks were made upon Israel from Palestinian territory. The Israelis expected the PLO to do this, as they would find it preferable to the Israeli army staying in the Gaza strip. However, the PLO was resented by Palestinians for attempting to prevent attacks on Israel, whilst the Israelis condemned it for not stopping all the attacks. Israeli military incursions and air strikes against Hamas and PLO targets have undermined Palestinian autonomy in the Gaza strip. Yasser Arafat went from being a peacemaker at the signing of the Oslo Accord to being hunted down by Israel and besieged in his own headquarters. Even after Arafat’s death and the succession of Mahmoud Abbas to its leadership, the PLO remains regarded as being an enemy organisation by Israel. However, it has now lost control of the Palestinian Authority due to losing the elections held in 2006 to Hamas. The United States, whose government hoped that the PLO would gain greater creditability with the Palestinian people, had cajoled Abbas into those elections. Hamas and its allies benefited from the PLO’s failure to resist Israel or to further Palestinian independence (Fisk, 2006 p.1283).

Therefore Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza strip has had effects on Palestinian politics, although not those intended by the Israelis or indeed the PLO. Israel had gained control of the Gaza strip in 1967 and had seemed unlikely to give up any of the occupied territories. The Palestinians did not have control over any of the territories they lived in and were subject to rigorous military controls by Israel. The withdrawal from the Gaza strip was a result of the peace talks between Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin. Israel was trading land for peace with the PLO hoping to gain office and territory. For the PLO the withdrawal of Israel from the Gaza strip was a significant achievement, or so it seemed at the time. However, the Oslo Accord did not satisfy radical Palestinians and it put the PLO in the position of having to safeguard Israeli security. If Yitzhak Rabin had remained as Prime Minister the Oslo Accord may have worked, his death led to the Israelis taking a tougher stance against the Palestinians. The PLO lost support to Hamas through its perceived corruption and the inability to stop Israel’s military incursions in to the Gaza strip. Hamas attracted support amongst Palestinians through its uncompromising opposition to Israel and its radical Islamic beliefs.