Friday April 1, 2005

I've Been Thinking:

Anarchy now reigns in the Palestinian Authority.
Tawfik Tirawi resigned yesterday. This is cataclysmic!

Tirawi is the head of PA West Bank Intelligence. He quit because of anarchy and an inability to control the situation. He claims his underlings are not following through, he says that he receives no support from Abbas.
But Tirawi was one of Abbas' most trusted and closest advisors.

As part of the deal with Israel for regaining Palestinian control in certain cities - like Jericho and Tul Karum - the PA accepted the condition that they disarm and register those people that Israel called terrorists and Israel would refrain from "targeting" those individuals. This has yet to happen.

Is it possible that Abbas does not want to move ahead? Possible that he prefers this status of anarchy to an ordered and safe democratic society?
I think Abbas is afraid. I think he is scared to act. He must disarm the hooligans and the thugs, but disarming means shedding Palestinian blood.

When you become prime minister it comes with a price.
Abbas had to know full well that restructuring Palestinian society would cost the lives of some people. You can't do the job of prime minister and play chicken. If he does not succeed in squashing those thugs who are turning his Authority into anarchy, he will have a thug-run racket in every Palestinian city and he, the prime minister, will end up a corrupt politician paying the thugs "collection."

The going's on in the Palestinian Authority is beginning to remind of a child's tale -- the Emperor's New Clothes.