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By Micah D. Halpern
November 16, 2004
There is little chance that liberal democracy will succeed in the Palestinian Authority. Not now. Not for a long time.
Am I being pessimistic? No, I am not. I have spent years studying and analyzing the Palestinian people. I'm being rational and realistic. Liberal democracy will not come to the Palestinian people because liberal democracy does not exist in a vacuum, it cannot simply be manufactured or forced on a people. It cannot come into existence in a society that has no history of freedom and no desire to embrace the values that freedoms represent. It cannot exist without leaders promoting it.
The Western world may wish it to happen, but that's not enough. This is no field of dreams. It is the harsh reality of a people that thrives on terror and tumult, that survives through anarchy and fear, that pulses with raw emotion and little rationality. Witness the burial of their leader.
But what about the elections, you ask? Aren't the Palestinian people trying their best to chart a new future by holding new elections? Don't those people now vying for power have a more democratic view of things than did their predecessor? Even if they do -- and I don't think that they do, they will not succeed.
In the best-case scenario, temporary Palestinian leadership and future leadership will be mired in powerlessness. Before anything positive can happen the winners in this election will have to break the logjam of the Arafat legacy, a legacy that demanded that the Palestinian people fight for everything and compromise on nothing. A legacy that most hold dear.
In a worst-case scenario, and this is something of which I am fearful, these elections will represent a cataclysmic backlash against the United States and Israel and destroy any hope, in our lifetimes, for democracy.
As I see it, the new leadership -- it doesn't matter who wins the election or on which side of the internal political fence they sat during Arafat's lifetime -- will curry their messages to the extremist elements. They will choose to campaign for and convince the Palestinian people of how important it is to be strong and not compromise. They will do it because that is the tradition of Arafat.
And that is the kiss of death for any democratic spirit and movement. The less extreme will try to outdo the more extreme and try to cater to the margins, transforming themselves and becoming more extreme, all in a vicious, anti-democratic, unchanged cycle.
They will do this out of fear of being labeled collaborators and traitors.
That policy may save their individual lives but it will also destroy any possibility for change. And make no mistake about it, the lives of future Palestinian leaders are definitely in jeopardy. Witness the brutal murders perpetrated against future leaders at the memorial tent for their leader.
As always, pundits will pontificate. Many will talk about hope and new directions, about new opportunities for peace in the Middle East. There will be debates. Will new leadership bring a new attitude toward the Israelis and the US? Will there be a new orientation toward the return of Palestinian refugees? Will compromise replace intransigence? Some will agree with me, others will not. We?ll see.
For now we know that elections have been declared and new leadership will be selected. We will be able to fill in the blanks with names, to know the whos and the whats, in about two months time. But that's all it will be -- a filling in of blank spaces with interchangeable names and titles -- because attitudes and actions will remain unchanged. Inevitably the new leadership will be the same as the old. The only real change will be a greater -- yes, a greater -- support for Hamas and other even more extremists elements in Palestinian society.
Will things never change? I believe that they will. I believe that one day, a true leader will step in and better the lives of the Palestinian people. But not now. Not for a long time.
When it does happen, the true leader of the Palestinian people will be the person who understands the need for a solvent, independent, economically sound, Western-leaning, Moslem country and is persuasive enough to convince the Palestinian people of this need. Someone not afraid to stand up and say "enough!"
The true leader of the Palestinian people will be the person who succeeds in changing the attitudes of the Palestinian people vis a vis terror, Israel, the United States and Europe.
The true leader of Palestine will be the person who transforms despair and hatred and anguish into hope and leads the way into a future of safety and security. And that, my friends, requires re-educating an entire population. It takes time, it takes patience, it will take generations.
Until then, expect more of the same.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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