Grassroots International Speakers Analyze Palestinian Autonomy

by Katherine M. Metres

"Between Occupation and Autonomy: Eyewitness Account from Palestine" was the title of a Feb. 22 presentation by Professor Marie Kennedy of the University of Massachusetts, Boston and Nuhad Jamal of Grassroots International. Speaking at New York University's Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies, the eyewitnesses reported that, despite the peace process, Palestine is still the scene of much injustice.

Kennedy and Jamal visited Palestine as members of a September 1995 fact-finding delegation of Grassroots International, a Boston-area non-governmental organization (NGO) that supports several Palestinian "partner" NGOs. While Jamal is a native Palestinian, it was Kennedy's first trip to the country and she said she was shocked to see the scale of abuses still taking place there. "Some of us found ourselves wondering," she said, "is this autonomy or a large concentration camp?"

Using slides, Kennedy and Jamal focused on two of the outstanding issues between Israel and the Palestinians,settlements and sovereignty,and discussed the difficult work of NGOs in this period.

"In spite of the partial freeze on settlements extracted from former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir by former U.S. President George Bush, existing settlements are expanding and new ones are everywhere," Kennedy said. The partial freeze excepted Greater Jerusalem, the Jordan Valley, expropriations for "security purposes," which are often later made available for Jewish settlement, and "public land",usually land previously expropriated from Palestinians. All in all, 40 percent of the Gaza Strip and 60 percent of the West Bank remain under Israeli control, with 80 to 85 percent of the water of those areas diverted to Israel and its settlements. "By the time final-status negotiations begin, there will be little to negotiate over," Kennedy commented.

She noted that settlements are being carefully sited next to Palestinian villages to prevent the latter from expanding. Israel controls Palestinian building in Greater Jerusalem, most of which is Palestinian territory carved out of the West Bank, by issuing permits that cost three times the price of building a house. A house constructed without a permit is liable to be demolished.

The delegation visited a Palestinian home in Hebron next door to a house constructed by Jewish settlers. To build their house, the settlers had destroyed ten rooms of the Palestinian home. To add insult to injury, the settlers threw their garbage onto their neighbors' property and blasted music and propaganda toward the devout Palestinian Muslims at all times, but especially at prayer times.

In a remark that now seems prescient given the fact that two Hebron-area men committed suicide terror bombings just days after the New York presentation, Kennedy said, "I marveled at the restraint of the Palestinians. The wonder is not that there is any violence; the wonder is that there is not more."

Visiting the Ibrahimi mosque where 29 Palestinian worshippers were murdered at prayer by American-born Jewish settler Baruch Goldstein in February 1994, the delegation learned of subsequent killings that same day of 10 Palestinians by Israeli soldiers "who continued to shoot at those who were trying to flee the mosque, at those who were evacuating the wounded, and at those who had gathered at the hospital in order to find out about their loved ones and donate blood" (News From Within, 3/94).

When she questioned an Israeli soldier about measures to protect Palestinian civilians from settler violence, Kennedy was told, "The Palestinians are the perpetrators of violence; they don't need protection."

Entering the Gaza Strip, Kennedy and Jamal perceived a more relaxed atmosphere. In contrast to the tense and ultra-conservative Gaza of the intifada years, now visitors are greeted warmly by Palestinian police at the Eretz border, and ordinary folks sit outside, socialize, go to the beach, and throw big weddings. Many women eschew the head scarf and are active in public life. With cooperation from international donors, the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) is developing parks for tourism.

But tourists will not go to beaches into which open sewers still run, Kennedy pointed out. She said Gaza's infrastructure (construction, sewage, garbage, clean water) needs urgent attention, yet donor aid goes mostly for the police, bureaucracy, and "quick fix" work. Israel compounds the problem by restricting the importation into Gaza of construction materials. And many of the people sitting outside socializing have no other choice: As a result of the frequent closures of the border with Israel, laborers who used to work there have fallen on hard times. Unemployment has soared to 60 percent.

Although the Palestinians of Gaza have greater freedom of internal movement under autonomy, Kennedy says resource distribution still looks like "apartheid." Jewish settlers have 84 times the land and 16 times the water per capita as Palestinian residents,most of whom are descendents of refugees who were driven by Zionist troops in 1948 from their homes in present-day Israel to make way for the Jewish state.

Sovereignty often is discussed in terms of political independence. While statehood is crucial for Palestine to assume a normal place in the international community, economic sovereignty would make a bigger difference in people's welfare. The Palestinian autonomous regions not only suffer from underdevelopment, they also are trapped in an economic relationship with Israel that, while potentially mutually beneficial, is currently hamstrung by Israel's unwillingness to give up control and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's inadequate attention to the issue.

Under the Oslo accords, Israel retained all authority over agriculture and trade. The Palestinian Agricultural Relief Committee, a partner of Grassroots International that provides technical assistance to farmers in the West Bank and Gaza, informed Kennedy that Palestinian farmers are not allowed to export produce to Israel or to place duties on Israeli goods. In attempting to cultivate a new crop, the Committee had to import low-quality seedlings from Israel. And even if the prohibition on exporting to Israel were lifted, the Palestinians would be unable to compete with Israeli farmers, who receive free land, water and fertilizer from the state.

Since they are prohibited from exporting to Israel, can West Bankers trade with their counterparts in the Gaza Strip? Theoretically, yes, said Kennedy. In practice, however, the three unloadings between the West Bank and Gaza that are required for security, and a wait of up to three days at the Israeli border can cause produce to spoil before it arrives.

In spite of all these obstacles, there appears no way but forward with the peace process. Palestinian society, ideally with international support, must "take up the slow task of building a people's democracy," said Kennedy. She promised Palestinians that Grassroots International,of which she is a board member, will support their democratic struggle. "We're in this for the long term," she said.

Nuhad Jamal elaborated on the work of Grassroots' Palestinian partners. The Democracy and Workers' Rights Center is working for compensation for Palestinian wage earners who have never received any benefits in return for the 22 percent tax deducted from their wages by the Israeli government. Estimating that $3 billion has been pilfered in this way, the Center's legal staff has won for its clients $1 million in compensation so far. It also is organizing workers' committees eventually to replace the factionalized and unrepresentative General Federation of Trade Unions.

The Women's Center for Legal Aid and Counseling, in addition to advising women in cities and remote villages alike, is preparing recommendations on Palestinian personal status law reforms that could enhance women's legal status in marriage, divorce and inheritance. A third organization, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, was founded by Raji Sourani. Sourani was arrested by the PNA and fired from his previous job as head of the Gaza Center for Rights and Law after he condemned PNA human rights abuses that included torture and death in custody, censorship and harassment of journalists, and the restriction of due process rights in security courts.

Jamal noted that Palestinian NGOs currently are in a precarious position. Most of the funds they formerly received from abroad now go to the PNA. Further, PNA laws on the status of NGOs in Palestine are making them weak and dependent.

Commenting on the peace process, Jamal lauded the recent Palestinian elections, in which the overwhelming majority of eligible voters participated, as "an exercise of self-determination" rare in the Middle East. Nonetheless, she is concerned that Israeli soldiers can redeploy in the autonomous areas at will. She further observed that the purpose and powers of the newly elected Palestinian Council are unclear. It can pass no laws on refugees, security, foreign policy, settlers, or borders, and Israel can veto any laws it passes.

"Far from presaging independence," she said, "the Oslo agreements are a Palestinian concession that occupation can go on." Even if final-status negotiations end the occupation once and for all, will the Palestinians be freer or more prosperous as a result? Jamal is pessimistic. "Many Palestinians are concerned that the PNA will continue on its present course to becoming another Arab dictatorship," she said.

We in the international community must do everything we can to support Palestinian civil society and its democratic institutions. They are the hope of Palestine.