As They Shattered Western Stereotypes, Palestinians Achieved a Sense of Pride and Unity

By Suha Sabbagh

The Palestinian delegation that went to the peace conference in Madrid initiated an unlearning process for images held by Americans about Palestinians. The images include the Palestinian as a terrorist and as a masked stone thrower. They omitted the Palestinian as a professional, although the rate of Palestinian university graduates equals that of Great Britain. The message conveyed by the new image is that Palestinians are "more like us." Therefore, they possibly deserve what they clearly want, which are the things Americans take for granted: the right to an education, the right to earn a living and the right to live in dignity in their own country.

All this was contained in the speech of Palestinian delegation leader Dr. Haider Abdel-Shafi. When the words were pronounced by a medical doctor rather than a politician, they were received as the genuine reflection of the desires of people in the occupied territories. The message behind the intifada was, for the first time, understood.

Dr. Hanan Mikhail Ashrawi, a Christian woman professor at Bir Zeit University, was for English-speaking onlookers the most articulate member of the Palestinian delegation. Single-handedly she destroyed the stereotype of the passive Arab woman. At the same time, she was visible evidence that Christian and Muslim Palestinians have identical interests in "the Palestine question," a fact persistently ignored in the American media. It remains to be seen whether Dr. Ashrawi's brilliant performance will stimulate renewed commitments to a just settlement from both church and women's groups in the US.

In the world of image warfare, the media proclaimed the Palestinians undisputed winners. This is no trifling matter in an American culture that places so much importance on winning. Only a few months back, the conventional wisdom (expressed in this magazine among others) deemed the Palestinians psychologically incapable of helping themselves.

Palestinians, in fact, did not consciously set out to wage a public relations campaign. Image building has little use in Palestinian culture, where leaders know each other's personal histories and find it difficult to submerge their individuality.

Physicians, writers and educators were chosen to put forth the Palestinian case because of the deep respect bordering on veneration that Palestinians have always felt towards education. As a result, not even the choice of a woman as a spokesperson was based on public relations savvy.

Dr. Ashrawi's presence was viewed by Palestinians as a natural recognition of her own role, demonstrated negotiating skills, and the leading role that women have performed throughout the intifada. Even the Islamic hard-liners of Hamas had no objections. The Palestinians will not soon forget, however, the favorable public relations and image-making impact from Madrid, and they are bound to take it into consideration in all of their future activities.

Historical Prerequisites

However powerful its imagery, Palestinian participation in the conference could not have taken place without three historical developments: the intifada, the evolution of moderate thinking within the PLO, and shifts in the policy of the United States.

Palestinian thought began to change perceptibly when the struggle shifted from the camps of Lebanon and other centers of the Palestinian diaspora to the territories occupied by Israel in 1967. Palestinians who struggled from their own homes on their own lands felt more secure, irrespective of the Israeli reprisals. That same sense of security also bred greater flexibility.

It was only after the intifada had achieved widespread international acceptance that the Palestinians adopted the two-state solution, formulated by PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat's public acceptance in Geneva, in December 1988, of Israel's right to exist. At the same time, Israelis and Palestinians began to know' each other through the dialectical relationship that developed between occupiers and occupied.

It is generally assumed that the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, and the subsequent expulsion of the PLO from Beirut, led to the emergence of the intifada. There is reason to believe, however that the intifada was an inevitable reaction to military occupation.

It was only a matter of time before the new generation would refuse to be further humiliated by Israel and ignored by the world.

The international community empathized instantly with the image of the young unarmed Palestinian David fighting a heavily armed and powerful Israeli Goliath.

The Palestinian leadership exiled to Tunis in 1982, could now accept openly a two-state solution because it was based on the struggle of the people in the occupied territories. Palestinian leaders also recognized that the flexibility which marked the intifada might in fact yield what many years of armed struggle had failed to deliver—a Palestinian state. This realization was a prerequisite to the peace conference.

Although US involvement in the Gulf war placed much greater pressure on President Bush to convene the peace conference, it is possible that the Bush administration had planned all along to address the political rights of Palestinians. President Bush's all-out effort to end the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, however, forced the issue of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land to the forefront. It was not only politically wise but also morally imperative to address this issue and to redeem administration promises to Arab leaders and to the growing majority around the world who understand the plight of the Palestinians. The skills deployed by Secretary of State James Baker to convince all parties to attend also cannot be overlooked.

The Palestinians did not go away empty-handed from the first session of the conference They won a major public relations victory and a feeling of hope, which was soon translated into a sense of pride and spiritual unity among Palestinians all over the world. Their dexterity in overcoming the obstacles to representation raised by Israel earned them a diplomatic victory and also laid the ground for future power-sharing between the Palestinian leadership and the people. By no means least, the conference was also a victory for the efforts of Palestinian women, symbolized not only in the performance of Dr. Hanan Mikhail Ashrawi, but also by the participation of another woman, Zahira Kamal, on the Palestinian delegation's advisory committee. Their presence means that women will be part of any future government in Palestine. It may also prod other Arab governments in the area to incorporate more women into their own delegations, if only to achieve the same public relations gains.

Suha Sabbagh is the executive director of the Institute for Arab Women 's Studies in Washington, DC.

Palestinians Made Major Concessions—Now It's Up to Washington

By Rachelle Marshall

For Palestinians under occupation, who had nothing to lose, there's no doubt that the Madrid conference produced net gains. The delegation headed by Haidar Abdel-Shafi came away with no tangible rewards, but for the first time in this century Palestinians were given a chance—over Israel's last-minute protests—to state their case to the world and expect to be heard. Thanks to media coverage, delegates such as Abdel-Shafi and Dr. Mamdouh Al-Aker, and adviser Hanan Ashrawi, were revealed as reasonable and compassionate human beings who sincerely want peace with Israel. Israeli propagandists will have a hard time from now on portraying all Palestinians as terrorists. And judging by the thousands of residents of the West Bank and Gaza who turned out to demonstrate support for the conference, Palestinians themselves were given renewed pride and hope.

But apart from hope, it is still not certain that anything of substance will come from the meetings. Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir insisted that Israel would never return any part of the "land of Israel." He referred to the past suffering of the Jews but made no mention of Palestinian grievances. The Palestinian delegation, on the other hand, brought to the conference a message that should have made headlines but aroused only a ho-hum response.

In his opening speech, AbdelShafi appealed to Israel for "genuine reconciliation and coexistence under international law. " He added, "Your security and ours are mutually dependent as entwined as the fears and nightmares of our children." After reaffirming the Palestinians' long held demand for national independence, AbdelShafi then offered an historic compromise: Palestinian acceptance of a transitional period of autonomy while bilateral negotiations take place over Israeli troop withdrawals, the transfer of authority, and the permanent status of the occupied territories. Meanwhile, for the Palestinians' protection—and Israel's—these areas would be under UN trusteeship.

The Palestinians' acceptance of temporary autonomy rather than a full-fledged state was the latest of a series of concessions they have made, starting as far back as 1977 with the PLO's agreement to negotiate on the basis of a two-state solution and including the Palestine National Council's unilateral recognition of Israel in 1988. Instead of being treated as news, however, AbdelShafi's announcement in Madrid was buried under columns of newsprint emphasizing "intransigence" on "both sides."

Even Secretary of State James Baker, obviously dismayed by the accusations of terrorism that had been traded back and forth by Shamir and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Al-Charaa the day before, expressed disappointment with all of the parties' "unwillingness to take confidence-building steps." As if he had not heard Abdel-Shafi's reference to the nightmares of both Israeli and Palestinian children and his appeal to the Israeli people for reconciliation and an end to the " prolonged exchange of pain," Baker told the entire gathering, "You have failed to deal adequately with the human dimension of the conflict."

Although the Palestinians' acceptance of temporary autonomy was non-news in the United States, it could turn out to be the most promising development of the conference. If the autonomy agreement provides for a freeze on the seizure of Palestinian land, restoration of Palestinian water rights, free elections, and withdrawal of Israeli troops, then peaceful co-existence for Israelis and Palestinians could become a reality.

Fear and Reluctance

At least two obstacles stand in the way of such an agreement: the fear of many Israelis that Palestinian control of the West Bank and Gaza will leave them vulnerable to attack, and congressional reluctance to put pressure on the Israeli government.

As the Madrid conference got under way, Michael Mandelbaum of the Council on Foreign Relations gave support to familiar Israeli claims by asserting that "Israel will be asked to give up a tangible security asset—territory that it has occupied as a buffer against its enemies—in exchange for something that is intangible and revocable: in effect, for a promise. " It does not take a military expert to see the flaws in this argument.

An occupied territory blanketed with Jewish settlements obviously cannot serve as a defensive zone since civilians would be vulnerable to attack and their presence would interfere with military actions. In any case, a buffer zone is hardly needed by a powerful Israeli Defense Force equipped not only with nuclear warheads but with tactical nuclear weapons as well.

For their part, if the Palestinians had an independent state, that state would have every incentive to avoid provoking Israel and thus inviting its own destruction. In fact, in May 1988 several dozen retired senior Israeli military officers publicly condemned the occupation as doing more harm than good. Speaking for the group, called the Council for Peace and Security, retired General Ori Orr said, "I think we all agree that the occupation should end because maintaining it does more damage to our security than ending it."

In the last analysis, however, it will not be the wise men and women on both sides who determine the final outcome of the Madrid peace conference but our own representatives in Washington. If as a reward for Shamir's going to Madrid, Congress votes in January to approve $10 billion in loan guarantees to Israel without demanding genuine concessions, and if President Bush—in an election year—declines to veto such a measure, then the Israeli government will have no reason to do anything but stall negotiations with the Palestinians while it builds more new settlements.

On the other hand, it is likely that the US, by withholding substantial aid to Israel, could force Shamir to agree to territorial compromise. If, in the coming months, Congress and President Bush refuse to pour out more aid unconditionally to Israel, and instead put strong pressure on Israel's leaders to compromise with its neighbors, there will at last be a chance to achieve peace. After years of kowtowing to the Israel lobby, it's time for Congress to serve the real interests of the Israeli people.

Rachelle Marshall is a free-lance editor living in Stanford, CA. She is a member of New Jewish Agenda and writes frequently on the Middle East.