by Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff
Ruling Palestinian party Fatah to gather in November • PA President Mahmoud Abbas in power since 2005 • Palestinian officials dismiss Channel 1 report that Abbas told confidantes he will step down ahead of conference, not run again for PA premiership.
PA President Mahmoud Abbas
attends a news conference in Bethlehem, last week
|
Photo credit: Reuters  |
Rumblings in Ramallah in recent weeks have
raised expectations that Palestinian politics is in play, with
80-year-old Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, in power for
more than a decade, facing a mounting challenge to his leadership.
There is frequent speculation that Abbas, who
was elected to a four-year term in 2005 and has not had to face a vote
since then, is about to step down. He has confounded those predictions
in the past and may well do so again.
But the degree of rumor-mongering and
alliance-shifting over the past two months suggests change is in the
air, or at least that agitation against his presidency is growing.
Earlier this month, Abbas unexpectedly
dismissed the secretary-general of the Palestine Liberation Organization
and his effective number two, Yasser Abed Rabbo, who had been critical
of his decision-making for some time.
In his place, the president appointed Saeb
Erekat, a long-time adviser and occasional confidant who has been the
chief negotiator with the Israelis for the past two decades.
Then, in a separate but related development, a
Palestinian appeals court ruled that Mohammed Dahlan, a former official
in the Fatah party who is now a rival to Abbas, was entitled to
parliamentary immunity in a case brought against him by an
anti-corruption body set up by the president.
That increases the likelihood that Dahlan, who
fell from favor in 2011 and now lives in exile in the Gulf, could
return to Ramallah to fight the charges, a move that would bolster his
credentials as the main challenger to Abbas.
As if those moves and feints were not enough,
Channel 1 reported on Sunday that Abbas had told confidants he would
step down within two months, just before a Fatah party congress penciled
in for Nov. 29.
The report was quickly dismissed by
Palestinian officials, with Abbas' spokesman telling Reuters it was
"typical Israeli rumors" designed to destabilize Palestinian affairs.
It is not clear who Channel 1's sources were,
but Interior Minister Silvan Shalom, who is responsible for the
Palestinian file, held unannounced talks with Erekat in Jordan on
Friday, a Palestinian official confirmed to Reuters.
The upshot is that various pieces of the Palestinian puzzle are moving at once, fueling the impression of impending change.
"This has been in the making for some time
now," said Mattia Toaldo, a Middle East analyst at the European Council
on Foreign Relations in London, referring to Abed Rabbo's dismissal.
"It's part of the struggle for Abbas' succession as well as a consequence of the paranoia about Dahlan."
To all intents and purposes, Dahlan, 53, is
the critical piece in the puzzle, even if he remains at one remove from
the daily thrust of Palestinian politics -- at least for now.
A former minister of security and a powerful
figure in Gaza where he was born, Dahlan is based in the United Arab
Emirates, although he also holds Serbian citizenship.
He has been successful at raising support from
the Emirates and Qatar, funds that he has deployed to help communities
in Gaza and the West Bank, although critics say the money has also
helped finance political opposition to Abbas.
Part of the reason for Abed Rabbo's dismissal
were his links to Dahlan, Palestinian media have reported, and the same
goes for legal moves made against former Palestinian Authority Prime
Minister Salam Fayyad, another Abbas rival.
Whether the tectonic shifts lead to an
eruption will become clearer as the Fatah congress approaches. Such
gatherings have been promised in the past, only to be delayed.
But if the Nov. 29 gathering goes ahead, it
should better set out the allegiances in Palestinian politics and
indicate who might emerge after Abbas, who has said he will not stand
for another term as president whenever elections are next held.
"I don't see elections anytime soon, but I do
see some intrigue at the Fatah conference in November," said Grant
Rumley, an expert in Palestinian affairs at the Foundation for Defense
of Democracies in Washington, D.C.
"Erekat's tapping as the next PLO
secretary-general might be a hint that he'll be appointed
vice-president," he said, adding that the success of the Palestinian
leadership ultimately depended on its ability to negotiate with Israel.
Yet Palestinian sources say Erekat is not a viable
successor, saying he is not deep enough in Fatah or security issues.
Instead, Abbas may be setting him up as a custodian while others fight
it out for the top job.
Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=27187
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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