Speaking of Apartheid - Jordan treats 600,000 Palestinians like dirt

Generally when people speak about Palestinians in Jordan, they think about the majority who have full Jordanian citizenship. 

They are still treated as not real Jordanians, and the native Jordanians regard them as people who will leave one day to live across the river. But they do have all of the benefits of citizenship.

However, there are a lot of Palestinians in Jordan who have no citizenship, no health benefits, and very few human rights. They are mostly the Palestinians who came from Gaza after the 1967 war.

Although UNRWA counts them as "Palestine refugees," they are not refugees by any measure. They came over voluntarily, well after the Six Day War, because they didn't want to live under Jewish rule. This New York Times article from November 7, 1967 says that even then, hundreds of Palestinian Arabs who couldn't leave Gaza under Egyptian rule were crossing into Jordan every day, and the reporter could not find one of them who said that the Israelis mistreated them. 

How many are there? According to UNRWA, there are 158,000 - about 7%. But a census done in 2016 counted an astonishing 634,000 Palestinians who do not have national ID numbers.

This means that they are barred from the majority of positions in the public sector. 

They are banned from many professions such as dentistry, engineering and law.  

They need special work permits to obtain jobs in the private sector.

They have limited property rights.  Up until recently, they could not own land at all. 

They have limited or no services from the Jordanian National Aid Fund. 

They cannot attend state universities or are forced to pay much higher fees than citizens. 

They are ineligible for government health insurance, which means that any major medical procedure keeps them in poverty. 

Even the ones born in Jordan are not eligible to become citizens.

There are more stateless Palestinians in Jordan today than there were Arabs who fled Israel in the 1948 "nakba."

Yet who even knows about this huge group of people? Who talks about them? Why is there such a discrepancy between UNRWA's estimates and Jordan's census in even counting them?

This is real apartheid against some 28% of the Palestinians in Jordan. Human rights groups are mostly silent. 

And no one calls this "apartheid."

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Who is Michael Ross? Troubling Questions for the Organizers of the Jordan is Palestine Conference (update)

Michael Ross has been somewhat of an enigma to those of us with an interest in the Jordanian Option. Referred to as "Chief of Staff/Secretary of State for Peace" in the Jordanian Opposition Cabinet's shadow government, and a prominent speaker at the recent Jerusalem Jordan is Palestine conference, we actually know very little about him. Two key players in the Jordanian Option, Mudar Zahran and Rachel Avraham, have vaguely referred to Ross as a "Republican lobbyist."

In a recent article relating to the Jordanian Option, I asked a question about Ross: "What is his area of interest as a lobbyist? Corn?"

It seems I was close. Not corn, but rather, something that rhymes with corn.

As it turns out, there's something called the Lobbying Disclosure Act, which calls for lobbyists to register significant lobbying activities with the Clerk of the United States House of Representatives. This is by way of bringing accountability to federal lobbying practices. The Lobbying Disclosure Act means that the public can access details of significant lobbying by way of a government database.

When the name Michael Ross is entered into the Lobbying Disclosure Act Database, two entries come up, both from 1999, for a lobbyist named Michael C. Ross. The first entry is Ross' client, the "Adult Entertainment Education Fund." The second entry is for the Michael Ross client called the "National Cabaret Association."

Is this Michael Ross the same Michael Ross who addressed hundreds of people at the Menachem Begin Heritage Center last month? The same Ross who shared a stage with Temple Mount activist and Member of Knesset Yehudah Glick? Is he the Michael Ross who is executive director (and sole board member) of the International Jewish Muslim Dialogue Center?

Let's take a look.

Here is the Michael C. Ross who spoke at the Jordan is Palestine conference (guy on the left).

Here is his Facebook profile.

Here is a photo of Michael C. Ross from the California Lobbying Directory of 2011-2012 (when he last appears, it seems.)

The address listed in the above California lobbying directory mirrors the one listed in the "Jordanian Constitution," drafted by Ross in February 2016.

This same document has Ross down with the middle initial "C."  Michael C. Ross.

Here's his LinkedIn profile. Can't really tell if it's the same dude, because no beard. But he's Michael Ross from San Mateo, a lobbyist.

The LinkedIn profile URL: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ssorleahcim/ uses the same backwards name as per his email address as listed in his draft of the Jordanian "constitution" (third screenshot above)

What do we know so far? We know that the Michael Ross who spoke at the Jordan is Palestine conference is a California lobbyist. We can't say with 100% certainty that there are two men in San Mateo named Michael C. Ross who were lobbyists from the 1990's through 2000 and on.

But we do know that a Michael C Ross from Sacramento (different home address) attempted to form a national PAC for topless clubs, the National Cabaret Association, in 1999.

A simple online background check confirms Michael C Ross from San Mateo once lived at the  Sacramento address in the above screenshot (blacked out), which Ross used in his capacity as a lobbyist for the National Cabaret Association.

We know that the very same Michael Ross invested in Tail Feathers, a Sacramento strip club believed to have been owned, in part, by a convicted rapist. Here's part of an article from April, 1997:

Michael Ross, a Tail Feathers investor and a lobbyist for the adult entertainment industry, last week filed protests with Sacramento County for approving the name change. He wants the Board of Supervisors to rescind the change in Dove's business license.

He's making that request, he said, to protect both his ownership rights and the community.

Unfortunately for that particular Michael Ross, "lobbyist for the adult entertainment industry," Tail Feathers filed for bankruptcy 18 months later:

Michael Ross, a disgruntled Tail Feathers investor and a lobbyist for the adult entertainment industry, plans to watch the bankruptcy process very carefully. "I think this is all a smokescreen," he said of Dove's bankruptcy filing. He and other parties who had disputes with Dove had been trying to resolve matters through arbitration, he said. Ross contends Dove owes him $125,000, although he said Dove believes that amount to be about $30,000.

Is this Michael Ross, "lobbyist for the adult entertainment industry," the same Michael Ross as the Republican lobbyist from California who would serve to negotiate peace between Israel and Jordan, if the Jordanian Option were to be implemented? Is this the same guy who would serve as Mudar Zahran's chief of staff? The same man who wrote an article smearing award-winning Israeli Arab journalist Khaled Abu Toameh under the pen names Michael Ben Avraham and Michael Ben Abraham?

If so, what is the connection between the adult entertainment industry and the Jordanian Option? And what is the connection between Michael C. Ross and Mudar Zahran? How did they stumble upon each other?

Because, if they're the same guy, you have to wonder why a lobbyist for the adult entertainment industry would take so keen an interest in an Israeli Arab journalist that he would up and write an article smearing the guy, just out of the blue. And then subsequently send it to Mudar Zahran. Who would subsequently send it to Rachel Avraham, to be printed under a pseudonym.

Screenshot from Rachel Avraham's Facebook page, since deleted.

How do we know Michael Ben Abraham is Michael Ross? Well, Rachel Avraham told us so. HERE, for instance. An excerpt from the linked article:

How did these unlikely characters, Ross, Zahran, and Avraham, happen to meet, to know one another?

And why would Ross print an article about Abu Toameh under a pen name? Why not send the article directly to Avraham, rather than through a third party?

Ross' only other writing experience, up to that time, was a single op-ed, penned under his real byline and posted by Jerusalem Online, by then editor Rachel Avraham. Why would Ross not send the second piece as a direct submission then, since Avraham had already printed his earlier work?

Troubling questions, to say the least.

One has to wonder if any of the speakers or their guests at the Jordan is Palestine conference bothered to check the identity of Ross, a man who suddenly shows up to take part in a controversial conference, someone whom no one has ever heard of before?

And what is behind Ross' involvement in the Jordanian Option? How did someone in the adult entertainment industry come to ally with Mudar Zahran, a man apparently running away from prosecution for avoiding repaying a sizable loan from a Jordanian bank, while pretending to be a political refugee?

How did hundreds of people pay money to hear either of these men speak?

Why did men of such high caliber, members of Knesset and important writers, share a stage with Ross, and debate him?

Why did Jews on the right so easily fall into step with plotting to overthrow the king of another country, without seeing how this would look to the world? How did we just accept people like Ross and Zahran, without knowing what kind of people they are, without knowing their history, their deeds?

To be fair, the Jordan is Palestine idea is a valid one, one to be explored and pursued, but perhaps through different means, by persuasion.

Because it is not our place to direct a coup or overthrow a king. This is not a good place for Jews to be.

The fact that Mudar Zahran and Ross managed to grab this much fealty among the Jews is rather pathetic actually. You want to know why they did this, you want to know more.

If you're a thinking person.

It leaves you feeling dirty. Used. Zahran is using the Jews to position himself as a political refugee, apparently to avoid prosecution for  refusal to repay a loan.. But we are so desperate we bought into him completely. Him and his henchman, Ross.

How did these two men meet? What is their plot? Is Mudar Zahran duping the Jews to save himself? What is Ross' role in all this?

I don't know.

But we have a right to learn the truth.

Which is why I sent some questions to Michael Ross and also to Ted Belman, organizer of the Jordan is Palestine Conference.

Belman refused to answer my questions.

But I will be certain to let you know, should Michael C. Ross respond.

UPDATE: And here is Michael Ross' response. As published on his friend's page. (It's a good thing Ross knows how to Start Your Own Country. He's going to need one.)

  

UPDATE (from EoZ): Mudar Zahran objects to the characterization of why he left Jordan. In an email exchange where he (again)  threatened legal action against me, he wrote:

 I did NOT flee any loans in Jordan. I left because there was a substantial threat to my life by the Jordanian government and the UK government has granted me asylum after fully-verifying my claim for asylum and seeing it to be valid and beyond reasonable doubts.

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Report: Israel planning gas pipeline into Jordan

From Bloomberg:

Israel, seeking to tap recent natural-gas finds for export, plans to build a pipeline from the Dead Sea to the Jordanian border to supply its neighbor, two people with knowledge of the matter said.

The Ministry of Energy and Water Resources expects to begin work on the 15-kilometer (9-mile) link in 2015 and complete it in 2016, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the information isn’t public. The ministry commissioned the project on behalf of U.S. gas producer Noble Energy Inc. (NBL) and a Jordanian partner, they said.

The 2010 discovery of the offshore Leviathan field, coming after the nearby Tamar find, proved a bonanza for Israel, which expects the gas to meet its needs for a quarter of a century while also enabling exports. For Jordan, which has seen fuel imports from Egypt disrupted by pipeline bombings in Sinai, deliveries from Israel would help to boost security of supply.

An Israeli Energy Ministry official, who asked not to be identified, declined to comment, while calls to Jordan’s energy minister weren’t answered. A spokesman for Noble Energy in Tel Aviv declined to comment when contacted by phone.

Israel, which itself imported Egyptian gas until bombings cut deliveries, reached its first export agreement earlier this week, a 20-year deal to supply a planned Palestinian power station. Noble and its partners at Leviathan, the larger of the two fields, said they’ll get about $1.2 billion to send gas to the plant to be built in the northern West Bank city of Jenin.

Partners in the offshore Tamar field, which include Houston-based Noble, also are in talks to sell gas to Jordanian potash plants for 15 years for $500 million to $700 million, Israel’s Calcalist business newspaper reported last month.

Jamal Sarayreh, the chairman of Jordan’s Arab Potash Co., declined to comment when contacted last week. Noble Chief Executive Officer Charles Davidson said in November the company would prefer to export Israeli gas to neighboring countries than to the Far East, which would require seaborne-tanker shipments.

“We will be able to market more gas regionally at lower capital cost because all of these regional markets are basically using pipes, and in some instances they’re connecting the pipes that already exist,” Davidson said.

The new pipeline will start at Sdom, according to the two people. It will be an extension to an existing link that brings gas to the Dead Sea Works Ltd. chemical plant there.

This is very big news, and it shows the importance of a strong economy to Israel's defensive posture.

Jordan (and Egypt) keep doing an interesting dance, publicly inciting hatred against Israel in their media but privately cooperating with the Jewish state. Deals like this strengthen existing peace agreements but they don't reduce the hate - and this seems to be a governmental decision to keep the old mentality of using Israel to divert attention from internal crises.

The contradictory messages cannot easily coexist, but widespread Arab antisemitism would not allow for the governments to act friendlier towards Israel in public. Note how no one will dare confirm any deals - publicizing them is a dangerous business when the Arab media is so invested in hating Israel and Jews.

Normalization with the Arab world will never happen, even if Israel signed a "peace plan" with the Arab League.  From Israel's perspective, the best that can ever be hoped for is detente, not peace. Deals like these (and you can be sure that there are negotiations to export gas to Egypt as well) help strengthen Israel's position in this detente, and other under-the-table agreements will be made, but there will never be peace in the way that Israelis yearn.

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Jordan holds a beauty pageant. For goats.

From Ammon News:

Jordan hosted its second Levantine Goat Beauty Pageant on Friday, in which breeders from the Kingdom and Gulf States took part.

Levantine goats are distinguished from other breeds for their curved noses and soft hair. A levantine goat can sell for $25,000 in the Gulf States.

Yahia Abu Jaber, the organiser of the pageant, said 'the levantine goat represents old traditions for Arabs… the levantine goat has has many beautiful characteristics, and this goat differs from other goats in terms of body shape, height, the incline of its head and its wide-open eyes. This makes it more expensive, he noted.

The prices of levantine goats in the Gulf states can range between 100,000 and 200,000 Riyals, equal to between $25,000 and $2,000 US dollars.

The pageant was attended by Saudi, Emirati, Kuwaiti, Syrian and Palestinian breeders.

Don't get too smug. New York City hosted a goat beauty contest once, too.

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Does the Jordan-Israel peace agreement give Jordan custodianship of the Temple Mount?

Jordanian newspapers today are reporting that Jordanian officials confirm that Jews have no right to pray on the Temple Mount, according to the Israel-Jordan peace treaty signed in 1994.

They were responding to members of Knesset who said that the treaty did not require any Jordanian approval for Jews to pray there.

Who is right?

Here is the text of the relevant article of the treaty, from Jordan's King Hussein website:

Article 9 - Places of Historical and Religious Significance and Interfaith Relations

1. Each Party will provide freedom of access to places of religious and historical significance.

2. In this regard, in accordance with the Washington Declaration, Israel respects the present special role of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in Muslim Holy shrines in Jerusalem. When negotiations on the permanent status will take place, Israel will give high priority to the Jordanian historic role in these shrines.

3. The Parties will act together to promote interfaith relations among the three monotheistic religions, with the aim of working towards religious understanding, moral commitment, freedom of religious worship, and tolerance and peace.

Paragraph 1 makes it clear that nothing can prohibit Jews from visiting the Temple Mount, just as Muslims or Christians cannot be banned from the area either.

Paragraph 2 has two parts. The first is clearly not prescriptive; it is simply a statement that Israel "respects" Jordan's "special role" without saying what that role is. It does not give Jordan any power to create rules.

The second part is almost prescriptive but not quite; it uses the word "will" instead of the stronger "shall." It also doesn't define what it means to give "high priority" to Jordan's "historic role." If Israel is the party assigning priorities to Jordan's role, that means that Israel can override them. Most importantly, however, is that this sentence only refers to the time of permanent status negotiations (implying that Jordan will be a party to the talks) but it does not say that Jordan's role, whatever that is, is permanent.

Paragraph 3 explicitly calls for freedom of religious worship. This indicates that not only is Israel permitted to allow Jews to visit the Temple Mount and perhaps to allow them to pray, as the previous two paragraphs implied, but it enshrines the freedom for Jews to pray on their holiest site is. Banning such prayer would be a violation not only of human rights law but of this treaty itself.

The peace agreement certainly does not give Jordan any custodianship or powers over the Temple Mount. The best that can be said is that it demands Israel take Jordan's opinion into account, but Jordan has no veto power over how the holy sites are governed. Moreover, the third paragraph shows that freedom of worship is a critical principle to be upheld by both parties, which would naturally include freedom for Jews to worship.

In short, the Jordanians who claim that the treaty gives them the right to ban Jewish worship are not being truthful.

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Jordanian band defies BDSers, tours Israel

From the Times of Oman:

This week, a Jordanian band went on a tour that included the Golan Heights, Nazareth, Haifa, Ramallah, Bethlehem and Jerusalem. But the popular music group which is rated as one of the top five in the region faced a concerted social media and online attack as having participated in a politically unacceptable act.

The attack focused on the fact that the band members received visas from the Israeli embassy in Amman. They are accused of normalising with the Israelis. Entry into Jerusalem, the Golan Heights, Nazareth or Haifa is not possible without a visa.

The permits issues by the Palestinian Authority in coordination with and after the approval of the Israelis are valid only in West Bank cities like Bethlehem and Ramallah.

The band, Autostrad, identifies itself as "an Ammani world, reggae, funk band from Jordan". Fronted by lead singer Yazan Alrousan, Autostrad was formed in 2007 with guitarist Hamza Arnaout, keyboardist Wisam Qatawneh, bassist Avo Demerjian, saxophonist Bashar Abdelghani and drummer Burhan Ali.

The online and social media campaign was launched by a number of young Jordanians and Palestinians, including some who are citizens of Israel.

In an article published on a number of progressive sites, the writer says the band is welcome to Palestine only after it is liberated. A hashtag with "come after it is liberated" also went viral as attacks against the music group mushroomed.

Autostrad members reject the accusation of normalisation and insist that they are visiting their country upon invitation from credible Palestinian organisations and will sing to Palestinians and Syrians living under Israeli rule.

It's not like Autostrad loves Israel. Quite the contrary:

Arnaout was quoted on a website that getting a visa was the only option available.

"We are Jordanians and Palestinians and this is the only way we have to enter our homeland Palestine and no one can stop us from doing our work."

But this is a big loss for the "Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel" which defined this trip as breaking their rules for normalization.

Even the author of the piece, Daoud Kuttab, criticized PACBI:

After 65 years of Nakbeh and 46 years of Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Gaza and Golan Heights, having a group of unelected individuals decide who is a patriot and who is a traitor does not serve the overall cause.

Ray Hanania made a similar point in Saudi Gazette, slamming the haters:

The extremists, who are a minority faction in our Arab community, step in and bully the mainstream Arabs into silence. Arabs are afraid to stand up to the extremists who often direct their hate and anger against Arabs even more than they do against Israel. So the mainstream Arabs remain silent. It’s better to not say anything, the moderates mistakenly conclude, than to stand up to the fanatics.

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PalArabs riot, police shoot tear gas, many arrested. In Jordan.

This story completely flew under the radar, and it wasn't covered at all by Jordan's state media.

From Ammon News, October 9:

Last Thursday, October 3rd, at approximately 7:00 p.m., a conflict occurred in Gaza Camp, eight kilometers outside of Jerash, between several residents of the camp and the adjacent Al Hadada neighborhood to the west.

The tribal altercation between the two parties escalated into a full lockdown of the area by Jordanian police in order to control the combatants. Eyewitnesses reported that Jordanian residents of Al Hadada vacated the area, the violence shifted between Jordanian police forces and Palestinian residents of Gaza Camp.

Camp residents threw rocks at the police and demanded that they cease their occupation of the main street, to which the police responded with tear gas and rubber bullets. A number of stores and cars were looted and burned as a result of the initial clash. Fighting continued between police and residents, with the Jordanian Police forces employing tear gas and rubber bullets both on the main street and within residential areas until 4:00 a.m.

The police presence intensified on Friday morning with the addition of armed trucks and armed personal carriers. Local businesses were not permitted to open, and checkpoints were set up at the camp entrances, where officers did not allow those without ID cards to enter the camp.

Skirmishes between anti-riots police and residents of Gaza Camp resumed again at 12:15 p.m., nearly twelve hours after the original conflict between residents of Al Hadada and Gaza Camp had ended. An eyewitness said that the afternoon prayer at Abu Bakir mosque was interrupted by tear gas, and worshippers were driven the main street. At several times, police entered the residential streets with tear gas launchers, riot shields, and rubber bullets, engaging those who refused to go indoors.

By 10:30 p.m. Friday evening, the fighting mostly ceased. Eyewitnesses reported that the police limited their presence to the easternmost section of the camp, but continued to arrest those found out on the streets.

Police cordoned Gaza Camp by this past weekend lasted approximately forty hours. No casualties were confirmed, but many residents were injured by the officers' fire. The tear gas also caused a significant amount of discomfort as it spread inside residential homes throughout the day and a half long conflict. Spent canisters of tear gas found in the camp indicate that they were deployed after their expiration date.

Fire and damage was also inflicted upon the infrastructure and properties within the camp.
“Police cars have returned to the camp every day this week,” a source within the camp stated today. “They are still arresting more people.”

While only 14 arrests have been confirmed, residents have claimed at least 20 have been detained, with some estimates as high as 100. The current charges include assault of police officers and the destruction of property.

Here's video:



Apparently, no "pro-Palestinian human rights" groups bothered to go to the camp to act as human shields against the Jordanian occupiers.

Residents of the Gaza/Jerash camp are not citizens of Jordan. Although they have lived within Jordan's borders for over 45 years, they cannot become citizens, they cannot freely travel, and they are not tried in civilian but in military court, from which nine of them were released today after being held for over two weeks in custody.

There are two separate double standards here, both on how Jordan treats its Palestinian Arabs who originated from Gaza as well as how Jordanian police are not criticized by groups that pretend to be pro-Palestinian for their riot control methods.

But, as Meryl Yourish likes to say, it is Israel Double Standard Time, which occurs every day of the week that ends in a "y."

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Meanwhile, in Jordan...

From Ammon News:

Riots erupted in night protest organized by youth pro-reform movement in Hay al-Tafaileh neighborhood in Amman, as police fired heavy tear gas to disperse the crowds and arrested four men.

Rioters set tires on fire, broke glass, launched fireworks at the police, threw explosive bottles, and attacked police cars expressing their anger at the arrest of 10 of pro-reformers in the past few weeks, according to Ammon News reporter.

Several of the detained activists were being tried by the State Security Court, Jordan's special military tribunal, on anti-regime charges.

Jordanian riots haven't quite made it on the radar, especially with what's going on in other Arab countries.

However, all it takes is one symbolic event that grabs people's imaginations, like the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi in Tunisia in 2010, and then all bets are off. If Jordanian police kill a protester, or rumors of torture start to spread, everything could change in an instant.

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Jordanian columnist reminds readers on Eid that Jews are the devil

During the annual Hajj pilgrimage, Muslims throw a series of small stones towards three pillars (later replaced with walls) to symbolize the stoning of the Devil, done according to Muslim tradition by Abraham.

Rashid Hassan, writing in Jordan's Addustour, wants to make sure that his readers know exactly who the devil is.

The pilgrim returns from the blessed land, from his pilgrimage, cleansed from sin, and he returns to his country as his mother bore him, to keep this purity. This will only be achieved by addressing the devil and all that symbolized by the evils and sins ... This is a message to the Muslims in general.

...The Zionist occupation embodies the ugliest image of the devil. [The ritual] imposes on Muslims all over the world to address him, and the clarion call to liberate Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa, the first kiblah and third of the Two Holy Mosques, the place of the Ascension of the Prophet, peace be upon him. Jews are killers of prophets, who are working day and night to change the heart of this Arab city, to transform it into a Jewish city...

In this context, we wonder - Why didn't the Arab states implement the resolutions of Arab summits to support of Jerusalem and its people? The pledges to fund it remain unpaid, reminding us about those wealthy Jews are financed the establishment of colonies in Palestine such as Rothschild in the late nineteenth century, and now the Russian Jewish billionaire Moskowitz who funded the establishment of colonies in Arab Jerusalem and its area, to separate it from its Arab surroundings. There are now twelve of these colonies, surrounding [Jerusalem] like a bracelet.

...The cause of all tragedies, past and present, are the bullying enemies of the nation, in the forefront the Zionist enemy, who works on the Judaization of Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa throwing out all laws and international norms, and which prompted the African nations to divert the Nile waters and cause our brothers to die of thirst.

In a nutshell, the blessed pilgrimage reminds us and calls on us to respond firmly to the devil, which is embodied in all the sins and evils; greed and corruption, injustice and tyranny, and embodied in the Zionist occupation and Arab differences that are behind the Arab bloodshed and foreign intervention.

See also yesterday's post where Iran's Supreme Leader makes a similar point in his annual Hajj address. But he says "Zionists" instead of Jews, the mark of a true moderate.

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Jordanians really hate their Palestinian Arab citizens (Wikileaks)

Wikileaks has some interesting cables from Jordan that discuss the situation of Palestinian citizens of that country. Essentially, the Hashemite minority really hates the Palestinian majority, and can't wait for an excuse to kick them out.

Like, for example, a Palestinian Arab state.

Here are excerpts from a cable dated February 6, 2008:

East Bankers have an entirely different approach to thinking about the right of return. At their most benign, our East Banker contacts tend to count on the right of return as a solution to Jordan's social, political, and economic woes. But underlying many conversations with East Bankers is the theory that once the Palestinians leave, "real" Jordanians can have their country back. They hope for a solution that will validate their current control of Jordan's government and military, and allow for an expansion into the realm of business, which is currently dominated by Palestinians.

...In fact, many of our East Banker contacts do seem more excited about the return (read: departure) of Palestinian refugees than the Palestinians themselves. Mejhem Al-Khraish, an East Banker parliamentarian from the central bedouin district, says outright that the reason he strongly supports the right of return is so the Palestinians will quit Jordan. East Banker Mohammed Al-Ghazo, Secretary General at the Ministry of Justice, says that Palestinians have no investment in the Jordanian political system - "they aren't interested in jobs in the government or the military" - and are therefore signaling their intent to return to a Palestinian state.

When East Bankers talk about the possibility of Palestinians staying in Jordan permanently, they use the language of political threat and economic instability. Talal Al-Damen, a politician in Um Qais near the confluence of Jordan, the Golan Heights and Israel, worries that without the right of return, Jordan will have to face up to the political challenges of a state which is not united demographically. For his part, Damen is counting on a mass exodus of Palestinians to make room for East Bankers in the world of business, and to change Jordan's political landscape. This sentiment was echoed in a meeting with university students, when self-identified "pure Jordanians" in the group noted that "opportunities" are less available because there are so many Palestinians.

The right of return is certainly lower on the list of East Banker priorities in comparison with their Palestinian-origin brethren, but some have thought the issue through a little more. NGO activist Sa'eda Kilani predicts that even (or especially) after a final settlement is reached, Palestinians will choose to abandon a Palestinian state in favor of a more stable Jordan where the issue of political equality has been resolved. In other words, rather than seeing significant numbers return to a Palestinian homeland, Jordan will end up dealing with a net increase in its Palestinian population.

As with their Palestinian counterparts, conspiracy theories are an intrinsic part of East Banker mythology regarding the right of return. Fares Braizat, Deputy Director of the Center for Strategic Studies at Jordan University, told us two of the most commonly held examples (which he himself swears by). The first is that Jordanians of Palestinian origin choose not to vote because if they were to turn out en masse, Israel (and/or the United States) would assume that they had incorporated themselves fully into Jordanian society and declare the right of return to be null and void. The second conspiracy theory, which has a similar theme, is that after the 1994 peace agreement between Jordan and Israel, the Palestinian leadership in the West Bank issued a deliberate directive to "all Palestinians" residing in Jordan to avoid involvement in Jordanian politics so as not to be perceived as "going native." The main point of both theories is that Palestinians are planning to return to a future Palestinian state, and therefore have nothing substantive to contribute to the Jordanian political debate - a convenient reason for excluding them from that debate in the first place.

The right of return in Jordan is inextricably linked with the problem of semi-official discrimination toward the Palestinian-origin community. Braizat claims it is "the major reason that keeps the Jordanian political system the way it is." As long as the right of return is touted as a real solution, East Bankers will continue to see Palestinians as temporary residents in "their" country. This provides the justification to minimize the role of Palestinian-origin Jordanians in public life, since they are "foreigners" whose loyalty is suspect and who could in theory pack up and leave at any time. Note: The suspicion of disloyalty is deeply rooted in Black September, when Palestinian militants attempted to wrest political control from the Hashemite regime. Since then, Palestinians have been progressively excluded from the Jordanian security forces and civil service (Ref D). End Note. The suggestion that Palestinians should be granted full political representation in Jordan is often met with accusations that doing so would "cancel" or "prejudge" the right of return. For their part, many Palestinian-origin Jordanians are less concerned with "prejudging" the right of return, and more concerned with fulfilling their roles as Jordanian citizens who are eligible for the full range of political and social rights guaranteed by law.

While Jordanians of Palestinian origin are not shy about their origins, many stress just as strongly their strong connections and loyalty to Jordan. Jemal Refai says, "I consider myself Jordanian. Nobody can tell me otherwise." Mohammed Abu Baker, who represents the PLO in Amman, says, "if you tell me to go back to Jenin, I won't go. This is a fact - Palestinian refugees in Jordan have better living conditions." PNC member Isa Al-Shuaibi simply notes that "Palestinians in Jordan are not refugees. They are citizens."

What's the term for when a minority rules over, and discriminates against, the majority?

Remember - Jordan is the only Arab state that allowed large numbers of Palestinians to become citizens. If the Palestinians in Jordan are looked down upon this much, imagine how much the other Arab countries hate them.

Yet those same Arab countries will fall over themselves to hold conferences and sponsor UN resolutions and fund NGOs  that are supposedly "pro-Palestinian." Don't be fooled - they all hate them, and they want to dump them in Israel rather than help them integrate. This is the entire reason people still talk about the "right of return" today - because of the hate exhibited by Arab brethren of the Palestinians who want nothing to do with them.

(h/t Yoel)

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Lebanon barring Palestinians refugees from Syria

Once again, the Arab world shows its derision for their Palestinian brethren. And once again, the world ignores blatant discrimination against Palestinians - when done by Arabs.

From HRW:

The Lebanese government began on August 6, 2013, to bar Palestinians from entering the country from Syria. Refusing to allow asylum seekers to enter the country violates Lebanon’s international obligations.

Two Palestinians told Human Rights Watch that they were among about 200 Palestinian asylum seekers barred from crossing the border, after Lebanese General Security on August 6 abruptly changed its entry policies for Palestinians living in Syria.

The Palestinians stranded at Lebanon’s border include entire families, children, the elderly, and the sick. Some spent the night in the area between the two countries’ border posts, fearing for their safety if they returned to Syria, without shelter or bathroom facilities. Some have family members waiting for them in Lebanon. Others say they have no homes to return to in Syria as they have been destroyed during the war, or no money to return home, even if it were safe.

A Palestinian asylum seeker stuck at the border told Human Rights Watch that at approximately 6:45 p.m. on August 6, Lebanese border guards told him and other Palestinian asylum seekers waiting to enter that the guards had received a call from the Lebanese General Security office telling them not to allow any more Palestinians to enter the country. After this announcement, the only Palestinians allowed to enter Lebanon were Palestinians with Lebanese wives or mothers, or who had plane tickets to leave Beirut that day. General Security made no public announcement of the change in policy.

Lebanon is still allowing tens of thousands of Syrians to enter the country. It is only discriminating against Palestinians.

Jordan has a similar policy and Egypt also discriminates against Palestinian Syrians.

Blatant, explicit and rampant discrimination against Palestinian Arabs happens every day, and is indeed enshrined in the laws of every Arab country which does not allow them to become citizens while all other Arabs can.

Keep this in mind the next hundred times you hear Arabs say that the "Palestinian issue" is their number one priority, and the key to solving all the problems in the region. They don't mean that they care about Palestinians - it means that they regard the destruction of Israel is their number one priority, and the Palestinian Arabs are useful only as pawns in that goal.

In reality, the Arab world hates Palestinians nearly as much as they hate Jews.

But there are no "pro-Palestinian" groups that can be bothered to point that out.

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Jordanian MP calls to kidnap Israelis; Israel protests; Jordan supports him

In early July, during a parliamentary debate, Jordanian MP Tareq Khoury called on Jordan to "kidnap members of the Israeli embassy in Amman or Israeli tourists visiting Jordan to get Israel to release Jordanian prisoners on hunger strike in Israeli jails."

He said that such a move would be "an honorable precedent in the history of the Kingdom."

He added that the peace agreement between Jordan and Israel was a humiliation to Jordan because it doesn't protect Jordanian prisoners - which include mass murderer Abdallah Bargouthi.

Israel lodged a protest at these statements where a Jordanian MP demanded that Jordan violate international law and existing agreements with Israel.

Now Jordan responded - by telling Israel to shut up.

You see, Israel's protests are considered by Jordan to be an unacceptable infringement on its sovereignty. Furthermore, in the response it said that Jordan's constitution allows members of Parliament to say whatever they want.

They point out that the first article of the peace agreement between Israel and Jordan demands "respect for Jordanian sovereignty and the political independence of Jordan."

I had no idea that Jordan's independence is so weak that merely protesting someone's words endangers Jordan's political independence.

By the way, Article 11 of the peace agreement mandates "To abstain from hostile or discriminatory propaganda against each other, and to take all possible legal and administrative measures to prevent the dissemination of such propaganda by any organization or individual present in the territory of either Party."

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Jordanian columnist: "How to destroy Israel without war"

An op-ed in Jordanzad discusses how to get rid of Israel without defeating it militarily.

You see, the Arabs need to do to the Jews what the Arabs think the Jews did to put the Arab nations in disarray.

So, according to writer M. Mamedabid, the Arabs should secretly create and fund an extremist Jewish organization that would make Al Qaeda look like Girl Scouts. This organization should openly advocate the murder of all Arabs, Christians and Muslims in the Middle East. Using secret Arab funding, it will go on terror sprees and murder gentiles all over the region.

Meanwhile, the Arab states would publicly declare their support for the "moderate" Israeli parties, therefore adding to the power of the Jewish terrorist groups.The Jewish extremists will start killing the secular and leftist Jews, causing a civil war. Eventually the extremist Jews will take over the country, thanks to the secret Arab petrodollars funding them, and the West will turn against Israel, which will have been revealed to be a disgusting racist state, and it will then disappear in a cloud of infighting and civil war.

I can't wait for the first checks to be surreptitiously sent from Amman to the zealots of the Temple Mount Faithful to implement this brilliant scheme.

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Jordan treats Palestinian Syrian refugees "worse than dogs"

From Amnesty:

Cyber City is an unusual camp beside a desolate crossroads outside Irbid, in northern Jordan. Hidden behind a wall and some pine trees, a dreary six-floor block looks out over rusting machinery and a dry plain. Formerly for migrant workers, it now hosts around 500 refugees from Syria.

After passing security checks I bump into Abu Alaa, a dignified 60-year-old refugee whose two sons are missing in Syria. “No news still,” he sighs, holding my hand warmly. “I was just calling again.” His phone shows repeated unanswered calls to numbers back home. He says his two grown-up sons had tried following him into Jordan but were refused entry due to their Palestinian origin. On separate occasions over the coming months, each appears to have been detained by the Syrian security forces and Abu Alaa fears they may not be alive.

Palestinians have been heavily affected by the violence in Syria. Almost half of the 500,000 or so Palestinian refugees in Syria have been displaced. Refugee camps and other areas in which they live, including Dera’a Camp, and Yarmouk and Sayida Zaynab in Damascus, have witnessed heavy fighting. Some 6,000 residents were forced out of Ein al-Tal Camp in Aleppo in April 2013. Sbeineh Camp in Damascus was reportedly hit by a ground-to-ground missile in May 2013, killing at least five people. Two children and two women were among at least five others killed by mortar shells fired into Khan Eshieh Camp near Damascus in June 2013.

Yet Abu Alaa’s sons are among hundreds if not thousands of Palestinian refugees fleeing the violence in Syria who are believed to have been turned away at the Jordanian border, in violation of international law. While Jordan is hosting around half a million people from Syria, it is generally not allowing access to Palestinian or Iraqi refugees...

Of some 7,000 or more Palestinians who did manage to enter Jordan, either before the country denied all access to them early last year or as a result of using false documents, some were later forced back to the border, also in violation of international law.

Bilal, who entered Jordan ahead of other family members, tells me his father and brothers were detained in Amman and escorted to the border in December 2012. “One night my elder brother rang and told me they had been taken there at gunpoint. My younger brother had been pulled by his hair and forced into the security vehicle that took them there. They waited three days just 100 metres beyond the Jordan border post, with fighting nearby, hoping to be allowed back, until my elder brother was injured and they realized the only option was to seek aid inside Syria.”

A worse fate befell Mahmud Merjan, who Cyber City residents say was killed on a Syrian street in late 2012, three weeks after being forced to sign a “voluntary” paper that he would go back to Syria. “It wasn’t an arbitrary killing,” says one man who knew him well. “He was known and wanted by the regime.”

All those in Cyber City have fled from Syria. But while the Palestinians from Syria used to be the majority, I am told, their numbers have dwindled as many got fed up with conditions and returned to the conflict zone. “I prefer to go back and die in Syria with some dignity rather than live without it here,” many say.

Complaints about the conditions here are many. Palestinians are not officially permitted to leave Cyber City. Now and again informal permission is granted to visit relatives in Irbid and Amman and so on, but mostly they are confined to the building and the immediate vicinity. Such conditions amount to arbitrary detention. “I’m sorry, but a dog can come and go more easily than we can,” says a very frustrated Ali, who has been here for more than a year.

The closed border to Palestinians and the arbitrary detention of Palestinians is further dividing families, whose identities reflect decades of turmoil and flight. Sena, a Syrian woman, is here with her children while her Palestinian husband is unable to enter Jordan. Ziad is in Cyber City while his Syrian wife and children are in a Jordanian town. Elderly Abu Khaled has to stay here while family members holding Jordanian nationality do not.

While Syrians and Palestinians from Syria appreciate being in safety in Jordan, they struggle to make ends meet. Individuals are entitled to a monthly coupon worth 24 Jordanian dinars (about US$34) which they exchange for food in a small shop next to Cyber City. This works out as a mere 0.80 dinars per day, it is repeatedly pointed out. A 160g tin of tuna on the shop’s shelves costs more than that.

“It is 100 per cent worse for Palestinians here than for the Syrians,” says Ziad. “One, they are allowed to leave this place while we are not and, two, when they go out they can visit charitable organizations, show their UN refugee agency card” – which Palestinians do not have as they fall under the mandate of [the UN Relief and Works Agency] instead, although they should receive the same services – “and collect further relief.”

“Every day here is the same,” Bilal continues. “Eat, sleep, eat, sleep.” With others, he counts off the names of families who have decided to risk their lives to go back into Syria. “Yes, this is what the Jordanian government wants, for us to go back. But what is the alternative? We live without purpose here. This is not life.”

A friend of the deceased Mahmud Merjan summed up the despair: “It was one of our life’s dreams to visit Jordan, but we came and encountered such hate. Let’s hope there are no more refugee camps for Palestinians in heaven.”

Even Lebanon, which has anti-Palestinian laws and severe restrictions on what Palestinians are allowed to do, allows refugees from Syria of Palestinian ancestry to go to overcrowded UNRWA camps there to get services. Jordan isn't even allowing that, preferring to send them to their possible deaths in Syria.

Here we have systemic and institutionalized discrimination against Palestinians by their fellow Arabs, far worse than anything Israel does, and the world media is silent. I cannot find a single English language media outlet to report this story from Amnesty even though it was published on Monday.

Just yesterday, five more Palestinians in Syria were killed, including two children. The media silence is deafening.

Similarly, so-called "pro-Palestinian" groups say nothing.

The reason is because so-called "pro-Palestinian activists" who are brilliant at getting press coverage for anti-Israel stunts don't really give a damn about real Palestinians - when their suffering cannot be blamed on Israel. The media similarly doesn't consider Arab hate for Palestinians to be newsworthy.

The double standards applied to Israel are crystal clear.

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Jordan refuses potato shipment from Gaza

On Sunday, two truckloads of potatoes were shipped out of Gaza through Israel en route to Jordan as another massive hole was exploited in the supposed "siege" of Gaza.

Today, Jordan refused the shipment.

The reason?

Gaza isn't on Jordan's list of approved countries for potato imports.

The Gaza potato farmers did everything necessary to ensure that Israel would be comfortable with the export going through its territory. They must have had a paying customer in Jordan. It is plausible, if far-fetched, that no one thought to ask whether Jordan would allow potatoes from Gaza to be imported.

Jordan's farmers have been upset over imports of produce from other countries, particularly Israel, so it is possible that they placed some pressure on whatever official made this decision.

The Gaza exporter noted that the Palestinian Authority did nothing to try to convince Jordan to allow the import.

The siege of Gaza is apparently true - it is blockaded by Jordan and the Palestinian Authority.

(h/t Judge Dan)

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The elephants in the room, 2013

Now that US has successfully pressured Israel and the PA to attend talks, it seems to be a good time to revisit the list of "elephants in the room" that are still being mostly ignored. The list, sadly, has not changed much since I last did this in 2010.

Elephant 1: Hamas controls Gaza

Every peace plan includes Gaza in a Palestinian Arab state, and none of them has any provision on how to handle the fact that Gaza is a terrorist haven, in much worse shape since Israel uprooted the settlements there, controlled by a terrorist group that is consistently and wholeheartedly against Israel's existence.   Peace is impossible with this elephant, so it is easier to pretend it isn't there. (See also Elephant 11.)

Elephant 2: Palestinian Arabs elected a terror government

In the only fair, democratic elections in the territories, the Hamas terrorists were chosen by the people. Poll after poll shows that Palestinian Arabs support terror in Israel itself. (Over 40% still support a violent intifada in 2013.) The elections proved that the conventional wisdom was wrong - and the conventional wisdom proceeded to ignore it.

Elephant 3: The current PA government was not elected

This corollary to Elephant 2 means that the current people negotiating for the Palestinian Arabs do not represent the people. Even if they sound moderate or compromising, they have no mandate. The current PA president is well past his term of office, and the current and previous prime minister were never elected (in fact, he received a tiny percentage of the vote when he did run for election.) Negotiating with the PA is, literally, meaningless.

Similarly, the unelected PLO is the real power behind the PA. The PA officially reports to the PLO, and all negotiations are done by the autocratic, Fatah-dominated PLO, not the PA.

Elephant 4: The current PA government has almost no power - and no respect

Outside of Ramallah, the Fayyad/Abbas government has little popular support and little power. Hamas is a very real threat to the PA in the West Bank and is quietly building its base. The attitudes that forced the PA to abandon Gaza - a lack of passion by people for its positions - could very well play out in the West Bank as well.

Elephant 5: The PA is being kept alive by artificial methods

The PA budget is bloated from "payroll" of non-working workers - but if they would slash the payroll, the people on international welfare would revolt. So the very basis of the organized Palestinian Arab workforce is a fiction being kept barely alive by ever-increasing infusions of cash with no real plan to fix the problem. (The bulk of the PA budget goes to Gaza, and much of that goes to workers being paid not to work.)

Elephant 6: Fatah remains a terrorist group paid by the PA

Despite the recent claims that the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades has dismantled, it is a joke meant to appease the wishful-thinkers. The PA might arrest Hamas members in the West Bank, but there still remains - today - terrorist groups that report to Fatah. Here's the webpage of one of them. There has been no serious move by the PA to dismantle their own terror groups.

Elephant 7: The first - and second - stages of the roadmap were never implemented

The entire point of the road map was to slowly build confidence, starting with the end of terror and incitement on the Palestinian Arab side, afterwards building a "provisional" state and only then going to final-status negotiations. Abbas and his team simply threw out phases I and II. By skipping to Phase III as if the other two phases were already in place, the entire exercise is simply a joke. Incitement remains at full blast and the lull in terror is tactical, not a sea-change in Palestinian Arab attitudes. 

Even though the US has made statements against Palestinian Arab incitement, it hasn't moved to stop it. 

This is not so much an elephant anymore quite so much as it is a proof that terror works. Before the second intifada, the world was not fully behind a Palestinian state; autonomy was still considered an option. The world never demanded 1 to 1 land swaps based on the 1967 lines - but after the terror spree they now do. And the demands of the road map to slowly build confidence before granting a state has likewise been thrown out the window. 

Terror pays.

Elephant 8: The PA's goal remains the destruction of Israel

Whether it is by "right of return" or not changing the Fatah charter or by printing map after map showing no Israel, even the most moderate Palestinian leader clings to the idea of destroying Israel, and looks upon a Palestinian Arab state as only one stage in the process. One only needs to look at the maps of "Palestine" in official PA documents and schoolbooks. 



A 2011 poll that remains criminally under-reported proves that when Palestinian Arabs say they want a two-state solution, it is only a stage towards their real goal of destroying Israel. 



Elephant 9: Jerusalem

Most Israelis want a unified Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty. Most Palestinian Arabs refuse to accept anything less than all of ("east") Jerusalem as the capital of a Muslim state. The positions are not compatible and a compromise will not reduce the chances for violence - it will increase it.

Elephant 10: What happened to Gaza

Forgetting Hamas for now, the time period between Israel's dismantling settlements in Gaza and the Hamas takeover is instructive as to how Palestinian Arabs take advantage of territory they gain. They didn't build new houses or communities to reduce the "refugee camp" population, no schools or hospitals. They destroyed the greenhouses purchased for them by American Jews; they turned beautiful former settlements into training camps for terror - in other words, Israel's last major concession not only didn't help achieve peace, it ended up encouraging terror. Any claims that something similar wouldn't happen in the West Bank is the triumph of wishful thinking over experience.

Elephant 11: Palestinian Arab "unity"

Related to Elephant #1. No peace plan can work unless Hamas and the PA/Fatah reach some sort of unification agreement. This is not possible in the foreseeable future. Moreover, Hamas is powerful enough that any such agreement must include a hardening of PLO positions that would be completely incompatible with the basic Quartet demands for peace - renunciation of terror, recognition of Israel and acceptance of previous agreements.

Elephant 12: The Palestinian Arab "diaspora" and Arab intransigence

Any final peace agreement would mean that Arab countries could no longer justify keeping Palestinian Arabs in "refugee camps" nor could they justify their continued refusal to discriminate against Palestinian Arabs from becoming citizens of their countries should they want to stay. The millions of PalArabs in the Middle East becoming citizens would not be accepted by many Arab countries as it would endanger their own tenuous holds on power. 

Elephant 13: Economics

Some 16 years after Oslo, the economy in the territories is still close to non-existent and wholly dependent on foreign aid. Not only is there no free market, there is no incentive to build one as the very mentality of Palestinian Arabs and their leaders is one of welfare rather than responsibility. All the plans to create a Palestinian Arab state do not consider Day 2 and how such a state would be able to sustain itself. The expected influx of hundreds of thousands of people from "refugee camps" would make it even worse. It would take at least a generation to turn the poisonous attitude of entitlement around.

Elephant 14: Gaza demographics

Gazans have no room to expand as their numbers continue to grow at among the fastest rates in the world.  Theoretically they could move to the West Bank but only a small percentage would. This is another Day 2 powder keg that is being ignored in the interests of a "solution" of a "Palestinian state." 

Elephant 15: Palestinian Arab leaders never showed interest in independence

The West assumes that the goal is an independent Palestinian Arab state where Arabs no longer have to live under "occupation." But the actions and words of Palestinian Arab leaders have never borne that goal out; they have not worked towards building the institutions and infrastructure that would be necessary in an independent state. Their insistence on "right of return" and "Jerusalem" as issues that must be resolved before independence betray their thought processes - inconsistent with independence (neither of which require those two issues to be resolved) and consistent with a desire to destroy Israel in stages.

Elephant 16: A unilateral Palestinian Arab state would be militarized

There is no way that a new Palestinian Arab state would remain demilitarized for any length of time. The Palestinian government could invite a friendly Muslim nation to position anti-aircraft weapons within its territory; to shoot missiles at El Al planes landing a few miles from the Green Line, or to get a few thousand tanks poised to cut Israel in half.

Iran already effectively controls Lebanon and Syria and is working to ensure Gaza comes back under its orbit. They would use the nascent state of Palestine to position themselves on the West Bank as well. Just like the PA ran away from Gaza at the first sign of trouble, so would they abandon their state to Iranian proxies and Islamic terrorists.

The PLO's will to defend themselves is not nearly as strong as their will to destroy Israel, a desire that has been inculcated in them for generations. Palestinian Arab nationalism is a fundamentally weak and externally-imposed construct. Iran is poised and anxious to take advantage of the chaos that would follow a unilaterally declared state, even if at the moment they are distracted.

But the West is ready to risk Israel for that elephant as well.

Elephant 17: The so-called "right to return"

The PA is showing no interest in integrating the Palestinian Arabs outside of the territories into their state. On the contrary; the "refugee camps" in PA controlled territory continue to grow, rather than shrink. Clearly, the PA expects the bulk of the  "diaspora" to go to Israel, not a Palestinian Arab state, and decades of incitement both within and without the territories have brainwashed generations of Arabs to not accept anything less than a "return" to a land that most of them have never stepped foot in. (UNRWA has been a major promulgator of this lie.)

Elephant 18: The tension between being pro-West and pro-Arab

The biggest Western success story in the Palestinian Arab territories is the existence of the "Dayton forces" that have been helping crack down on Hamas in the West Bank. 

However, most Palestinian Arabs regard those forces as puppets of the West. Not only do Hamas and Islamic Jihad hammer away at this point, but ordinary Palestinian Arabs do as well. The more cooperation between the PA and Israel/US, the more the PA government is delegitimized in the eyes of its people. 

Elephant 19: Corruption and human rights abuses are still endemic in the PA

Despite the publicized successes, the PA remains mired in corruption, hardly a model for an independent state. The 2008 Global Integrity Report rated the West Bank as close to the bottom in its corruption ratings. Press freedom remains low; the justice system is improving but hardly competent, and whistle-blowers are forced to go to the Israeli press to expose corruption. The success that the PA has had in weakening Hamas in the West Bank has come at the expense of massive human rights violations, including torture. 

Elephant 20: Palestine would be Judenrein

Statements by PA leaders make it clear that their state of Palestine would not have any Jewish citizens allowed within. Jews whose ancestors have lived in Judea and Samaria, whether for decades or for millennia, will be legally barred from living in Palestine - an extraordinary display of state anti-semitism that is completely at odds with the Western standards that the nascent state of "Palestine" is attempting to live up to. 

Elephant 21: The Muslim world's antipathy towards Israel

Even if all of the preceding elephants could somehow vanish, the Arab world and the Muslim world remains implacably against the idea of a Jewish state in the midst of supposedly Muslim lands. Iran remains in de facto control of southern Lebanon and Gaza; ordinary Jordanians and Egyptians remain among the worst anti-semites in the Arab world. The best "peace" would be bitter cold; it will not include any real normalization, and the threat from radical Islam remains potent in Arab and Muslim states. Furthermore, any tension between Israel and any of its neighbors - Hezbollah or Hamas or Syria - would result in even the moderate Arab world solidly behind Israel's enemies, no matter what. The best peace plan would result in Israel being exactly where it is today - surrounded by enemies, with less of a land buffer, and Israel relying on US money to prompt Arab neighbors to keep radicals in check. 

That is not peace, and that is not security. 

Elephant 22: The Arab Spring

We now see how tenuous is the hold of Arab leaders on their nations. The chances of a similar upheaval in the Palestinian Arab-controlled areas is not small. What would happen to the "peace agreement" then? 

Besides that, Abbas has no successor. Poll show that if elections were held today, the new president of the PA would be a convicted terrorist now in Israeli prison. Any piece of paper signed by Abbas would be next to worthless after he is gone.

 It is true that Egypt has, despite rhetoric, kept the Camp David accords, but that is out of self-interest. The entire point of Palestinian Arab nationalism has been to destroy Israel, not to achieve statehood - so their self-interest coincides with taking any Israeli concession and then reneging on their end.

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