Editorials: Abbas’ intentions

SPECULATION abounds as to the seriousness with which Palestine President Mahmoud Abbas declared his intention not to run for elections in January. There were doubts from the start that is now being reinforced following the news that there might not be any elections at all. The Palestinian Election Commission’s ruling Thursday that the Jan. 24 vote should be put off because of opposition from Hamas appears to reinforce the already strong belief that Abbas really has no intention of stepping down.

Abbas’ announcement appears mainly aimed at pressuring the US to force Israel to freeze settlements. He may not resign if he receives real concessions from Israel with regard to the settlements issue. The problem is that if he sticks to his position that settlement construction must stop before negotiations resume, talks may remain frozen because of Israel’s position. But if he bends on that key issue, he will be attacked by Palestinians of all factions.

Those who think that Abbas is faking it argue that the Palestinian president has run out of options and is trying to re-establish his credentials from scratch. The countries known to back Abbas failed to bring enough pressure on Israel to make it offer the kind of tangible concessions that would make the Palestinian people believe in the peace process. Even President Barack Obama, who seemed at least for a while a potential savior, has ended up a liability rather than an asset for Abbas.

A pressing question is whether Abbas’ anger against Israel and the US is authentic. One interpretation says Abbas is acting bravely and for purely patriotic motives. Abbas, one could imagine, has done some soul-searching and decided to do what is good for the cause at a rather critical moment for the entire nation. People who think well of him believe that he is bowing out to give others a chance to put the Palestinian house in order. According to this interpretation, the Palestinian president will resist any pressure to accept a new term in office.

Even if Abbas was sincere about not contesting the next elections, this does not mean he will step down from office. He could easily remain de facto president of the Palestinian Authority until elections take place after national reconciliation is achieved, whenever that may be.

It is still uncertain if Abbas will reconsider his decision. He claims not to desire power, but his actions are to the contrary and imply he is willing to go far to hold on to his position. Without Gaza, which is controlled by Hamas a complete election cannot be held. The Election Commission did not set a new date, meaning the election would be postponed indefinitely.

Abbas is probably the most moderate Palestinian leader from the Israeli and Western viewpoint. The extremist view will go so far as to say Abbas is not a partner as much as he is collaborator. Whatever the case, it is inconceivable, at least at this juncture, that any other Fatah substitute who would replace Abbas would be willing to accommodate Israeli whims, especially on matters related to Jerusalem and the settlements. Abbas, it seems, has realized that his supporters and may be even his detractors need him more than he needs them.

Faith in US justice

US President Barack Obama’s decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in a civilian court is a brave move and the correct one, said The Observer in an editorial on Sunday. Excerpts:

The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the US had such profound global consequences that they have lodged in the world’s collective imagination as a pivotal moment in history. That makes it hard sometimes to see them, in the plainest of terms, as a crime. But the need to see 9/11 in precisely those terms is implied by last week’s decision by US authorities to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the self-confessed mastermind of the attacks, and four alleged accomplices, in a civil court in New York. It is a decision for which Obama deserves great credit.

The men have been held in Camp Delta, the US military detention center at Guantanamo Bay. Its closure was an important election pledge for Obama, signaling an intent to reassert the primacy of constitutional law in the conduct of America’s anti-terror policies. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s arrival on US soil, and entry into a courtroom under US legal jurisdiction, will be a moment of great symbolic importance in that process. Under President Bush, US and international statutes governing the rights of prisoners — civil or military — were subordinated to expediency in the pursuit and interrogation of terrorist suspects. The White House condoned kidnap, indefinite detention and torture as part of a “war on terror�. That apparatus did much to corrode the image of the US as a bastion of fairness, governed by constitutional principle.

That is not to say that a trial of the alleged 9/11 plotters in a federal court will signal a perfect constitutional restoration, nor that past aberrations are easily forgotten. There is no clean break from the Bush approach. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was detained for years without charge and subjected to “waterboarding� — now admitted by the US to be a torture technique — some 183 times. Evidence thus procured will be tainted. That legacy will be on trial alongside the defendants. Lawyers will find much to debate even before testimony is heard.

Then there is the problem of disinterested jurors. There is hardly a chance of finding 12 Manhattan residents who have not already formed strong opinions about the crime and the defendants.