Fatah; PLO Threaten To Abrogate Oslo Accords Security Arrangements

Fatah, which is the largest faction in the PLO and which is in an ongoing struggle with Hamas to control the Palestinian Authority, has threatened to abrogate security arrangements that were established under the Oslo Accords because the peace process has broken down over an inability of the Palestinians to recognize Israel's right to exist and refusal to accept a 2-state solution.

That's not how the Palestinians see it, of course. They'd like to claim that the talks have collapsed because Israel refuses to stop building housing, but housing has never been an impediment to peace. Just as the Egyptians; Israel withdrew from Sinai and destroyed thousands of homes and uprooted Israelis who lived in Sinai as part of the Camp David talks.

The Palestinian Authority will stop coordinating its security with Israel, in response to the US's official announcement that peace talks have failed, Al Quds al-Arabi reported on Friday.

Khana Amira, a PLO official, told the UK newspaper that the PA is also considering canceling its other commitments to Israel, including the Oslo Accords and the Road Map, which demand that terror organizations will stop.

Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior PLO official and an adviser to PA President Mahmoud Abbas reportedly plans to convene a meeting with the PLO and Fatah central committees on Friday afternoon, in order to make a new plan for the Palestinians.

Palestinian officials told Al Quds al-Arabi that they expect US President Barack Obama to attempt to restart peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

"Maybe the meeting will give the American government another chance," an official told the paper.

The Palestinians are also considering seeking the UN Security Council's recognition of a Palestinian state on all the Palestinian territories that were captured by Israel in 1967.

What the Palestinians want is to make their territories free of an Israeli and Jewish presence. They want to accomplish what never has happened in the course of history of the region - to eliminate the Jewish presence in areas that have historically had a Jewish presence, including in Jerusalem and its environs. To that end, the Palestinians continue to engage in revisionist history (and here), which shows just how unwilling the Palestinians are to accepting a 2-state solution. They are unwilling to admit that Israel has legitimacy and longstanding and historical claims to the land.

Moreover, Palestinian consideration of a Security Council recognition of a Palestinian state on all Palestinian territories that were captured by Israel in 1967 doesn't hold water.

For starters, Palestine didn't exist. When Israel declared independence in 1947, Arab states around former Mandate Palestine invaded and took the land for itself. Egypt captured Gaza and Transjordan (now Jordan) captured the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The Palestinians want to eliminate Israeli control over East Jerusalem, which includes the Temple Mount and the Western Wall, Judaism's holiest sites on the planet. Israel will never accept such a situation, and it is unlikely that the Security Council will abide by such a unilateral declaration against Israel as long as the US hold veto power to stop action.

The Palestinians continue to refuse to negotiate in good faith with Israel and they have habitually shown themselves to be incapable of making a deal on which lasting peace can occur. Palestinian propaganda efforts repeatedly attack Israel's right to exist and indoctrinate new generations of Palestinians to seek Israel's destruction as a religious and political obligation, and that doesn't even get into Hamas' refusal to accept Israel's existence as anything other than aiming points for its terrorists.

It's also questionable as to whether President Obama would restart peace talks when his efforts to date have been an abject failure. It made little sense for his involvement in the process at the outset of his presidency since the conditions were not favorable to even the slightest movement on peace since the Palestinians have become more strident in their demands without making any concessions to peace. Hamas remains as it has been for years, and they have consolidated power in Gaza, which means that any peace deal would have to go through Hamas, which has not wavered in its refusal to make peace with Israel (it wont even recognize Israel). So the President cannot even acknowledge with whom Israel is supposed to negotiate when the Palestinian Authority itself lacks legitimacy to negotiate on behalf of the Palestinians (Hamas and Fatah refuse to recognize the others right to control the PA and elections have not been held to reconcile the strident differences).

US efforts to restart the peace process have been a miserable failure since President Obama took office because he and his diplomatic corps have steadfastly refused to recognize the reality that the Palestinians would much rather accept the status quo - take foreign aid, including from the US, without having to build a peaceful infrastructure alongside Israel while continuing calls for Israel's destruction and rabble rousing, rather than making the tough decision to make peace. Without a partner in peace, there can be no peace. Until the Palestinians show a willingness to make concessions, there can be no peace. Until the US recognizes that its continued efforts will meet with failure until the Palestinians change their tune, there can be no breakthrough.