The following article is from the Socialist Worker, October 1993, paper of the International Socialists (Canada). A Bad Deal For Palestinians --------------------------- US president Bill Clinton and other Western leaders hailed the accord signed between the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Israeli government early in September as the "dawning of a new era" of peace which "opens the door to a comprehensive and lasting settlement" in the Middle East. Many supporters of the Palestinians see the "limited autonomy" agreement as a realistic first step to end the bloody strife in the war-torn Middle East. After more than 40 years of fierce military conflict, they hope that the limited gains offered by the accord will lay the basis for an independent Palestinian state. Yet the new proposals, for all the international praise, do nothing to eliminate the underlying causes behind the wars and suffering. They do nothing to solve the basic conflict - the fact that Israel is built on land stolen from the Palestinians. They do nothing to address the systematic discrimination against Arabs within Israeli borders. Nor do they confront the fact that Israel survives through massive US aid in order to serve as "watchdog" for Western interests in the region. An editorial in the Arabic language weekly, A-Sunara, correctly argues that those who will benefit from the deal are the "states running the New World Order" and not the oppressed Palestinians. The agreement reached between the PLO and Israel marks a grave defeat for the oppressed masses of the Middle East, confirming Israel's dominance and the continued suppression of the Palestinian people. Only a month ago, Israeli politicians were condemning the PLO as a "terrorist" organization and jailing anyone who met with their representatives. The accord also follows the massive Israeli bombardment of Lebanon in August, showing that the Israeli government intends to maintain its military seige of neighbouring countries. It is a sign of both the despair and desperation of the traditional Palestinian leadership that the PLO has pursued such a disastrous strategy. PLO leader Yasser Arafat is desperately hoping to recover unquestioned leadership over the Palestinian people after decades of a dead-end strategy of courting the support of Arab states who have no interest in Palestinian liberation. The PLO also faces pressure from the fundamentalist Hamas movement, which rejects compromise with Israel. The autonomy agreement may be beneficial to some upper-class Palestinians, such as Arafat and Faisal Husseini, who some day hope to rule a independent state. But it will bring neither peace nor prosperity to the Palestinian masses, especially the 50 per cent of the Palestinian population who have lived in horrendous refugee camps outside of Israeli- controlled territory as a result of the dispersion of the 1947-48 and 1967 wars. The offer of limited autonomy in Gaza strip and West Bank amounts to little more than glorified municipal government. The Gaza strip is effectively a huge refugee camp similar to the bantustans in South Africa. Its population of 800,000 lives in dreadful poverty with unemployment exceeding 60 per cent. Acceptance of the limited autonomy deal would be like the African National Congress supporting the bantustans as a first step towards ending apartheid - something they have never considered. Israel is offering the PLO "control" over education, health, culture, welfare, direct taxation and tourism. Yet the lack of economic resources will likely mean poor quality schools, health care and social services. The PLO would have its own police force, but Israeli troops will remain ready to intervene whenever they feel it's necessary. According to Israeli foreign minister, Shimon Peres, the police would primarily be used to quell the Hamas movement which shows the divide and rule aims of the Israeli government. And if Palestinians got out of line, Israeli Prime Minister Rabin said: "the Israeli defense forces will always be there." Nothing has been done about the 13,000 political prisoners who remain in Israeli jails and the Israeli military has kept up a reign of terror in the occupied territories throughout the "peace" negotiations. The week the agreement was signed in Washington, Israeli soldiers gunned down numerous Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. Palestinian scholar, Edward Said, is right when he claims that: "The PLO has transformed itself from a national liberation movement into a kind of small-town government..." Real economic and military power in the Occupied Territories will remain firmly in Israeli's hands. For its part, the Israeli government is happy to conclude a deal which will lessen the pressure it faces from mounting economic crisis, a growing Islamic fundamentalist movement and the Intifada. Massive immigration from Eastern Europe has added to already high jobless rates and exposed the failures of Israel's health, welfare, housing and education services. The Labour government believes it can buy time to overcome these difficulties by dealing with a demoralized and weakened PLO. The "limited autonomy" deal amounts to an imperialist peace with Israel dictating all the terms of surrender. Such deals will not bring peace to the Middle East. Only the PLO's founding demand, for a democratic, secular Palestine in which Jews and Arabs live together, will provide the basis for peace. But in order to reach this a very different strategy than the PLO's needs to be followed. The racist state of Israel will only collapse when the hold of imperialism on the Middle East is eliminated. This means uniting the Palestinian and Arab working class to overthrow the reactionary Arab regimes and drive out the Western imperialists who are responsible for the terrible misery in the region.