Palestinian Authority and P.L.O. Non-Compliance with signed agreements and commitments: A record of bad faith and misconduct

Direct Use of Violence

Clearly, the most obvious breach of the Palestinian commitments involves the direct participation of its armed forces - the Palestinian "Police" (in effect, Arafat's regular army) and the various Security organs – in armed clashes with the I.D.F. or in attacks on Israeli citizens.

The pattern evident in the current crisis had already been established in 1996, when Palestinian policemen played a major role in the extensive clashes that left 15 Israeli soldiers dead; in effect, they acted as a fighting force - even in places where only hours earlier some of them participated in the Joint Patrols with the I.D.F., according to the Interim Agreement.

In the recent crisis, the role of the regular Palestinian forces has been somewhat more ambiguous - in line with Arafat's interest in keeping his hand half-hidden, and using mainly his militia forces - the Fatah "Tanzim" or cadres - in the firefights and attacks on Israeli targets. Still, in the context of the overall crisis.

Local Police commanders were, in fact, given orders, at times, to re-establish law and order and restore the calm – but their actions often indicated that they felt (or rather, realized) that such instructions do not fit in with Arafat's broader support for the struggle (as reflected in the propaganda effort, as detailed below) and were therefore half-hearted in carrying them out.

In many cases, Palestinian Policemen took an active part in the fighting, in an organized fashion or as individuals; and there is no evidence (now or on previous occasions) of disciplinary action being taken against those who did so. There is evidence, moreover, as to the complicity of Preventive Security operators - particularly in the Gaza Strip - in armed attacks on the I.D.F. and on Israelis.

Perhaps the most serious event for which the Palestinian police bears a major share of responsibility in the recent crisis was the lynching of two Israeli reserve soldiers in Ramallah on October 12, 2000. It was indeed a mob which killed them and mutilated their bodies: but it had been the Palestinian policemen who captured them, brought them into the Police Headquarters at the center of town, and then put up only a half-hearted effort to prevent the attack. So far, the P.A. did nothing to punish those resp onsible.

Everyday Practices: the Palestinian Security Organs - such as Preventive Security, as well as the General Intelligence Service and its arm in the West Bank, under Colonel Tawfiq Tirawi, have been involved in other violent actions in breach of the agreements, such as the abduction or unlawful arrest of Israeli citizens (in some cases, Israeli Arabs suspected as "collaborators"), and the murder of Palestinian real estate dealers (suspected of selling land to Jews).

Another salient case (outside the context of any specific local confrontation - in which a senior P.A. official acted, in effect, as a terrorist - involved BG (now a Major General) Ghazi Jabali, the Commander of the Police Force, issuing orders for an attack - actually carried out by two of his colonels - on settlers in the West bank in July 1997 ("Yediot Aharonot", July 18 1997).

Moreover, at various "friction points" (e.g. events in Bethlehem, March 1998; the Gush Katif road in the Gaza Strip, July 1998; Khan Yunis, February 1999), Palestinian policemen and members of other organized forces drew weapons in support of violent demonstrators or in direct confrontations with the I.D.F.

Ambivalence towards, or outright complicity in, acts of terrorism "I want to make it clear that any arrangement or active understanding between the P.L.O. and the Hamas on the possibility of continued terrorism by the Hamas, with the consent of the P.L.O., would preclude an agreement and prevent its implementation" (Prime minister Rabin at the Knesset, April 18 1994).

In terms of its impact on Israeli society, and hence on the prospects for building the necessary bridges of trust and cooperation, it was the Palestinian failure to comply with its commitments on restraining terrorism - and in fact, the periodic courting of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad as partners in the struggle – which left the most bitter legacy in 1995-1996, and now seems to be repeating itself.

An important development, in this respect, was the understanding between the P.A. and the Hamas leadership, in preparation for the January 1996 Legislative Council elections - in effect, encompassing the sort of "rules of the game" for terrorist action that Prime Minister Rabin had warned against, more than a year earlier. -What the P.A. sought (in the draft exchanged with the Hamas in October 1995) was "an end to military operations in or from the National Authority's territory, or declaring them in any fo rm". (JMCC daily Press Summary, October 12, 1995).

The actual understanding, reached in Cairo between PNC Chairman Salim al-Za'anun and Hamas leader Khalid Mash'al on December 21 1995 ("al-Quds", December 22, 1995), allowed the Hamas to "hold on to its reservations" as regards the Palestinian commitments [to restrain terrorism]; but the movement did undertake "not to aim at embarrassing the Authority" - i.e., avoid operations which the P.A. could be blamed for.

In a joint interview ("al-Nahar'", December 23, 1995), Za'anun went so far as to explain that in the event of an attack in Hebron (then still under Israeli rule) it will not be the Palestinians' duty to do anything about it; if Israel wants to avoid such action, it should hurry up and withdraw from the rest of the territories...

This concept was clarified by the PLO representative in the Arab League, Muhammad Subayh, a few months later: Hamas, he said, had committed itself not to act from inside Palestinian controlled areas (MENA in Arabic, March 8 1996, in FBIS-NES-96-048, March II). By the time this revelation was made, the terrorist campaign within Israel - which nearly brought down the entire process - was already well underway. This only confirmed a general pattern of negligence - and at times, active complicity, or at least t acit moral support for the Hamas - on the part of the P.A. and its security organs.

Throughout the early period of consolidation in the areas under its control - from May 1994 onwards - Arafat resisted constant pressures by Israel to restrain the Hamas and restrict, if not destroy, the infrastructure established by the terrorist organization. The failure to do so put in question the basic underpinnings of the Oslo accords; and its most evident outcome was a sharp rise in the number of Israelis who fell prey to terrorist attacks during this period.

Arafat, throughout this period, continued to embrace the Hamas, in political terms; when the "Engineer" Yahia 'Ayyash - the man behind many of the worst Hamas attacks - was killed, he came to pay his condolences to the Hamas leader Mahmud al-Zahhar ("al-Quds'\ January 6, 1996). Meanwhile, the Preventive Security Chief in Gaza, Dahlan, apparently kept his contacts with the leader of the “’Izz al-Din al-Qassam" forces - the Hamas military arm - Muhammad Dheif (a childhood friend) and broke them off only after the second bombing in Jerusalem. ("Haaretz", March 10 1996).

It was the political fallout (including intense international pressure) following the suicide bombings of February-March 1996 which finally led to a break in this pattern, as the P.A. belatedly awoke to the consequences of its conduct on this issue.

Still, in March 1997 there was once again more than a hint of a "Green Light " from Arafat to the Hamas, prior to the bombing in Tel Aviv (later applauded by Barghuti, as mentioned above): this is implicit in the statement made by a Hamas-affiliated member of Arafat's Cabinet, Imad Faluji, to an American paper ("Miami Herald", April 5, 1997).

The next few years, in which the question of "reciprocity" took center stage in the negotiations (culminating in the Wye River memorandum and the attached security understandings), were marked by mixed results - the pressure for security cooperation did lead to partial compliance, but no real steps were taken against terrorist infrastructures; and the "revolving door" practice - i.e., the release of active terrorists and Hamas/Palestinian Islamic Jihad operators, long before they had served their terms - be came (and remained) a constant problem.

The P.A., since its establishment, has in fact taken a consistently lax attitude towards terror activists. It did act, in periodic bursts, to arrest some of them, and to respond (until the recent crisis broke; very rarely since) to specific information from Israel or other (mostly U.S.) sources on actual attacks being planned; but most of the time: -