Translator: Amir Hossein Mirsalehian
Source: Rasekhoon.net







 

At the level of Palestine, the region and at the international level
We consider the Palestine issue and its environment as dependent and independent variables respectively. By environment, we mean the international and regional environments or the Arab world. The effects of developments in Palestine, international and Arab worlds on the developments within Palestine are studied in three levels:
1. Analyzing the international system
2. Analyzing the region
3. Analyzing Palestine
Why the Oslo Peace Treaty was propounded in 1993? The peace and the tendency to establish it was not made in one night and it was the result of a long process.
After the Palestinian Resistance Movement was founded, it started to work in two regional and international fields. The supporets of this movement in each filed were known.
After the Israel regime was established, it was supported by powerful international supporters. The Israel’s supporets have been bound by their cooperation treaties with this regime so far while the Palestine’s supporters changed their position immediately and were shaky and unstable in their position to protect the Palestine’s resistance and some of them were compelled to submit to peace. There has been the same tendency for peace at the international and regional levels that has also influenced the Palestine resistance.
The USSR and China’s supportive position on Palestine
Among the superpowers, just USSR and China supported the Palestine resistance movement. At first, China supported Palestine more than any other country because it provided Palestinians with weapon and military training up to the 1970s. The first foreign travelling of Palestinian leaders was to China. After this travel, China undertook to provide weapon for Palestine Resistance. In addition, China casted an abstention vote on Division Resolution in UN voting while the Soviet voted in favor of it and accepted Palestine division and it was the second country, after U.S., that recognized Israel. But China continued to support Palestinians strongly up to 1970s. Since 1973 when Mao proposed the Three Worlds Theory, the Chinese decided not to support liberation movements in the world anymore and tried to enter to the international system and develop. Therefore, they decreased their protection from liberation movements and consequently Palestine Resistance in 1973 and 1974. The Soviet supported Palestinians politically and financially, but never gave in to their demand for substituting a Palestinian government for the Israeli one. The Soviets wanted to find a fair solution that guarantee the peace between Israel and Palestine.
The Soviet’s position on Palestine was that this problem would not be solved by military operation. This position was completely clear in one of USSR ministry of foreign affairs officials’ speech. This senior official said in his speech in 1973:
There are just two solutions for the Palestine issue, war and the other, peace. Palestinians and Arab world cannot defeat Israel unless the Soviet support them, but the Soviet is not agreed with war because it can be a reason for making a nuclear war between two superpowers that may endanger the world peace.
He believed that the best solution for Palestinians is a fair peace. Since 1975, the Soviet took this approach. This country was one of the founders of Geneva Conference programs. The Soviet asked for a meeting to be held between U.S., the Soviet, Israel and Palestine that make more efforts to make peace. It wanted to convince Palestinians that peace can better help to solve their problem. The Soviet’s disagreement with the Camp David Accord was a political rather than a revolutionary position. The Soviet wanted to play an important role in the peace process and did not want U.S. and Egypt to take the roles only. When Gorbachev was appointed as the leader of the Soviets in the early 1980s, he ignored the Palestine issue actually and insisted on making peace. In the late 1980s, Gorbachev let a mass of Russian Jews to immigrate to Palestine so that Palestinians despaired of the Soviets completely. The Soviet was one of the countries that insisted on the peace in Madrid Conference in 1991 and believed that Palestinians should make peace with Israel. Therefore, China and the Soviet sheered away from supporting Palestine and the Arab World, but at the Israel side, U.S. and Europe fuly protected Israel and supported it in every event and the Arabs were left alone. In 1973, in the Ramadan War that resulted in Arab victory, Syria and Egypt gained many victories, but in the second stage of the war, the U.S. supported Israel so strongly while the Soviet took a neutral position such a way that Israel finally could defeat the Arabs.

Although the Palestine disaster made the Arabs to protect them to some extent regionally, they tried gradually to make peace. This shifting in their position had some effects on Palestine Resistance. Egypt was one of the most important supporters of Palestine in the Arab world. In 1968, when Jamal Abdolnaser was the president of Egypt, after he was despaired of his six-day war, tried to solve the region problems politically. For example, he accepted Rodgers Plan in 1969 that led to some of the Palestinians’ protests. Since 1974, at the time of Sadat also, Egypt tried to politically solve the problems by running Kisiinger programs. After accepting this program by Sadat and his travelling to Israel and Jerusalem, Egypt did not Palestine any more.
The most important issue is that every revolutionary and guerrilla war needs a territory strategically more than any other thing so that it can lead to an armed operation against enemy.
It was so clear that Palestine also needed a territory. If we pay attention to leading guerrilla wars in Palestine, we can see that the wars started from the West Bank since the time Palestinians’ headquarter was in their territory by the 1976 war. In the operation started in January 1965, the guerrillas’ headquarter was in the West Bank and it continued up to 1967. But the Jordan government standed up to Palestinians from the beginning and did not let the Resistance Movement lead the Guerrilla operations against Israel in Jordan. By 1970, these disputes led to many disasters and Black September war between Jordan army and Palestinians during which many people were killed and finally the Palestinians were forced to leave Jordan and go to Lebanon. Since then, their headquarter was transferred to Lebanon, especially south of it where the Shiites of that region welcomed Palestinians so that they could continue the battle against Israel. Some of the problems in this region, like ideological differences and strategic attacks against Lebanese Shiites, help Israel to make Shiites stand up to Resistance movement. Although Israel did not succeed to organize this conspiracy, but it could partly achieve its goals.
The Palestinians were faced with many problems in Lebanon. The Lebanon government always reacted against the armed struggles of Palestinians so that Palestinians were forced to sign the Cairo agreement mediated by Jamal Abdolnaser. According to this agreement, the Lebanon agreement let Palestinians to lead the armed conflicts from south of Lebanon. In 1982, Israel attacked this region and tried to remove Palestinians from this region. The Israel war in 1982 is one of its most important wars and is considered as a great disaster during Palestine revolution. In this war, nobody helped Palestinians. Palestinians and Shiites of south of Lebanon and Lebanese were left alone in this war. Some of the political parties of Lebanon could fight against Israel only 70 days. Beirut was under siege for 70 days and was bombarded hundreds of times every day. Even a bullet was not fired at Israel by Arab countries. By Israel pressures, the Lebanese were driven to extremities so that they forced Palestinians to leave Lebanon.
In this battle, many innocents were killed. The U.S. also tried to kick out Palestinians from Lebanon by signing the Philip Habib agreement in 1983 and due to the internal problems, the civil wars started in Palestine. The Palestinians were forced to withdraw from Beirut and Bekaa Valley to Tripoli where they were forced to leave too by the Arab armies. Therefore, the Palestine Resistance Movement lost Lebanon as its headquarter too. Now, the Palestinians took a new approach to establish the peace. They went to Cairo and met Hosni Mubarak and in 1985, made peace with Jordan. Therefore, they could not continue armed conflict and Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon and Syria were not the fields to battle any more. They are not also allowed to make attacks against Israel from Syria. Palestinian Resistance Front was totally in desperation. Another important issue was that the Arab world, except for just few countries, tried to set up Guerrilla groups in Palestine rather than really help Palestine Resistance and become the founder of Palestine revolution. For example, Iraq that designed the Arabic front program, fighted against the Palestinians rather than Israelies. Iraq protected Abunezal and resorted to terror of Palestinian leaders.
Other Arabic countries also resorted to do so. Each country set up its own group and supported it. These internal groups tried to create division between Palestinians. For example, the guerrilla group of Alsaegha in Syria and supporting Abunezal by Libya intensified the disaster and led to disorganizing the Resistance.
In the middle 1980s, Egypt decided to make peace and Jordan that was one of Israel’s close friends from the beginning of its establishment, advocated making peace in 1980s and Saudi Arabia, that supported Palestinians financially, insisted on the peace after the program designed by Fahad. Morocco also took the same approach. In the Arab world, just Syria and Libya who were not so powerful wanted to continue war, but they were left alone.
The effects of countries and international function on the Palestine internal issues:
The armed conflict continued up to 1970s. After Egypt and USSR’s inclination towards peace, the Resistance Movement introduced a 10-item program in Beirut in 1974 that was a clear example of the effects of international and regional fields on the Palestinian one. The 15th item of this program suggested that the Palestinian National Charter that calls for the release of Palestine should be revised. In addition, in the 10-item program of Palestinians, it is mentioned that “in each area of the occupied Palestine that is released, we install a government”. According to this item, the Palestinians prepared themselves for peace with this justification that even if no area was released and obtained through peace and compromise, they can install a government there.
In 1970s, after China, the Soviet and Egypt had supported the peace and defeating of Syria in war, the Palestinians preferred to adjust their plans. After travelling of Sadat to Jerusalem in 1977and the Camp David Accord, the international and regional pressures forced the Palestinians to modify their positions. After the war in 1982 and the civil wars in 1983 between different Palestinian parties and the followers of Gorbachev, the Palestinians gathered in the 16th Meeting of the Palestine National Council in Algeria in 1988 and install a Palestinian government and announced to the world and Israel that they are ready to recognize Israel. After a short time, Yaser Arafat went to Geneva and officially recognized Israel as a country. The Madrid conferences in 1990s also maximized this effect more. Inside Palestine, the rise of Islamic Resistance Movement, Jihad and Hamas that were developed after weakness of Arabic and Palestinian Nationalism tried to take the field from the National Resistance Movement. Although they had not yet succeeded, they felt that Islamic groups would be more powerful over time in Palestine Liberation Organization. Another issue was the Palestinians isolation. After the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, the Palestine Liberation Organization’s support for Iraq isolated them to a great extent. After this war, the Palestinians felt that they do not indeed a significant role in the international and Arabic world. Regarding the Islamic Movement Development in one hand and their isolation within the Arab world and the disaster they suffered from on the other hand, the Palestinian leaders, like Arafat, decided to establish secret talks with Israel by the agency of Sweden. The result of these negotiations can b observed in Oslo agreement. The Oslo agreement, that was the result of the effects of international and Arab world on the Palestinian Resistance, was an event happened suddenly. All the world wanted to make the peace. The international and Arab world and Palestinians suffered from disaster. In fact, Arafat wanted to show that he still plays an important role in Palestine.

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