Report by Robert Dreyfuss in the Nation, on an appearance at Washington Institute for Near East Policy last week of Lt. Gen. Keith Dayton, who is training Palestinian troops in the West Bank and who said that two-state solution is required, and in a hurry:
Recognizing that by organizing and training thousands of Palestinian troops, professionally led, he is creating in effect a nationalist army, Dayton warned the 500 or so WINEP listeners that the troops can only be strung along for just so long. "With big expectations, come big risks," said Dayton. "There is perhaps a two-year shelf life on being told that you're creating a state, when you're not." To my ears, at least, his subtle warning is that if concrete progress isn't made toward a Palestinian state, the very troops Dayton is assembling could rebel.
Dayton was responding to a question from Paul Wolfowitz, the neoconservative former deputy secretary of defense, who now hangs his hat at the neocon-dominated American Enterprise Institute. "How many Palestinians see your people as collaborators?" Wolfowitz asked. In answering Wolfowitz, the general acknowledged that Hamas and its sympathizers accuse the Palestinian battalions of being "enforcers of the Israeli occuption." But he stressed that each one of them believes that he is fighting for an independent Palestine.
Jeff Blankfort responds:
I don't agree with Dreyfuss's analysis, that the US trained army will turn on Israel if there is not a move towards Palestinian statehood. There is a sad phenomenon one sees throughout the world--El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Burma, and numerous African countries-- in which armies composed of a nation's poor have no problems in being convinced, thanks to money and status, to murder their fellow poor. One of the problems that I found with Fatah and its supporters going back to 1970 was that, beyond simple nationalism, with few exceptions, they were totally lacking in political awareness and, as such, Yasser Arafat, was ideal as their leader. When Fatah members started thinking for themselves and raising important questions, they were routinely purged. When the Fatah paper, Al-Fajr,raised questions about PLO corruption in the early 90s, Arafat shut it down. That the PA/Fatah troops suppressed protests in the West Bank during Gaza, that they stand by while Israeli soldiers continue to assassinate other Palestinians and destroy homes of their fellow Palestinians in the West Bank speaks volumes and the sound they make is very ugly. I guess they would have no problem controlling a Palestinian Bantustan which seems, in fact, what they are being trained to do.
The palestinian troops are headed by Mohammed Dahlan, who was also responsible for the coup against Hamas – the one that Hamas preempted by striking first. What's the hierarchy of who these security forces listen to? First US, then Israel, then Fatah? With Dahlan's private interest thrown in somewhere too?
Who does Fatah represent these days?