Mahmoud Abbas Continues Ruthless Campaign Against Opponents

Last week I reported that Mahmoud Abbas was monitoring the phone calls of political opponents. A few weeks before that Jordan, at Abbas’ behest, seized Mohammad Dahlan’s assets as well as those of his brother and an unidentified individual.

Palestine Press and Palestine Today are both reporting that Fatah has expelled Samir Mashharawi. Mashharawi is a friend of Dahlan and worked with him in Gaza, when Dahlan was in charge of the security forces. Dahlan was expelled from Fatah back in June, with ratification of the expulsion coming in August.

According to Palestine Press, Mashharawi slammed Fatah a few weeks ago in an interview on Al-Arabiya. Mashharawi reportedly said that Fatah “lacked leadership” and had lost “the spirit of the struggle.” According to Al-Quds Al-Arabi, Mashharawi has been residing in the UAE, where he is engaged in business dealings with Dahlan.

Abbas is also targeting Mashharawi due to his comments in support of Dahlan in the Abbas-Dahlan affair. According to Mashharawi, the dispute between Dahlan and Abbas is“personal” and Abbas is using it as a distraction as he “wants to run away from five years of failure in running the Palestinian Authority and the political portfolio.”

In July 2011, Palestinian Authority security forces, at the behest of Abbas, raided Dahlan’s home in Ramallah. During the raid they arrested 23 guards and confiscated 16 guns and two vehicles. According to Mashharawi, Abbas wanted to do far more.

“They wanted to initiate an armed clash with Dahlan’s men so that the police could open fire. The goal was to kill Dahlan and then announce that he was part of a conspiracy to overthrow the Palestinian president.”

All of these events further emphasize the points recently made by Jonathan Schanzer.

All things considered, Dahlan’s fate is inconsequential. His star fell long ago. More noteworthy is the ruthlessness Abbas has employed in pursuing him. With Washington’s full support to fend off Hamas’s challengers, Abbas has become relentless against anyone who dares challenge him.

While Dahlan will probably not pose a political threat from exile, Abbas will likely keep after him. But it won’t end there, either. The Palestinian president has also picked fights with other potential political threats, including Prime Minister Fayyad, and Yasser Abbed Rabbo of the PLO. All three share a belief that the Palestinian Authority under Abbas has become less transparent and strayed from its original goal: a viable and transparent state that coexists with its neighbors, including Israel.

The Dahlan affair can best be understood as a witch hunt. It underscores the fact that Abbas has consolidated power, and that he will abide no challenges. Abbas’s whims bode poorly for the Palestinian Authority, which may now expend more energy settling scores than resolving the long-standing conflict with Israel.

Don’t you just love Palestinian politics?

Update: Palestine Press is reporting that Mashharawi’s expulsion from Fatah is official. Palestine Press runs a photo, which sums up where Abbas’s mind has been of late.

11 thoughts on “Mahmoud Abbas Continues Ruthless Campaign Against Opponents”

  1. Isnt Israel or the US to some extent maintaining his power by quietly opposing new elections that might give Hamas more power?

  2. What happens when Abbas dies? Even without the “lifestyle” of Arafat, he’s already quite old. How can you build a nation without some political structure that allows people to move up?

    1. Unknown. There are people like Nabil Shaath, Saeb Erekat, but they still represent the Old Guard of Fatah. The Young Guard has never been given a chance to really develop. In the 2006 elections, the divide between the two was a key part of Fatah’s defeat. There is a great quote from Mohammad Dahlan in this Wikileaks cable after the results of those elections came through.

      Successful Fatah candidate Mohammed Dahlan confirmed that Hamas would gain a majority. He opined that Hamas should form a government and that Fatah should stay out. Dahlan said “we have to reform this piece of s–t called Fatah.” He was very angry with Abu Mazen for allowing the chaos in Fatah to continue in the runup to the campaign and for appointing the “incompetent Nabil Sha’ath” as Fatah campaign manager. Dahlan thought that “Abu Mazen should dismiss all the leadership in Fatah” and start over. He thought that Hamas would not actually be able to govern, but that he would rather have “one year of chaos” than “going on like this.”

      As you can tell it has not be reformed, Abbas and his cronies have simply consolidated their power.

  3. “…….Palestinian Authority under Abbas has become less transparent and strayed from its original goal: a viable and transparent state that coexists with its neighbors, including Israel.”

    If this is what Schanzer really thinks, then I have a bridge that I can sell him.

  4. So say there is an agreement, and then they have a “Palestinian Spring”. Then what?

    (Although thanks to contact with us, they are probably somewhat more “liberal”.)

    We have a law, that was pushed through, kicking and screaming, that requires a plebiscite for an agrrremnt. I suggest we require one for the other side also.

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