CPTnet
 13 September 2007
HEBRON: An independent Palestinian view of Fatah and Hamas

by Lorin Peters

H. comes from a long line of independent activists. His grandfather was one
of the founders, in 1920, of the Palestinian Peoples (formerly Communist)
Party. He is critical of both Hamas and Fatah. But, he notes Fatah has had
much more access to power. And it has demonstrated that power indeed
corrupts.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) legislative elections do not use proportional
representation. Fatah, the political party in control of the PA wrote the
rules to favor itself. The party with the largest number of votes gets more
than its share of legislative seats. Two years ago, Mahmoud Abbas, the
leader of Fatah since the death of Yassir Arafat, saw that Fatah was losing
popularity. He asked the legislature to adopt proportional representation
-- each party receives seats in direct proportion to the number of votes it
gets. But most of the Fatah representatives refused, assuming they would be
re-elected.

In the January 2006 elections, Hamas got 42% of the popular vote; Fatah got
38%. But because of Fatah's rules, Hamas got 65% of the seats, while Fatah
got only about 25%.

H. claims that 30% of Fatah's own security officers voted for Hamas because
of Fatah's corruption. Palestine uses NIS (new Israeli shekels), but the PA
operates almost entirely on donations from outside nations. The value of
the U.S. dollar ranges from 4.0 to 4.5 NIS. H. explained that the heads of
the sixteen different Fatah security forces exchange the dollars, pay their
men 3.5 NIS per dollar, and pocket the difference (about 20% of their
payrolls). The International Red Cross delivers food aid to most families
in Palestine via the security headquarters during the day. By the time the
officers return to headquarters, half of the food, the best half, has
disappeared.

H. also noted the problem of weapons in Palestinian society. Some
Palestinian clans have better weapons than the security forces. The
Palestinian police arrested a clan member last winter. His clan attacked
the police station holding him and took twelve policemen hostage. They took
all the weapons in the station, including high-powered rifles and
riot-control gear. And they held the station for many days.

No one accuses Hamas of corruption. And it has experience running hundreds
of soup kitchens throughout Palestine. But H. says it has never run
anything as complex as the PA. Fatah has leaders who are quite capable of
running the PA. But Fatah has not reformed its corrupt practices. Not even
after losing the election.