As the Palestinian unity government announced June 2 receives a cautious welcome from many world leaders, Russia’s support for the new body is providing the Kremlin with an opportune platform to pursue its foreign policy ambitions and strengthen its domestic ideology.

Russia is one of the four members of the Middle East Quartet – along with the European Union, the United States and the United Nations – working on the Israeli-Palestine peace process and has pledged its, albeit cautious, support for the new body.

But with seven years of internal conflict having been brought to an end with the formation of the unity government, Russia is now likely to be looking to emphasise its role as peace broker in the Middle East to gain influence not just in the region, but in other areas torn by internal conflict, experts say.“Russia could use this unity government as a platform to push its position on a number of issues in the region.” – Dr. Theodore Karasik, Director of Research and Consultancy at the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis

Dr. Theodore Karasik, Director of Research and Consultancy at the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis (INEGMA), told IPS: “Russia could use this unity government as a platform to push its position on a number of issues in the region.”

“The Kremlin and the Russian Defence Ministry are beginning to make large inroads into the region, capitalising on perceived Western mistakes to win over countries on issues that are up in the air.”

For more than a decade, Russian foreign policy has ostensibly been against intervention of foreign powers in the affairs of other sovereign nations and it has increasingly viewed the Middle East as a good example to prove its point, highlighting the chaos and violence following direct U.S.-Western military action or support in various states.

And it has positioned itself as a peacemaker, trying to avert the same Western mistakes in Syria by pushing for a solution to the country’s internal conflict that does not involve U.S. military action.

This has given it an enhanced, if far from dominant, role in a region where it is already a major arms supplier to a number of regimes and has important relationships with key states such as Israel and Iran, among others.

Its support for, and role as part of the Middle East Quartet, in bringing about a unity government in an explosive part of a highly troubled region, will cement its position there, say Russian analysts.

It will also help to solidify support from others for its view that U.S.-led solutions for the region, and by extension other troubled parts of the world, are fatally flawed.

“Russia is looking for a position in the Middle East, utilising the perception of U.S. and Atlanticists’ mistakes that have led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in the region,” said Karasik.

“The idea of a Palestinian government is not just about a two-state system but about an Arab initiative to solve problems between internal factions, Hamas and Fatah, and bringing calm and peace in a wider area that goes beyond just Gaza.”

“Moscow is then aligned with Arab states supporting this and can say that it is working on this as a mediator and bringing peace just as it was right at the time when U.S. President Barack Obama was about to bomb Syria,” Karasik added.

Indeed, defence analysts say that many countries in the region already view U.S. policy on Ukraine as misguided and are likely to side with Russia in opposition to the Western sanctions that have been imposed on it in the wake of its annexation of Crimea.

Russia’s emphasis on stability in the region is also tied to the Kremlin’s domestic agenda. The spate of colour revolutions in neighbouring and geographically close states in the last decade, as well as the recent Arab spring uprisings, have left Russia’s political elite aghast.

Fears of something similar happening in Russia, which intensified deeply following the revolution in Ukraine earlier this year, have been behind a severe crackdown on civil liberties and basic rights in Russia, rights watchdogs have said.

By acting as a peacemaker parading the benefits of stability in countries in the Middle East – and therefore the rejection of Western military-intervention led approaches to resolving other nations’ internal conflicts – and garnering support for that view from other states, the Kremlin is also reinforcing tacit support for its own approach at ensuring order at home.

“It sees itself as looking to prevent chaos from ripping up countries from within, something which ties in with its domestic agenda,” said Karasik.

The Kremlin propaganda machine has repeatedly pushed the idea that the West has been behind foreign revolutions, fomenting and then orchestrating them.

Throughout the Maidan protests in November last year, it painted a picture of the demonstrations being led by Western-backed and funded fascist groups bent on destruction and chaos and ultimately ushering in an illegitimate government doing the bidding of the West and posing a direct threat to Russia.

And it can now point to the conflict in the east of Ukraine as another example of the resultant chaos when the West interferes in other sovereign states.

However, those same problems in Ukraine may mean that Russia will have to forego any ambitions it might have in expanding its influence in the Middle East, say some experts.

Sergei Demidenko, a Middle East specialist at the Institute for Strategic Analysis in Moscow, told IPS: “The Kremlin will not go overboard in its support for the Palestinian unity government, but at the same time it would not be the case that it will not support it.”

“Palestine and the Middle East are not important for Russia in terms of foreign policy because its focus is all on Ukraine and the post-Soviet space at the moment. It will say that it wants to see stability in the [Middle East] region and Palestine, and that may well be true, but it will say that because it needs to say something.”

“Russia’s influence in the Middle East is not as great as some may think and the concern now is on Ukraine, not Palestine.”

The announcement this week of a new Palestinian unity government was greeted with cautious optimism by most of the world, outside of Israel. In the United States, however, it set off political rumblings that threaten to swell into a storm.

The decision by the Obama Administration to maintain its relationship with the Palestinian Authority for the time being drew an unusually sharp rebuke from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “I’m deeply troubled by the announcement that the United States will work with the Palestinian government backed by Hamas,” Netanyahu told The Associated Press.

But the United States decided that the mere support by Hamas of a technocratic government was not sufficient reason to cut off aid and contact with the Palestinian Authority. The U.S. position is far more sceptical, however, than those of the European Union, United Nations, Russia, China, India, Turkey, France and United Kingdom, all of whom explicitly supported the unity government.“Based on what we know now, we intend to work with this government, but we’ll be watching closely to ensure that it upholds the principles that President Abbas reiterated” – U.S. State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki

The matter may become even more controversial in the future for the United States. Unlike any of the other countries which are maintaining their support of the Palestinian Authority, the United States has laws which limit support for a Palestinian government that is either controlled or “unduly influenced” by Hamas. That is not currently the case, but it very well could be if Palestinian elections, which were a part of the unity agreement, are held.

Following Netanyahu’s criticism of the U.S. stance, the powerful pro-Israel lobbying group, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) urged the United States to reconsider its relationship to the Palestinian Authority.

“(President Abbas) chose to align with Hamas.” AIPAC said in a statement. “U.S. law is clear – no funds can be provided to a Palestinian government in which Hamas participates or has undue influence.  We now urge Congress to conduct a thorough review of continued U.S. assistance to the Palestinian Authority to ensure that the law is completely followed and implemented.”

Since none of the ministers or current members of the Palestinian cabinet are also members of Hamas, there is no legal obligation to review, much less suspend, aid to the Palestinian Authority. Moreover, if there were a real threat to aid to the Palestinian Authority, it is not clear that AIPAC and other pro-Israel lobbying groups would support it.

In the past, such groups have been reluctant to see aid to the Palestinian Authority cut, fearing that the likely result would be its collapse, which would greatly magnify the security and administrative burden on Israel, which would have to administer such matters in the West Bank directly.

Nonetheless, members of Congress are not happy that the United States was so quick to approve of the new Palestinian government. Eric Cantor, a Republican and the Majority Leader in the House of Representatives, called on President Obama to immediately suspend aid to the Palestinian Authority pending a review.

“The Administration, in consultation with Congress, should initiate an immediate review of this new government,” Cantor’s statement said. “Until such time that it is determined that assistance to this so-called technocratic government is consistent with our own interests, principles, and laws it is incumbent on the Administration to suspend U.S. assistance.”

While Republican baiting on this issue was surely expected, Obama will face an uphill battle even within his own party. Representative Nita Lowey, the Ranking Democrat on the important House Appropriations Committee, offered only tepid support to Obama’s position. “As long as Hamas rejects the Quartet principles and the existence of the State of Israel, United States funding for this unity government is in jeopardy,” Lowey said.

“I still believe that the United States should continue its policy of promoting negotiations to achieve an independent state for the Palestinian people living side by side with Israel in peace and security,” she added.

The 2014 Appropriations Act clearly does limit the aid that the United States can give to the P. Palestinian Authority if Hamas controls or “has undue influence” over it. But the current government does not meet that standard.

“The law as currently drafted at least maintains the pretence of an opening to Palestinian reconciliation,” Lara Friedman, Director of Policy and Government Relations for Americans For Peace Now told IPS. “It in no way threatens or requires punishing the PA for simply seeking such reconciliation; to the extent that negative ramifications for reconciliation are threatened, such ramifications are triggered by the character of the government or entity that comes out of reconciliation efforts, not the fact of the reconciliation itself.”

That is completely consistent with the U.S. stance, as articulated by State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki: “Moving forward, we will be judging this government by its actions. Based on what we know now, we intend to work with this government, but we’ll be watching closely to ensure that it upholds the principles that President Abbas reiterated today.”

It is unlikely that Congress is going to take immediate action, but the battle lines ahead of a Palestinian election have been drawn. If the technocratic Palestinian Authority continues indefinitely, Congress may not go beyond bombastic statements. But if an election is held and, as is overwhelmingly likely, Hamas wins a significant presence in the new government, Congress will have the tools it needs to press for a major cut in aid to the Palestinians. It is clear that this is not something the Obama Administration desires, and many believe it is not good strategy.

“Serious analysts of the Israel-Palestinian conflict have long understood that a permanent, negotiated settlement would require agreement between a legitimate and popular Israeli government and a legitimate and popular Palestinian Authority,” Professor Stephen Walt, Robert and Renee Belfer Professor of International Affairs at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University told IPS.

“Israel’s long-term security would be best guaranteed by the creation of a competent, authoritative, and generally legitimate Palestinian government that could keep order and protect the Palestinians against both Israeli repression and also their own extremists.  Such a government could not happen, however, as long as there were deep divisions between Fatah and Hamas.  Accordingly, the unity agreement is a useful preliminary step.”

For the moment, pragmatism seems to be trumping jingoism. But the harsh rhetoric that Israel and its supporters in the United Stated have employed suggests that if the Palestinians do take the next step and actually elect a new government, the Obama Administration may be unable to maintain its relationship with them.

Palestinians during a sit-in before the former prime minister Ismael Hanyia’s house to support Palestinian reconciliation. Credit: Khaled Alashqar/IPS

By Khaled Alashqar
GAZA CITY, Jun 4 2014 (IPS)

The formation of a new Palestinian government between Fatah and Hamas announced on Monday is an important station on the path to reconciliation, “but there still many stations to be reached before achieving real unity based on partnership among all Palestinians.”

With these words, Amjad Al-Shawa, head of the Palestinian NGOs network in the Gaza Strip, welcomed the government of national consensus, but told IPS that all decisions previously taken during the period of division should now be cancelled.

“The formation of a government of consensus imposes major responsibilities on us as civil institutions to work on enforcing the reconciliation agreement and contribute effectively to national action on the grounds of partnership in the formulation of national plans.”"The formation of a government of consensus imposes major responsibilities on us as civil institutions to work on enforcing the reconciliation agreement” – Amjad Al-Shawa, head of the Palestinian NGOs network in the Gaza Strip

“We demand that Palestinian rights be ensured, including reopening of all closed societies during the time of division and realisation of the rule of law,” Amjad Al-Shawa added.

The new Palestinian government announced to put an end to the political division between Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is the third government headed by Ramy Al Hamdallah, who succeeded former Palestinian Prime Minister, Salam Fayyad, and is the 17^th government since the establishment of the Palestinian National Authority in 1994.

The Palestinian unity government was sworn in at the PLO headquarters in Ramallah, in the presence of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Four ministers from Gaza were unable to attend after Israel denied their access to the West Bank.

The role of the government of national consensus is to prepare for presidential and parliamentary elections in the Palestinian territories in addition to the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip, which indicates the intention of the new government to give priority to Gaza and try to break the blockade since the Hamas government took office in mid-June 2007.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said in a televised address to the Palestinian people that the new government would mean the end of internal division which has harmed the Palestinian cause, saying that the new government is a transitional government, whose mission is to prepare for elections.

Abbas stressed that, like its predecessors, the national consensus government remains committed to the agreement signed internationally by the Palestinian National Authority, and to the political programme adopted by the institutions of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

The mandate for political negotiations, he stressed, will remain with the Palestine Liberation Organisation as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.

He warned Israel that any punitive actions prejudicial to the interests of the Palestinian people by the Israeli government would not pass without an appropriate response.

The Palestinian President’s remarks clearly reflect Palestinian concern about the possibility of the punitive action from Israel that has been voiced by members of the Netanyahu government if the process of reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas continues.

These threats concern Hamas in particular, the militant Islamic faction that Israel and many Western countries consider a terrorist organisation.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not take long to act following the announcement of the new Palestinian government. His Political-Security Cabinet was immediately summoned for an urgent meeting to discuss ways of responding to the Palestinian Authority as a result of the joint government with Hamas.

The Cabinet decided to grant Netanyahu authority to impose sanctions on the Palestinian National Authority and the government of reconciliation without specifying the details.

Observers say that this is a sign that that the Israeli cabinet has chosen a centrist path to satisfy two extremes: the headstrong Naftali Bennett,Minister of the Economy and the leader of the right-wing ‘The Jewish Home’ political party, who rejects any settlement or compromise with the Palestinians, demanding punishment and annexation of their land to bring it under “Israeli sovereignty”, and Yair Lapid, Minister of Finance and chairman of the Yesh Atid (There is a Future) political party, who called for waiting, joining Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who said that the Israeli government  should not rush to respond to the Palestinians.

The Hamas Government in the Gaza Strip, which has spent seven years ruling Gaza under a tight Israeli siege, almost continuous closure of crossings leading to Gaza and successive financial crises, has stepped down and Ismail Haniya, former Prime Minister of the government in Gaza told a press conference that he welcomed the new Palestinian consensus government and stressed the need to end division.

One of the challenges facing the new Palestinian government is to repair Gaza’s relationship with Egypt, which is now expected to open the Rafah crossing which links the Gaza Strip with the rest of world. Egypt had placed the formation of a national government of unity as a condition for opening the Rafah crossing.

Meanwhile, Egypt welcomed the formation of the new Palestinian government. In a statement Monday, Egyptian foreign ministry spokesperson Badr Abdel–Atti said: “The formation of a government of Palestinian national consensus is an important step to support Palestinian unity and the restoration of the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, primarily the right to self-determination and establishment of their own independent and sovereign state based on the borders of 4 June 1967.”

The next few days will be very important for how the new Palestinian Government goes about exercising its functions, especially in the Gaza Strip, which has suffered greatly during years of abuses and violations of the rights of individuals and institutions.

The new Government will need time and concrete steps on the ground to restore the confidence of the Palestinian people.

Israel is the only country to have rejected the alliance between former rivals Hamas and Fatah. Credit: Zack Baddorf/ZUMA Press/IPS

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 4 2014 (IPS)

The United States’ decision to “work with” the new Palestinian government has virtually isolated Israel: the only country so far to have publicly rejected the political alliance between Fatah and Hamas.

“Not a single nation has heeded Israel’s futile call to boycott the new unity government,” said Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer for the State of Palestine to the United Nations.

The new government, joining rivals Fatah, which controlled the West Bank, and Hamas, which ruled Gaza, was enjoying support from countries around the world, except Israel, he said

“This is a significant development and in line with the national interests of the Palestinian people,” Mansour added.

"[I]t is in Israel's interest to have the two parts of Palestine in a kind of political congestion suffocating for lack of a pathway to liberation and peace." -- Vijay Prashad, Edward Said chair at the American University in Beirut (AUB)
Israel, one of the closest allies of the U.S., has already launched a scathing attack on the administration of President Barack Obama, describing U.S. recognition as “American naivete”.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the United Nations stands ready to lend its “full support” to the newly formed government in its effort to reunite the West Bank and Gaza, in line with the intra-Palestinian unity agreement of Apr. 23, under one legitimate Palestinian authority.

This, he pointed out, includes addressing the serious political, security, humanitarian and economic challenges in Gaza, and holding long overdue elections.

Asked if this means “U.N. recognition” of the new unity government, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters: “The issue of recognition of governments is one that is up to member states.

Dr. James E. Jennings, president of Conscience International and executive director of US Academics for Peace, told IPS, “The new Palestinian government has already conceded to Israel what the Zionist state has long demanded: that Palestinian leaders recognise Israel, thus essentially conceding Israel’s right to exist.”

Further, he said, Fatah’s leadership of the coalition, with its built-in security agreement with Israel, means the new Palestinian government also agrees to operate behind the apartheid wall as a demilitarised entity dismembered by scattered Jewish settlements under the protection of Israel and its intrusive security services.

“Even if the new government survives, the lives of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza will continue to be dominated by realities imposed by Israel backed by its indulgent uncle, the United States,” said Jennings.

While Mahmoud Abbas will continue to remain President of the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority, the new 17-member cabinet will be headed by Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah, described as a linguist and a former university president.

Clarifying the political nuances of the agreement, the Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU) said the new government is “composed of a consensus cabinet consisting of individuals agreed upon by all of the major Palestinian political parties.”

The cabinet does not include members of the two largest Palestinian parties, Fatah or Hamas.

Instead, it is made up of independent technocrats whose job is to prepare the groundwork for elections for the Palestinian Authority.

Although Hamas supports the government, none of the members of the new cabinet is affiliated with Hamas, IMEU said in a statement released Tuesday.

Hamas remains designated a “terrorist group” by Israel, the United States and some of the Western European nations.

“Fascinating development,” Vijay Prashad, Edward Said chair at the American University in Beirut (AUB), told IPS. “But it is taking place for all the wrong reasons.”

Hamas is weakened by the strangulation of the Gaza economy by a combination of the (normal) Israeli garrote and the Egyptian closure of the tunnels and checkpoints, he added.

“With little easy access to regional and international markets, Gaza faces financial desperation – and this on top of the normal de-development and financial pressures.”

Prashad said Hamas had no good choices available to it because Gulf money is not a long-term solution or (in this time of a shakeup) a short-term option.

The international agencies (the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank) all ask for reforms that are not an option for a small region that is essentially a permanent sanctions economy, he said.

“Hamas had to surrender to the neo-liberal policy slate that has become the main policy agenda for the Abbas-led government in the West Bank,” said Prashad, co-editor of ‘Dispatches from the Arab Spring’.

Asked if it was really a government of national consensus, he said: “No. More like a government of desperation”.

Hamas had to back off on its demand for its person to run both religious affairs and prisoner affairs. This shows you that it is not based on consensus, he noted.

“Israel is going to do all it can to undermine even this consensus situation. It will do everything possible to break the unity, including sabotaging the elections slated to take place in six months,” Prashad predicted.

“And it is in Israel’s interest to have the two parts of Palestine in a kind of political congestion suffocating for lack of a pathway to liberation and peace,” he added.

Jennings told IPS it was clear from the beginning of the rift between the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and Hamas that it would hopelessly divide Palestinian political ambitions and serve only the interests of Israel.

In fact, it has been a disaster for the Palestinian people.

“The question, now that a lacuna of seven years has separated the two factions and vast changes have taken place in the Middle East, is whether the April reconciliation agreement can possibly hold, and whether it is already too late to repair the damage.”

An even more daunting – and very doubtful – issue is whether the Obama Administration’s willingness to do business with the new unity government can withstand being crushed between the upper- and-lower-millstone coalition of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his numerous sycophants in the U.S. Congress, he noted.

The irony of that situation is analogous to the time when the ancient Israelites were reduced to having their weapons blocked and their tools sharpened by their arch-enemies, the Philistines.

There is no agreement with Israel on political rights leading to statehood, no human rights guarantees for Palestinians, no control of its own borders, and no realistic chance for the massive economic programmes that are needed to empower Palestinian growth and development.

The caretaker technocrat government installed by President Mahmud Abbas in Ramallah with the concurrence of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza is a step in the right direction, Jennings noted.

However, it has very little time to perform before scheduled elections take place six months from now. Over the past few years humanitarian needs in the Palestinian territories have grown exponentially.

Caught between Israel’s destructive policies and remaining elements of Hamas rejectionists in Gaza, it is very doubtful that the new leadership will be able to withstand Israeli attempts to torpedo it and inspire the full support of the international community that is sorely and urgently needed, Jennings declared.

(END)