Inside the glass house

NEW YORK - The intra-Palestinian fighting in Gaza and the West Bank last week has triggered speculation of a three-state solution to the crisis in the region: Gaza, the West Bank and Israel. But the biggest single losers in the break up of Gaza and the West Bank, separated by Israeli territory, are the Palestinians.

A poll conducted by the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research revealed that 59 percent of Palestinians blamed both Fatah and Hamas for the infighting while 71 percent said both sides were losers. Perhaps the most startling revelation was that 70 percent of Palestinians polled said "the chances of an independent Palestinian state are low or non-existent."

The tragedy of the Arab world -- not excluding the Palestinians -- is that its continued political disunity has always been successfully and skillfully exploited by its enemies -- and by the Western world. Even the 22-member League of Arab States, created in 1945 to project a symbol of Arab nationalism, remains divided on some of the major political issues troubling the Middle East.

Jehane Noujaim, the Lebanese-American film maker who produced 'Control Room', a widely-acclaimed documentary on the Arab television network Al Jazeera, has a visually realistic story to tell. She said that at an Arab summit meeting years ago, the cameras were forced to stopped rolling to prevent the recording of insults and name-calling by two Arab leaders screaming at each other.

''You see the Arab League get-together, and certain members can't even have a conversation,'' Noujaim said. ''They're all standing on tables fighting with one another." Already, Egypt and Jordan, with strong support from the US and Israel, are hosting a summit meeting to shore up Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and isolate Hamas which took over the Gaza from Fatah last week.

The breakup of the Palestinian territory into Gaza and the West Bank has also thrown into disarray a Palestinian unity government that was delicately crafted by the Saudis. The intervention of Egypt and Jordan on the side of Abbas has only widened the split between the two warring parties.

The Western world, and specifically the US, has refused to give Hamas its legitimate political status despite its victory at parliamentary elections in January 2006. The US has declared Hamas a "terrorist organisation." Abbas's decision to dissolve the Hamas-led government of national unity and appoint a new, emergency government headed by former Finance Minister Salam Fayyad, has been hailed by the Bush administration.

"We are going to support President Abbas and what he wants to do," US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said last week, as she announced that Washington would immediately send some $86 million in aid, currently suspended, to the Palestinian Authority (PA). The US strategy is to boost Abbas and strengthen the West Bank economically. At the same time the Bush administration will try to prevent any funding trickling into Gaza, thereby hoping such a cash crisis would reduce Hamas' popularity among Palestinians.

The isolation of Gaza, which has a population of about 1.5 million people, has already threatened a humanitarian crisis there. "The situation we have at the moment is an extremely serious one", said David Shearer, Head of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

"We are quite concerned about the ability to open those (border) crossings and allow supplies -- commercial supplies more than relief supplies -- to start moving again," he told reporters at a UN press briefing last week. Since Gaza has no functioning sea or airport through which to deliver goods, the closure of the road crossing has worsened the crisis preventing the movement of food supplies.

Shearer said the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the World Food Programme (WFP) have been able to deliver some food and medical supplies into Gaza. But an estimated 600 people needing regular treatment for cancer, and other tertiary care that was not available in Gaza, have been prevented from leaving.

Underlining the gravity of the situation, backed by a presentation of maps showing the humanitarian situation on the ground, Shearer said that in the last seven years, gross domestic product (GDP) in the Occupied Palestinian Territory had dropped by 40 per cent and poverty had risen from 22 per cent to more than 60 per cent.

Meanwhile, as the political and humanitarian crises continue to deteriorate, the UN is sceptical about a proposal for the creation of a peacekeeping force in the Israeli-occupied territories. "There is little chance of any such force," Michael Williams, the U.N.'s new Middle East envoy told reporters last week. He said it is "interesting" that the question of such a peacekeeping force was now being discussed-- for the first time-- by all parties to the Middle Eastern conflict.

But until and unless everyone-- especially Israel and the Palestinians-- agree, such a peacekeeping force is unlikely, said Williams, the U.N.'s special coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.

Palestine: Three states or no state