Mahmoud Abbas is in a very lonely place just days after having been rolled out onto the international stage as the new hope of the Palestinians. The barrage of criticism has come not only from those with a vested interest in seeing his pursuit of the "roadmap" fail — the militant groups waging the armed intifadah, and Arafat — but also on the streets. Among those who bothered to pay attention to the meeting in Aqaba, there was widespread anger at the perception that Abbas had said many things the Israelis and Americans wanted to hear, but had avoided articulating Palestinian grievances. "There was no Palestinian voice at Aqaba," Palestinian human rights campaigner and longtime Arafat critic Mustafa Barghouti told the BBC. And the summit was condemned during Friday prayers in mosques throughout the West Bank.
Abbas had been holding meetings with Hamas leaders in the weeks leading up to the Aqaba summit, hoping to persuade them to sign on to a cease-fire. His plan had been to buy back weapons from militants and integrate some of them into the Palestinian security services. While the Israelis were willing to indulge Abu Abbas's cease-fire efforts, they also made clear that simply restraining militants from launching terror attacks was not enough. Implementing the "roadmap" would require that groups such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah's own Al-Aqsa Martyr's Brigade be dissolved, disarmed and their leaders detained. While Hamas may have been open to discussing some form of temporary truce, at least to the extent that this was necessary to avoid being blamed on the Palestinian street and in the wider Arab world for the failure of a peace plan, it can plainly see that the success of the "roadmap" would equal its own destruction. Hamas's decision to break off talks, then, is hardly unexpected — the fact that it came so soon after Wednesday's summit, however, is a sign that the Islamists have determined that there is very little enthusiasm or support among ordinary Palestinians for the efforts of Prime Minister Abbas.
The al-Aqsa Martyr's Brigade, however, kept open the possibility of a cease-fire. But only if Israel agrees to end the policy of assassinating terror suspects, release the approximately 6,000 Palestinian militants it currently holds in prison and restore Yasser Arafat's freedom of movement on the West Bank. And it's far from clear Abbas could wrest such concessions from Sharon right now.
The focus of much of Wednesday's summit was the need to launch a Palestinian "war on terror," and if Hamas won't come quietly the U.S. and Israel will expect Abbas to act forcefully to, in the words of White House spokesman Scott McLellan, "dismantle the infrastructure of terror." It's far from clear that Abbas has sufficient means even if he had the political will to go to war with Hamas. His security services remain weak and dispersed, and may be weaker on the ground than the militant groups in different parts of the West Bank and particularly Gaza. More importantly, in the absence of a consensus in Palestinian society behind pursuing the "roadmap" route, Abbas may struggle to persuade his gendarmes to follow orders to act against fellow Palestinians. President Bush may believe that by cracking down on the militants, Abbas "is serving the deepest hopes of his people." But right now, the Palestinians themselves don't appear to be convinced.
One beneficiary of Abbas's troubles, of course, is Yasser Arafat. He reportedly fumed at having to watch the Aqaba summit on TV from Ramallah, the White House having done its best to use President Bush's first-ever Middle East trip to crown Abbas as the new national leader of the Palestinians and consign Arafat to the dustbin of history. Bush pulled no punches during his stay in Egypt, telling a local TV network that "it's impossible to achieve peace with Chairman Arafat." Arafat's objective, by contrast, is to prove that peace is impossible without him. Washington's Arab and European allies have rebuffed U.S. and Israeli efforts to sideline Arafat altogether, recognizing that as the elected leader of the Palestinians and the longtime symbol of their national struggle, he enjoys far greater legitimacy among ordinary Palestinians than does his appointed prime minister. Among ordinary Palestinians, Abbas is viewed as an integral part of a Palestinian Authority many consider corrupt, and the impetus for his appointment is seen as coming primarily from the U.S. and Israel. His weakness relative to Arafat within the PA was demonstrated in the showdown over his cabinet, in which he was forced to concede to many of Arafat's demands. Now, with the "roadmap" process having been tied directly to his ouster, Arafat has little incentive to help his prime minister deliver, and plenty of reason to do what he can to make sure Abbas fails. Moreover, having no role in delivering on the "roadmap," Arafat is free to reinforce the hostility of the Fatah rank-and-file by railing against "plots" to undermine the Palestinian struggle.
But the best asset Arafat, Hamas and others looking for Abbas to fail have going for them is the situation on the ground in the West Bank and Gaza, where millions of ordinary Palestinians struggle to survive amid the privations of constant Israeli closures and military incursions. Abbas desperately needs an easing of those conditions in order to demonstrate that his way can bring positive change to Palestinian lives. But Israel's actions are guided by its security concerns, and there may not be much more than symbolic gestures towards the Palestinians until the PA security forces launch a crackdown. Abbas may have previously argued that he is unable to act against Hamas and other militant groups until the Israelis have loosened their grip. But now Washington is setting the agenda, sending a team of 12 monitors to the region this weekend to oversee implementation of the "roadmap." And the Bush administration is expecting results from Abbas, and quickly. That may soon leave the new, and somewhat lonely Palestinian prime minister facing the unhappy choice of either launching a Palestinian civil war he may not win, or disappointing President Bush and sending the "roadmap" into the swelling archive of failed peace initiatives.