- If Iraq can be called “not lost,” Palestine – the notional national entity that was to normalize Palestinian identity and provide a peaceful neighbor for Israel – is indeed lost, if it ever existed.
- If radical parties in Iraq are still trying to provoke a civil war, the Palestinians had a civil war in Gaza and are preparing for another in the West Bank. Fatah lost the first and doesn’t appear to have much going in the second.
- If the Iraqi government is struggling to meet American political guidelines, the Palestinian Authority (PA) is bifurcated between transnational jihadist Hamas in Gaza taking support from both Iran and Saudi Arabia, and weak, corrupt Fatah with only limited authority in the West Bank.
- If the Iraqi government has trouble providing security and services after less than two years, the Palestinians still live primarily on charity 14 years after Oslo.
- If the Iraqi military remains dependent on American soldiers for success, the Fatah military failed to meet every American organizational and command requirement for continued assistance, utterly failed on the battlefield and ran away ignominiously leaving equipment and wounded comrades behind.
So where does the U.S. propose to increase its investment? Palestine.
Lt. Gen. Keith Dayton, America’s security coordinator for the territories, wants five new Palestinian battalions across the West Bank to support Abu Mazen, according to the Israeli daily Haaretz. They will need new equipment and more training. (See previous JINSA Reports.)
A report by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy says Israel has determined that Hamas now has the U.S.-origin eavesdropping equipment and other signals intelligence technology provided in a previous effort to bolster Abu Mazen. It can be used against Fatah, of course, but will also hinder Israeli efforts to monitor Hamas in Gaza. “Hamas acquired (from Fatah arsenals) stockpiles of American-made small arms and ammunition as well as a wide range of military equipment and vehicles…thousands of M-16 and AK-47 assault rifles… rocket-propelled grenades, some equipped with dual warheads and designed to penetrate armor.” This is in addition to Hamas’s own extensive arsenal, growing steadily through imports via the tunnel smuggling network and indigenous production.
Hamas threatens Fatah for control of the West Bank. Abu Mazen is already talking about Palestinian “reunification” – accepting defeat and a lesser position for Fatah under Hamas rule. The U.S. should think long and hard before making additional investments of military training, technology and arms in the rump army of Abu Mazen. If he fights, he will lose and if he concedes, we will lose and lose whatever new equipment and/or capabilities we try to give them.
Either way, unlike Iraq, Palestine is lost.
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