Disappointed in Annapolis, the Palestinians feel deceived once again, reports Khaled Amayreh from the West Bank Palestinians throughout the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip have reacted to the American-hosted conference in Annapolis, Maryland, with a heady combination of scepticism, ambivalence and anger. The Palestinians used epithets like "another deception", "another lie", "another illusion" and "another Oslo" to describe the much-publicised Annapolis conference that they watched live on their television screens. "Another Oslo" is a reference to the 1993 Oslo Agreement between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), which generated high hopes, euphoria and great expectations. These upbeat feelings were soon thwarted and eventually proved to be totally misplaced as Israel continued to consolidate its occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, while pretending to seek peace. In the southern West Bank town of Hebron, a Palestinian man was killed Tuesday afternoon when poorly-trained and utterly-undisciplined Palestinian police opened fire on a rally, organised by the Islamic Liberation Party, protesting against the Annapolis conference. The usually non-violent group which calls for the reinstitution of the Islamic Caliphate that encompasses the entire Muslim world, is considered the second largest organised militant Islamic group in the West Bank after Hamas. The group's spokesman in Hebron, Mohamed Jaabari, condemned the "cold-blooded murder" of the Palestinian man and accused the PA police of "emulating the Israeli occupation army in killing and repressing Palestinians". "I don't see any difference. They are acting like the Israeli occupation army. They are traitors and quislings. This is why the Zionists and the Americans armed them and brought them here to kill us and silence our voices," said Jaabari. Hebron's appointed governor, Hussein Al-Araj, blamed the organisers for the violence, saying "we told them not to organise any rally, but they chose to challenge us. They bear full responsibility for the consequences." However, when asked why the police didn't use non-fatal methods to disperse the estimated 3,000 protesters, the governor sardonically said, "this is another problem." Similarly, PA police, recently re-armed and equipped by the US, violently repressed protests against the Annapolis conference in Nablus, Bethlehem and Ramallah and a number of other localities in the West Bank. Dozens of protesters and a number of reporters and cameramen were injured, some badly, when anti-riot police ganged up on protesters in the centre of Ramallah, beating the demonstrators with clubs and rifle-butts. Earlier, the PA warned the media against covering any "anti-Annapolis protests" unless they get a permission beforehand. However, the local and international media apparently didn't heed the warning, infuriating PA security chiefs. In Gaza, as many as 150,000 (organisers say a quarter of a million) people held rallies denouncing the Palestinian leadership of Mahmoud Abbas for what Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Zahar termed "using Jerusalem and the right of return as a bargaining chip". "Let them go to a thousand conferences, we say in the name of our people that we haven't authorised anyone to sign any agreement or any document compromising or harming our inalienable rights. Anyone compromising our rights will be judged by history as a traitor." Ahmed Bahr, deputy-speaker of the now virtually paralysed Palestinian Legislative Council addressed the huge multitude, saying that, "we will not let our people down, we will not compromise our national constants. We will not sell Jerusalem out, the right of return is a red line." Speaker Aziz Duweik is imprisoned in Israel for running in elections under the banner of an illegal organisation --Hamas. Meanwhile, Mohamed Al-Hindi, an Islamic Jihad leader, similarly lashed out at Arab leaders and representatives for attending the conference. "I don't know why they are trooping off to Annapolis. What has changed in Israel's attitudes and positions? Or, do they want to use this occasion to normalise relations with Israel?" Interestingly, Fatah, Mahmoud Abbas's faction, which controls the West Bank, failed to organise rallies supporting Annapolis. Insiders within Fatah intimated that the organisation was worried that such rallies would attract a few people compared to the anti-Annapolis rallies, and would therefore embarrass Fatah. In fact, much of the indignation, disenchantment and frustration in the Palestinian street is not aimed at PA President Abbas per se as much as it is an expression of distrust of Israeli intentions. "Abbas's speech is good and balanced. The problem is that he is being deceived by Israel and the US just as Yasser Arafat was deceived and cheated on by Israel and the US after the conclusion of the Oslo Agreement," explained a Palestinian teacher from Hebron after watching live speeches at Annapolis by US President George W Bush, Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. The teacher added that the Annapolis conference would be just another "big fiasco" because "Israel doesn't want peace and is not ready or willing to pay the price of peace." "Israel wants a peace deal that looks very much like a Palestinian capitulation, a deal that would reflect Israeli victory over the Palestinians, not one based on human rights and international law. And, the US is not willing to put pressure on Israel to respect Palestinian rights. That is the crux of the matter." Palestinian intellectuals generally hold the same views. Professor Ali Jerbawi, a prominent political scientist and leading expert on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, described the Annapolis conference as "theatrical". "We are talking about a conference without guarantees, without legal references, without a timetable. It is a journey to the unknown. Bush is simply telling the occupier and the victim of occupation to sort it out before he leaves the White House by the end of 2008." "I think in a certain sense we are becoming the Singapore of the Middle East as Palestine, our homeland, is being dwarfed into a mere city-state much like Singapore. But it is a Singapore of poverty, misery, roadblocks and despair." Jerbawi predicted that the excitement of the Annapolis conference would just evaporate very soon just like the commotion that followed the Madrid conference and the Oslo Accords soon died out. "What we really need is to dissolve the Palestinian Authority and stop this foolishness of thwarting the Palestinian cause for the sake of establishing a state that has a name but has no substance. "Abbas and his people should have realised this a long time ago. However, their immediate interests seem to blur their vision and make them see a distant mirage as real water."
