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Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs

Israeli Security, Regional Diplomacy, and International Law


Why Are the Palestinians Opposed to Ending the Occupation?

Filed under: Al-Qaeda and Global Jihad
Publication: Global Law Issues



The arguments against exercising Palestinian independence resemble each other. Nabil Abu Rudeineh, spokesperson for the Palestinian presidency at Ramallah, views Lieberman’s plan as a plot “against the Palestinian people’s aspirations for unity, liberty and independence” and as one that “expresses the aspirations of the Israeli extreme right.” Ahmad Assaf, spokesperson for the Fatah organization that props up the Palestinian Authority, argued that the Gaza Strip is still under “Israeli occupation” and so it will remain, because the Strip constitutes a single geographic unit with the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Sami Abu Zuheiri , a Hamas spokesperson, explained that “although Gaza was liberated in practice from the military and settlement presence, it is still from a legal and practical standpoint under occupation” and the Lieberman initiative is “an attempt to elude the responsibility imposed on the occupation.” Abu Zuheiri argued that Israel, “the occupying country,” must continue to provide for the Gaza Strip’s needs including food, electricity, and fuel.








Given this background, the question of why everybody is so enamored of the Israeli “occupation” is accentuated. Why are the Palestinians still adamant in their opposition to receiving total independence, at least at the first stage, on part of Palestinian territory? A possible key to the answer to the question was provided by Prof. Anat Biletzki, formerly the chairperson of the B’tselem organization, who warned in a lecture at MIT in 2007 of the danger that the Palestinian leadership, due to its fatigue, might agree to the establishment of a Palestinian state on part of Palestinian soil and two-state solution. Biletzki argued that only the solution of a single state in the entire territory of Palestine can provide a just and realistic solution, and she then proceeded to sharply criticize the preparedness of Prof. Sari Nusseibeh to forgo the refugees’ right of return.


This is primarily the guiding logic behind the position of the Palestinian leadership that has not renounced the idea of liberating Palestine in its entirety. Five years have elapsed since the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the Hamas government continues to preserve the refugee camps despite their crowded conditions and immense deprivation, and continues to demand international assistance to help them via UNRWA. Housing refugees in the areas of the settlements that were vacated in Gaza (or by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank) will not impair the right of the refugees to raise their right of return during negotiations, just as the rights of Palestinians defined as refugees living in cities and abroad is not impaired. However the objective of both the Palestinian Authority and the Hamas government is identical, namely, keeping the lava of the refugee problem at full boil, as this constitutes the key to the ultimate objective of the historic Palestinian odyssey – the liquidation of the State of Israel as a Jewish state. This is the real reason behind the Palestinian love affair with the “Israeli occupation.” Hamas wants to eat out of Israel’s hand and then proceed to eat the hand itself and the entire body. Israel’s opposition to placing the noose over its neck with its own hands is depicted by Hamas as a violation of international law.