COLLABORATORS

I have been very reluctant to comment on internal Palestinian politics, both because I am not Palestinian and because pro-Palestinian groups cannot afford to be fractured by internal disagreements, but the recent action of the PLO are so appalling they compel comment. The PLO's delegation to the U.N Human Rights Commission in Geneva, bowing to western, specifically American, pressure has withdrawn its support for the Goldstone Report accusing both Israel and the militant group Hamas of war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity during Israel's rampage in the Gaza Strip earlier this year. The report was flawed, but those flaws, which actually reflected a pro-Israel bias had nothing to do with the PLO's withdrawal, and the move would have been condemnable on pragmatic grounds even if they did.

Instead of pursuing justice for their citizens killed in large scale war crimes the PLO has pursued complacency. Can there be any doubt that the pretender President Mahmoud Abbas has no concern for his people, only for his own power. He has worked in tandem with the Israelis and Americans to subvert the results of democratic elections, he has undermined national unity, he has continued to occupy the Presidential compound after the expiration of his term in January, he has presided over increasing corruption and incompetence, he's even guarded by a Shin Bet security detail, and now he has acquiesced to the pressure of western nations and local businessmen and refused to demand accountability for war crimes and crimes against humanity carried out against the Palestinian people.

Abbas has shown himself to be just as much an enemy of the Palestinian people and just as destructive to Palestine's nascent democracy as his Israeli counterparts. Abu Mazen is nothing more than a petty, aspiring dictator and collaborator. And while those who support the Palestinian cause must maintain a unified front in spite of any political disagreements among them the ascendency of a collobarationist regime to power in Ramallah provides a discouraging indicator of what a liberated Palestine will look like.