We left Gaza yesterday with a Red Cross aid convoy, but I want to post some thoughts on Fatah’s collapse. We spoke with nearly a dozen Fatah fighters and soldiers from the various branches of the security services, all of whom were around in the president’s compound, the intelligence headquarters, the Preventative Security headquarters and even in Khan Younis until the final hours of the battle. We came with a pretty damning indictment of the political and military leadership.
Fatah never fought. Gaza was essentially handed over to Hamas. Soldier after soldier said they felt betrayed and abandoned by their leadership. There was a seemingly willful lack of decision making by the senior most political leadership. Up and down the Gaza Strip from the first moments of fighting, the military leadership disintegrated while the political leadership remained eerily silent.
Ousted Fatah loyalists in Gaza widely suspect a political decision was made early on in Ramallah to surrender the Gaza Strip to Hamas in order to extricate Abbas, Israel and the US from the seeming intractable pickle they were facing as infighting spiraled, living conditions worsened, and the peace process seemed hopelessly stuck. With the Palestinian territories now split, the US, Israel and Abbas suddenly have way forward, without compromising to Hamas.
I don’t mean to sound conspiratorial, and I think the likeliest scenario is that all the parties involved simply accepted what was essentially a fait accompli some time in the course of the fighting and set about finding whatever silver lining could be salvaged.
There are of course a dozen reasons why Fatah was so ineffective. Fatah was unpopular and the vast majority of the security forces were not really Fatah loyalists. They were merely after a steady salary, not some messianic belief in Fatah or the rightness of the Palestinian Authority. They were doing it because it was their job and they hadn’t been paid more than a fraction of their salaries in 18 months. Fatah was also divided into disparate bickering factions.
All that being said, the total surrender of the security forces is striking. Keep reading.
Fatah fighters’ accounts
Abu Qusay is a 23 year old police officer from the Nuseirat camp. He’s a die hard Fatah loyalist and says he was inside Abbas’ presidential compound until late Thursday evening.
We handed Gaza over to Hamas. We don’t understand why our leaders betrayed us like this. We fought back against orders because if we had followed orders, we would have given ourselves up… [Our leaders] received orders from Abbas to give up bases but some military commanders couldn’t accept this.
Abu al Majd, 23, fought along side Abu Qusay the entire time and corroborated many of the details of Abu Qusay’s account.
It was a story of surrender. The bases were given up. I feel psychologically destroyed. It really hurt. I understood that there was an order to evacuate the bases. We were betrayed.
A.R. was a major in the Presidential Guard and has served in the elite highly selective force since the days of Arafat. He is educated, bilingual and comes across as a well disciplined career soldier. In the midst of interviewing him in the garden of the Marna Hotel, Gaza City’s oldest, Al Arabiya began broadcasting a live interview with Dahlan and we all gathered around to watch. After the interview we continued.
“Funny,” A.R. said. “Despite all that has happened in Gaza, Dahlan’s spirits seem pretty high.”
“What do you think that means?” I asked.
“He knew. Dahlan knew this was coming and he was planning for this scenario,” A.R. said.
A.R. continued, describing the total lack of resistance by the Fatah security services. The only order they ever received was to surrender bases if Hamas wanted them badly enough, he said.
The only order we ever heard coming from Abbas in Ramallah was that he didn’t want a blood bath and if Hamas wanted the security bases, let them take it. We understood that there was not supposed to be any resistance.
The presidential guard were the most highly trained and professional soldiers in the security services’ ranks and they were dismayed when rudimentary and repeatedly drilled steps to respond to the Hamas onslaught were never taken.
No state of emergency was ever declared, curfews were never imposed, contingency counter attack plans were ever drawn up, heavy weapons were never mounted on the roofs of the security bases, and extra ammo stocks were never dragged out of storage.
Abu Mohammad, a 26-year-old barrel chested soldier in Force 17, spoke to me at Gaza’s Al Shifa Hospital:
This was a total betrayal by the political leadership. We were only told ‘don’t fire back,’ and a lot of people didn’t like this… When the clahses first started, when a soldier was being attacked the officers would give him two or three clips max. When they were finished and he asked for more they’d say no more… they only brought out the heavier weapons and ammo on Thursday when it was too late. By then most of the soldiers had run away.
The battle for the Preventative Security Services headquarters in Gaza City was the decisive turning point, when it became clear that nothing could save Fatah’s remnants in Gaza. But even that climactic battle was little more than a symbolic stand by only around 30 remaining soldiers, fighters said. Everyone else had long since jumped ship. They put on civilian clothes, dropped their weapons and scampered home. Some soldiers were dragged away from the trenches by frantic mothers who had heard Hamas’ threats to kill any fighters who didn’t surrender.
Hatem Iki, 22, a presidential guardsman with a gruesome story all his own:
The forces saw their leaders had all fled and so everyone else just ran away too.
Hatem’s brother, Mohammad Iki, 29, a sargent in the presidential guard:
When your leaders disappear and run away of course you will be defeated. Until the moment I left the presidential compound, there was never any orders or commands at all. Who would have expected the Muntada could fall without a single bullet being fired. It’s a total betrayal by our leadership.
We spoke with Abu Shaban, 37, a general intelligence officer as he waited at Erez to flee to the West Bank. This is what he had to say:
They decided to deliver Gaza to Hamas to put them in trouble and isolate them from the world. The way the fighting went leaves no doubt that they really gave it up to Hamas.
Abu Abdallah, 31, also a general intelligence officer, was in Khan Younis for the fight:
The decision came from high levels to withdraw from our compound because they didn’t want a blood bath. We were totally surprised.
12 responses so far ↓
1 Daygator // Jun 19, 2007 at 10:27 pm
Perhaps I am naive. Or maybe Abbas is a humanist.
Of course, a humanist does not a leader make.
But I believe there is a real value in Abbas’ decision not to “create a bloodbath,” both in political and moral terms.
2 Charles Levinson // Jun 19, 2007 at 10:43 pm
Daygator — yes, that’s absolutely a very real possibility, that Abbas really did do what he felt was the right thing and in the best interest of all, and if that meant looking weak, then he was prepared to do that. I think a lot of people would argue that. And that was definitely an oft-repeated theme with a lot of the Fatah guys we talked to. “We don’t want to kill our Palestinian brothers, but Hamas is the exact opposite,” several people said to us. It sounded a lot like a line to us, a sort of cover for their inaction. Especially since most people boasted of how ready they were to go on the offensive and kick some Ham-ass. But it is worth noting, and at least with some of these more professional soldiers, like the presidential guards, who really do stand out from the rest for their professionalism, I think there is probably an element of truth and sincerity in such sentiments.
3 Daygator // Jun 19, 2007 at 11:18 pm
I’m glad to know that there are Fatah-men who consider that side to the decision. Thank you for elaborating.
PS - I’m totally stealing “Ham-ass”.
4 Shual // Jun 19, 2007 at 11:45 pm
Hmmm… no. Abbas always talks like this. He looks like the Israeli propaganda-officers that used to apologize for civilian victims. A meaningless gesture. And you can not argue that he is free of responsibilty of things like the attack of the house of Ismail Hanija at Shati.
Fatah IS disordered, not reformed, has no leader, is not prepared, is not united, has no plan, no real budget. And this is the reason why Hamas took the exit: http://www.afp.com/english/news/stories/070527125512.6pipc5g6.html Hamas decided under pressure to wage it and Fatah was “absent”: “I hope it [inquiry of the loss muhahahahaha] comes up with real conclusions. Definitely mistakes were made. Each person should take responsibility for his mistakes. Even myself, I was gone for 50 days,” he said of his surgery in Germany. “Certainly people will try to blame me because I wasn’t there and I’m very close to [Abbas].” - Dahlan.
We call Abbas “Grußonkel”. A “meet-and-greet-man”. The quys that stands in front of the Hotel Palestine with his funny and pompus uniform and greets everybody: “Come in brother.”. Thats his function.
PS: Good to hear that you are safe now.
5 cronopio » Blog Archive » Lezioni di Democrazia // Jun 21, 2007 at 4:32 pm
[…] il ritiro ai propri uomini. Charles Levinson, un giornalista a Gerusalemme, ne da conto nel suo blog dopo aver intervistato uomini di Fatah. Ora che Hamas è isolata a Gaza e in Cisgiordania è stata […]
6 Dan Friedman // Jun 21, 2007 at 8:13 pm
Abbas is a a moderate and great humanist too. When his men were handcuffed and thrown off a 15-story building by Hamas, he responded by handcuffing and throwing Hamas men from only a 12-story building.
7 Freedom » Blog Archive » Concessions, Concessions - Haven’t they Always Lead to Peace? // Jun 22, 2007 at 11:32 am
[…] happily pay his salary. But, I digress… I found an interesting though disturbing item in the Conflict Blotter: Fatah never fought. Gaza was essentially handed over to Hamas. Soldier after soldier said they […]
8 chamish // Jun 24, 2007 at 4:26 pm
www.thebarrychamishwebsite.com
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MEET YOUR NEW DEFENSE MINISTER, ATILLA BARAK
by Barry Chamish
Allow me people to introduce you to Atilla Barak, mass murderer of religious Jews. And yes, Mr. Baumel, he ordered the murder of your son Zecharia . We are grateful you are slowly reaching the truth. Your announcement to not elect Peres President because he is covering up your son’s killing was a grand step forward.
In fact, the order to murder religious soldiers in order to sabotage Menachem Begin’s then-successful invasion of Lebanon, was not Barak’s. Shimon Peres and Yossi Sarid connived with the documents thief Sandy Berger of the Council On Foreign Relations (CFR), then President of the American office of Peace Now, to destroy the war in American eyes.
It was, in fact, Begin’s Defense Minister, Ariel Sharon who destroyed Begin for good. As those who have read my books know, Sharon had founded a left-wing political party called Shlomtzion, in early 1973. He invited Sarid to be his deputy. After emerging as the hero of the Yom Kippur war, in January of 1974, he was invited by Henry Kissinger (CFR) to New York. There a plan was hatched to destroy Begin’s Herut Party by joining Shlomtzion with it and wrecking it as the Likud. Sharon was promised power later if he would only produce a massacre that would ruin Begin and Herut for good. Sharon allowed the Falangist fighters to enter the PLO towns of Sabra and Shatilla and only removed them three days and 800 corpses later.
But let us concentrate on Atilla Barak. He is a coward. Prof. Uri Milstein, as good an Israeli historian as exists, writes that during the Yom Kippur War, Barak refused to enter China Farm and rescue a stranded armor unit. It was just too dangerous. But that’s a hidden fact. The events of Tze’elim exposed Ehud the heartless butcher for all of Israel to see.
In his last act as Prime Minister Rabin’s Chief Of Staff, Barak planned a complicated military exercise at the IDF’s Tze’elim military training ground. His planning went awry as 5 soldiers were killed and 13 were wounded when an errant mortar landed in their position. Sensing that he was in real trouble, Ehud hopped the nearest chopper and flew to Tel Aviv to plan a coverup with Rabin. Yediot Achronot blew his cowardice in his face as soldier after soldier testified to Barak’s irresponsibility if they were nice, cowardice if they spoke from the heart.
But Rabin was ordered to give him political power. So he was trained on how to overcome the scandal and made an aggressive ass of himself in a television interview. The masses bought his lies, but a significant minority, many soldiers and their circles, knew he was a lying weasel. And he survived.
In preparation for his upcoming political career, Barak announced he was going to America to earn some money. Some money, indeed! He landed at Martin Indyk’s Washington Institute For Mid-East Peace where he spent six months getting his marching orders. He returned to Israel and built a new mansion, don’t ask where the money came from. But how he rewarded his financiers! Within days of becoming Prime Minister in 2000, he pulled the IDF out of Lebanon with its tail between its legs, left tanks and intelligence computers behind and worse, left the Christian, Southern Lebanese Army to be arrested and tortured by the Hizbollah.
Which is why no Christian in his right mind will ever trust Israel’s leadership again.
It is no coincidence that within hours of being named Israel’s new Defense Minister that Kiryat Shmoneh was rocketed from Lebanon. This was no random act. It was a reminder that he is in the hands of Israel’s worst enemies. And he got the message.
And now Mr. Baumel, your son.
It was July of 1982, at Sultan Yacob, near the shores of Lake Karoun, Lebanon. Brigade Commander Avigdor Ben Gal left on a Jeep tour with his intelligence officer Mickey Shatz. We owe our information to Shatz who told the magazine Kol Ha’Ir what Atilla did after. Barak, holding a map of Syrian positions, and subsequent reports have future Labor Party leader Amram Mitzneh beside him, ordered a religious tank division into an ambush.
Without orders from his commander, in order to ruin Begin’s victory, he sent the soldiers to their deaths. On purpose. Anything to stop Begin’s success. Twenty three died fighting their way free. Just as many were wounded. And three were taken prisoner including your son, Mr. Baumel, Zecharia.
Mr. Baumel. We met. I told you Barak murdered your son. You let his memory die wasted. This time, find Shatz and Ben Gal. Make your son’s death worthy. Stop Atilla from murdering again.
end
I’ll be speaking in Denver and New York. Come hear me. Invite me to lecture to your group in those areas. Write me quickly at chamish@netvision.net.il
July 14, 10 AM:
THE EL-BETHEL COMMUNITY CENTER,
8333 ACOMA WAY DENVER, COLORADO 80221
CALL US AT 1-303-654-9924
July 22, 4 PM
Seaview Jewish Center
1440 E. 99th St.
Brooklyn, NY
For reservations call: 718 251 1900
Write me for my few signed books,
chamish@netvision.net.il
Get the rest on lulu.com including the newest, Bye Bye Gaza, only $10 to download.
black and white:
http://www.lulu.com/content/575116
And while you’re there, look at the latest book by me on lulu.com WHO MURDERED YITZHAK RABIN
This is the most complete volume of all with many dozens of never before revealed photos and documents.
9 The Arabist » The “Fatah never fought” theory // Jun 25, 2007 at 3:52 pm
[…] Conflict Blotter: Fatah never fought. Gaza was essentially handed over to Hamas. Soldier after soldier said they felt betrayed and abandoned by their leadership. There was a seemingly willful lack of decision making by the senior most political leadership. Up and down the Gaza Strip from the first moments of fighting, the military leadership disintegrated while the political leadership remained eerily silent. […]
10 Hamas « El Nuevo Pantano // Jun 28, 2007 at 2:23 pm
[…] events snowballing into a bigger clash and makes clear that Palestinian security forces were indeed attacked. The mystery is why they didn’t make a stiffer fight of […]
11 PrelKikam // Aug 27, 2007 at 3:30 pm
enter text? test, sorry
dfdf767df
12 Free Web Counter // Aug 29, 2007 at 1:18 am
Beneficial Hit Counters are for all websites Look at the extensive mixture of hit counters on Hit Counter Expert !
Leave a Comment