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Palestinian Arabs

Analysis: A parliament of terrorists


By Ryan Jones
November 24, 2005

The upcoming Palestinian Legislative Council election on January 26 promises to fill the parliament representing the people Israel is being forced to surrender land to with more recognized terrorists than ever before.

A new poll conducted by the Palestinian Center for Public Opinion shows the Hamas terrorist organization can expect to garner 22 percent of the vote, making it the second largest faction in the PLC.

Though that number is down from previous surveys, Hamas' sister Islamic terror group Islamic Jihad will fill another three percent of the seats, according to the poll.

While not a religious movement like Hamas or Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine has killed its fair share of Israelis over the past decade, including the most high-profile victim yet, former Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze'evi.

The poll shows the PFLP taking home five percent of the vote. The faction's list will be headed by Ahmed Sa'adat, the man charged with overall responsibility for Ze'evi's assassination, who will apparently campaign from his Jericho jail cell.

If the numbers hold true, the PLC will again be led by Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction, which the PCPO survey shows winning 37.5 percent of the vote.

Unlike with Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the PFLP, the West still prefers to see the main body of Fatah and its various ?military wings? as separate entities, thus providing Abbas and the ?politicians? with plausible deniability regarding the murderous actions of their colleagues.

The voters, however, would like to further blur the line within Fatah, if possible.

The PCPO poll recorded a large 33.7 percent majority of ?Palestinians? believe convicted terror boss Marwarn Barghouti is the best candidate to lead the Fatah faction within the PLC.

Barghouti's Tanzim group, together with the Fatah Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, are responsible for the lion's share of Israeli casualties since the start of the Oslo War in September 2000.

If the international community thought it was difficult hammering out a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinian Authority before, these numbers show the difficulty is only going to increase in the coming months.

Washington, meanwhile, continues to press Israel to not worry about the make-up of the PLC, and to instead focus on advancing the ?peace? process.

That can only mean one thing: Regardless of who is representing the ?Palestinians,? Israel can expect to come under increasing pressure to make one-sided concessions for the sake of a piece of paper Washington can put in its trophy case.

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