{"id":68890,"date":"2026-04-26T15:54:03","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T15:54:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/68890\/"},"modified":"2026-04-26T15:54:03","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T15:54:03","slug":"shadow-of-oslo-hangs-over-gaza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/68890\/","title":{"rendered":"Shadow of Oslo hangs over Gaza"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\tPalestine & Middle East<\/a><\/p>\n

The latest phase of the imperial takeover of Gaza is underway. Arthur Townend looks at the history of \u2018peace processes\u2019 and how the West and Israel have sought to cement their control over Palestinians <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tDownloading PDF. Please wait…<\/p>\n

Sunday 25 January 2026<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tIssue 2990<\/a>
\n\t\t\t\t\"Israeli<\/a><\/p>\n

Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, US president Bill Clinton, and PLO chair Yasser Arafat (Picture: Vince Musi \/ The White House)<\/p>\n

Donald Trump\u2019s new \u201cBoard of Peace\u201d is a gang of war criminals, with himself as \u201cchairman\u201d of the board.<\/p>\n

United States secretary of state Marco Rubio, Trump\u2019s son in law Jared Kushner and notorious war criminal Tony Blair will run the West\u2019s colonial administration of Gaza.<\/p>\n

So too will Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu\u2014the architect of the genocide<\/a>\u2014who now sits on the board.<\/p>\n

The Trump White House claims the board is part of a \u201ccredible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood\u201d.<\/p>\n

A National Committee for the Administration of Gaza of 15 \u00adtechnocrats will serve under the board. It will be led by Ali Shaath who served as a deputy minister in the Palestinian Authority (PA).<\/p>\n

His appointment is designed to give a veneer of Palestinian participation, but he answers directly to the board.<\/p>\n

The PA\u2019s complicity is no accident\u2014it flows from the Oslo Accords of 1993<\/a> and the sham \u201cpeace process\u201d.<\/p>\n

Then, too, the US claimed that its plan would lead to Palestinian self-determination. It promised a \u201ctwo-state solution\u201d with a Palestinian state based on the West Bank and Gaza, which Israel had grabbed in 1967.<\/p>\n

At the table were then US president Bill Clinton and Yasser Arafat, the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO).<\/p>\n

But the 1993 Accords, and a follow-up agreement in 1995, granted Palestinians control of less than 20 percent of the West Bank.<\/p>\n

The Palestine Authority (PA)<\/a> was created with Arafat as its first president. He was a symbol of Palestinians\u2019 heroic resistance and leader of the armed struggle against Israel from the 1960s.<\/p>\n

But Israel kept control of security, key sections of the economy and the \u00admajority of the Palestinian territory.<\/p>\n

The Oslo Accords were a product of Palestinian resistance\u2014and the PLO leaders making disastrous concessions to Israel.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The First Intifada, a mass uprising against Israel, began in 1987 and shook the US and Israel.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It erupted with strikes, boycotts and rallies and inspired resistance across the Middle East\u2014in Egypt, Turkey, Sudan, Kuwait, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco and Syria. But, even at the height of the Intifada, the PLO\u2019s leaders were prepared to make major concessions.<\/p>\n

Arafat\u00a0 had founded the Fatah \u00adnationalist party in 1959 and then led the PLO, a coalition of Palestinian resistance groups, from 1964.<\/p>\n

The PLO\u2019s strategy was reliant on the support of Arab regimes<\/a> in the region. This saw it adopt a policy of \u201cnon-interference\u201d in the class struggles across the Middle East in exchange for military and financial support. In practice, this meant not linking the struggles of Palestinians and workers and the poor in Lebanon, Jordan or elsewhere.<\/p>\n

But linking the fight for liberation to machinations of various regimes proved disastrous. Support was contingent on their own strategic interests\u2014and Arab ruling classes certainly didn\u2019t want to see the Palestinian struggle linking to political and social struggles domestically.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

After the 1948 Nakba, Israel\u2019s atrocities had scattered Palestinians throughout the region.<\/p>\n

In Lebanese and Jordanian refugee camps, Palestinians were organising.<\/p>\n

Palestine has the potential to mobilise mass opposition against Arab ruling classes\u2014and throughout the 1970s many states were unstable.<\/p>\n

In Jordan, the Palestinians became a challenge to king Hussein\u2019s monarchy.<\/p>\n

In 1970, Hussein\u2019s forces killed t\u00adhousands of Palestinians in what became known as Black September.<\/p>\n

The Six Day War in 1967\u2014where Israel grabbed East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza\u2014concentrated PLO forces in Lebanon.<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s invasion of Lebanon in 1982 was fuelled by an attempt to crush the Palestinians living there. The invasion weakened the PLO and it was forced to set up scattered new bases in Tunisia, Yemen and Sudan.<\/p>\n

The First Intifada was breaking out as the PLO was making concessions due to the limitations of its strategy. It had come to accept in principle the idea of a \u201ctwo-state solution\u201d, a major victory for the US and Israel. In 1987, the PLO leaders faced a choice. They could support the \u00adresistance from below across the Middle East\u2014or stick with it\u2019s policy of \u201cnon-inteference\u201d.<\/p>\n

During the Intifada, Arafat visited Kuwait and expressed his support not for the protesters there, but for the regime itself.<\/p>\n

PLO leaders also tried to contain the popular Palestinian solidarity which erupted in Jordan.<\/p>\n

Looking to stop the spreading \u00adresistance, the US began talks between Israel and the PLO. These Oslo negotiations led to Arafat\u2019s historic concession\u2014a recognition of Israel and the construction of a \u201cmini-state\u201d of Palestine. Israel retained control of the Palestinian economy and accelerated its exploitation.<\/p>\n

By 2005 almost 75 percent of imports to the West Bank and Gaza originated in Israel, while 88 percent of West Bank and Gaza exports was directed to Israel.\u00a0<\/p>\n

From 1993 to 2000, \u00adunemployment in the West Bank rocketed from 10.1 \u00adpercent to 23.8 percent, with 56 \u00adpercent of the West Bank falling below the poverty line.<\/p>\n

The Oslo Accords allowed Israel to enforce colonialism with the backing of Europe.<\/p>\n

While the Accords increased the flow of aid from European states, they did nothing to break Israel\u2019s grip on Palestine.<\/p>\n

Working with the Israeli occupation, the PA constructed a repressive regime<\/a>. The PA built a police force of 30,000, patrolling Palestinian territories and arresting political opposition.<\/p>\n

Fatah became a bloated, corrupt organisation with 100,000 personnel. PA officials operated Israel\u2019s permit scheme, controlling the movement of Palestinians in their own land.<\/p>\n

The PA had become a sub-contractor for the occupation.<\/p>\n

In 2000, the Second Intifada erupted. The next five years saw ongoing Palestinian resistance, but not on the same mass scale as 1987.<\/p>\n

The PA claimed to support the \u00adresistance but it wanted to defend the Oslo Accords and fell in line behind Israel\u2019s attempts to crush the resistance.<\/p>\n

The PA\u2019s failures became increasingly obvious. Life for Palestinians was no better, and Israel\u2019s colonial repression was increasing.<\/p>\n

Out of this despair grew Hamas, which didn\u2019t sign up to the Oslo Accords.<\/p>\n

In the 2006 PA elections, Hamas defeated Fatah. Fatah protested. Israel was appalled.<\/p>\n

The US backed an immediate coup. But Hamas secured control of Gaza\u2014creating a de facto split between the PA-controlled West Bank and Gaza.<\/p>\n

When the Arab Spring broke out in 2011, Mahmoud Abbas became \u00adpresident of the PA. True to form, Abbas worked with Israel to suppress \u00adresistance in Palestine.<\/p>\n

The PA\u2019s concessions to Israel did not stop the annexation of the West Bank which accelerated during the genocide.<\/p>\n

The PA has been able to do nothing but watch as settlers and Israeli forces ethnically cleanse Palestinian towns.<\/p>\n

Time and again, Fatah had the opportunity to embolden massive uprisings across the Middle East.<\/p>\n

But it never tapped into the potential of that resistance. Since 7 October, the Palestinian resistance in Gaza has valiantly fought against Israel\u2019s genocide.<\/p>\n

But Hamas\u2019 strategy, too, relied on the support of regimes such as Iran which are not consistent or principled supporters of the Palestinian struggle.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Armed struggle, and a reliance on support of regimes in the region, will not defeat Western imperialism\u2019s watch\u2011dog state.<\/p>\n

The next stage in the imperial takeover of Gaza<\/a> is underway.<\/p>\n

But hope still lies with mass \u00admovements that challenge US \u00adimperialism, Israel and the regimes in the region.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Palestine & Middle East The latest phase of the imperial takeover of Gaza is underway. Arthur Townend looks…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68891,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[85],"tags":[3126,35526,157,156,4175],"class_list":["post-68890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oslo","tag-israel","tag-netanyahu","tag-norway","tag-oslo","tag-palestine"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116471822227842014","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}