Leadership void must end for Israeli-Palestinian peace to advance

“Meet me in 15 minutes, he’s agreed to see you,” said the voice on the other end of the line.

As expected, I was given very short notice of my meeting with Marwan Barghouti. Security had become tighter than ever around the man the Israeli government loved to hate.

By that stage during the second Palestinian intifada, Barghouti was almost constantly on the move. Rarely did he sleep more than one night in the same place, while by day he steered clear of Israeli checkpoints and avoided getting into cars that had not been screened for bombs or electronic tracking devices. Never, never, did he answer his mobile telephone.

That day after numerous changes of cars and drivers, punctuated by interminable waits, I finally managed to interview Barghouti in a semi-derelict office block in an eerily quiet street in Ramallah.

Articulate, intelligent, impassioned, he drew on everything from Jewish settlements, human rights, the role of the US to the then almost redundant peace process in response to my questions.

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Barely two months after we spoke, Barghouti survived an Israeli assassination attempt. Less than a year after the interview, he was eventually arrested and sentenced to five consecutive life sentences for orchestrating attacks on Israelis.

Barghouti has often been described as the “Palestinian Mandela” and remains both a prominent and popular political figure associated with the Palestinian Fatah party and movement. Today, as I write this, he still languishes in an Israeli prison and is anything but forgotten even if some readers of this might not have heard of him before.

Looking back now through my notebooks from that interview all those years ago, a few lines leap out in light of recent events in Israel and Gaza.

“I do not believe attacks against civilians inside Israel are a good strategy, but where there are forces of occupation, yes, of course we must resist with the weapons that are available to us,” Barghouti told me that day.

“Peace is always possible,” he went on to say. “But not while there is the occupation, that is the heart of the matter. The Palestinian people know all about promises, especially broken promises. I argued for peace, and where did it lead us,” he asked, throwing one of my questions back at me.

Palestinians line up for a meal in Rafah, Gaza Strip (Image: AP)

Just last week, in a wartime opinion poll among Palestinians, the result showed that in a two-way presidential race, Ismail Haniyeh, the exiled political leader of Hamas, would trounce Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas. Were it a three-horse race, however, then Barghouti would beat them both, according to the poll by the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR).

In other words, Barghouti even from his prison cell remains an influential figure and most significantly especially among many young Palestinians who have long been frustrated with the shortcomings of Abbas and the PA.

As one international observer rightly noted, every time there’s an international crisis or a flare up with Israel, Barghouti’s name comes up. In fact, many still believe that the only reason Barghouti was not assassinated all those years ago, was because he could ultimately prove more useful alive than dead to the Israelis.

To that end, both from an Israeli and Palestinian perspective, here was a leader with the potential to become a key negotiator it terms of any mapping out of self-determination for the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

Even from behind bars that has been borne out as Barghouti has shown his refusal to be silenced and displayed the difference he could make.

For example, he played a key role in signing the Prisoners’ Document in 2006, written by Palestinian prisoners affiliated with Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP).

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This called for the creation of a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders, for Palestinian resistance to be limited to territories occupied in 1967, for a mutual ceasefire to be respected and for Palestinians to uphold their right to resist occupation in accordance with international law.

Its goal was a simple one if not so easy to implement and called for the forming of a coalition government in order to break the political deadlock brought on by Hamas’s 2006 electoral victory in Gaza.

My point here is an obvious one. In short, that it’s only with this kind of thinking that any progress towards a Palestinian state can be made. In other words, Barghouti represents someone capable of filling a leadership void that exits within the Palestinian ranks.

For too long now the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been subjected to a leadership vacuum in which outsiders in the West – especially the US and UK – have manoeuvred to place their preferred Palestinian leader in position based on interests of their own and invariably at odds with those of ordinary Palestinians. For years now as a result, Palestinians have been deprived of any real input or say on their own political reality by leaders they widely respect.

Should the opportunity present itself in the wake of the current hostilities for proper representation and truly constructive talks to begin towards a long-term resolution, then this obstacle of missing leadership must be overcome.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

Only yesterday, reports surfaced that Hamas’s political leaders have been talking with their Palestinian rivals about how to govern Gaza and the West Bank after the war ends. While Hamas has long had a conflicted relationship with Fatah and the PA, it’s a measure of the realpolitik that lies ahead and one that will need both a leadership vision and the support of most Palestinians.

All this of course very much depends on Israel’s reaction. But here too a crisis of leadership looms large. The Israeli people themselves even prior to recent events in Gaza have made clear their dissatisfaction with prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu (above) and his right-wing coalition. Tragically, Hamas’s attack of October 7 has only hardened the position of some within the top tier of Israel’s government that might have been open to change.

As everyone now looks for a positive way forward, the inescapable fact is that filling this leadership vacuum is imperative on both sides for it to happen.

From a Palestinian perspective, Barghouti has positioned himself as the one person – if not the only – capable of uniting rival political groups. Prison time at the hands of the Israeli authorities for political activism and resistance bolsters the legitimacy of many individuals among the Palestinian people.

Like Mandela with whom he’s often compared, Barghouti has now spent more than 20 years in prison, reinforcing his symbolic value as a political figure and potential lead negotiator. Right now that in itself is of immense diplomatic value and not to be squandered. Who knows, maybe it is indeed the reason Israel chose not to eliminate him in the first place.