[Marxism] Abbas accepts resignation of former US "white hope" for Palestine

[Fred Feldman]

Abbas Aide Resigns in Wake of Fatah Rout in Gaza 

By ISABEL KERSHNER
Published: July 27, 2007
JERUSALEM, July 26 - Muhammad Dahlan, the former strongman of Gaza who was
among those blamed for Fatah's stinging military defeat there last month,
resigned Thursday as national security adviser to the Palestinian president,
Mahmoud Abbas. 

The resignation was little more than a formality, because Mr. Abbas issued a
decree dissolving his national security council immediately after the Hamas
takeover of Gaza five weeks ago. 

An official in Mr. Abbas's office, speaking on the condition of anonymity
because he was not authorized to speak for attribution, said that he did not
understand why Mr. Dahlan sent the letter of resignation now, but that the
president accepted it anyway. 

Many in Fatah have blamed Mr. Dahlan for the rapid collapse of their forces
in Gaza in the face of a Hamas offensive that lasted less than a week.
Neither he nor most of the other senior security commanders of the
Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority security forces were in Gaza during
the fighting, leading to charges that their men had been abandoned in the
field. 

Mr. Dahlan was recuperating from knee surgery abroad at the time. He
returned to Ramallah, the Fatah headquarters in the West Bank, but is
somewhere in the Balkans for more treatment, said the official in the
president's office.

In a statement sent to reporters, Mr. Dahlan cited his "long absence" and
health problems as reasons for his resignation. But many Palestinians saw it
as an acceptance of responsibility for the rout in Gaza. 

"It was the right thing to do," said Sufyan Abu Zayda, a former Fatah
official. 

While out of favor in Fatah, Mr. Dahlan is even more despised by Hamas, the
militant Islamic group. As the chief of the Palestinian Authority's
Preventive Security apparatus in Gaza, he led a crackdown on Hamas in 1996.
The fall of the Preventive Security headquarters, where some Hamas militants
said they had been tortured, was a defining moment for Hamas in Gaza. After
the battle victory, Mr. Dahlan's grand home was looted and vandalized. 

Mr. Dahlan had risen meteorically from humble beginnings in a Gaza refugee
camp, first making his mark as a student leader in the 1980s. Israel and the
United States had come to trust him, and some saw him as a potential
successor to Mr. Abbas. 

Mr. Abbas appointed Mr. Dahlan as his national security adviser soon after
the formation of the Hamas-Fatah unity government in March, enraging Hamas.
Mr. Dahlan was said to be building a Fatah Executive Force in Gaza to rival
the Hamas militia, also known as the Executive Force, that had been set up
to rival the Fatah-dominated official forces. 

Mr. Abu Zayda indicated that he did not see Mr. Dahlan's resignation as a
sign of recovery in Fatah or the beginning of reform. "I have stopped hoping
or even dreaming about reform," he said. "There are people in Fatah who want
to take the movement with them to the cemetery."

In Gaza on Thursday, at least four Palestinian militants were killed in
clashes with Israeli forces. Islamic Jihad said that three of its men had
been killed in an Israeli airstrike as they traveled by car. It said one was
Omar al-Khatib, a senior Islamic Jihad commander. 

Israeli security officials said that Mr. Khatib and his deputy, who was also
killed, had been firing rockets and mortar shells at Israel. 

A Palestinian militant was killed in a morning strike from the air. An army
spokeswoman said he had been spotted aiming a rocket-propelled grenade at
Israeli forces on a search-and-arrest operation in the south of the Gaza
Strip. Palestinian medics said he had belonged to Hamas. 

A 20-year-old Palestinian man died after an Israeli soldier hit him with a
baton at a checkpoint near Bethlehem. The army spokeswoman said that the man
had drawn a knife and that a soldier hit him after another soldier fell in a
scuffle.