UN-Truth

Sam Bahour is a Palestinian-American businessman living and working in Ramallah since 1994.

In a recent interview in Ramallah, he spoke about current U.S. efforts to improve movement and access for Palestinians, and of Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak´s counter proposal to open VIP lanes for supposedly easier movement for a couple of hundred Palestinian businessmen who will have to be screened by the Israeli security services.

He also spoke about other difficulties of living and doing business in Palestine:

“I came to Palestine in October 1994, after seeing in our local paper in Youngstown, Ohio, that P.L.O. Chairman Yasser Arafat – after the Oslo Accords – took a decision that he wanted to privatize the telecommunications sector…So I tracked down one of these investors, when I was here, in the summer vacation of ´94. And in October I was recruited, along with another person whose name is Dr. Mohammed Mustafa, who happens to be today the economic advisor to the President [and head of the Palestine Investment Fund]…

There was one sheet of paper signed by these investors and by Arafat, which was a Memorandum of Understanding, and we basically worked for a solid year-and-a-half converting that Letter of Memorandum of Understanding into a full-fledged company, with shareholders and an IPO and a transfer strategy. At the time the telecom sector was under the Israeli occupation control 100%, and as part of the Oslo Process they were transferring it to the Palestinian Authority, which they did, and we immediately had a transfer from the Palestinian Authority to this private sector company. So from the last quarter of ´94, we negotiated for a year and a half for the license with the Palestinian Authority, which was a challenge, given there was no real capacity in the Palestinian Authority at the time to do any serious economic-kind of negotiations.

But we were successful … in getting a very good license for this company. And on the 1st of January 1997, we actually went live with what we know today as the Palestine Telecommunications Company, which today is the largest private-sector employer in Palestine, and by far the most profitable company in Palestine, PALTEL.

Q: Are you still with PALTEL?

A: No, I left a long time ago [and am now developing other business proposals...]

Q: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, who had to personally intervene to conclude negotiations on the November 2005 Agreement on Movement and Access, has been calling for an immediate improvement of life on the ground for Palestinians, in the West Bank in particular. She was told recently by Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Bark of some steps he is willing to take that should please her, including creation of VIP lanes for Palestinian businessmen at checkpoints. What do you think of that?

A: Sadly, we´ve been here before – and not only one time before. This is a repeat of a play that the Israelis put on almost every single time a U.S. or international dignitary comes to the region. The Israeli government is very well know for putting a tremendous amount of pressure on the Palestinians and creating facts on the ground that are in blatant violation of international law, and when they push a little bit too hard, and an international figure speaks out, or a UN official wants to come and see, upon the arrival of that official there´ll be some kind of facade of movement in a positive manner…

It´s the same facade we saw, time and time again, where Olmert would promise Abbas in their bilateral meetings to take out what they call outposts. Yet, we keep waiting for the actual on-the-ground actions to take place from the Israeli side. In reality these are nothing more than a well-designed, sophisticated media spin to allow this red herring, like they say, to be the topic of the trip — not the core essence of the problem, which is Israel´s intransigence in controlling and expanding its presence in the occupied territory and instigating even more violence against itself…

The issue of Barak issuing VIP statuses, and so forth — again, this is a policy that we´ve seen ever since the Oslo period has started, which is the, you know, the divide and conquer kind of age-old methodology, of trying to categorize Palestinians as good Palestinians and bad Palestinians, giving privileges to some Palestinians, whether they´re called business people or whether they´re called diplomats or whatever, and allowing the vast majority of the people to remain suffering.

We as Palestinians see beyond this, although some of our people actually go through and get these kinds of privileges. Some are doing it because they have no other alternative, in such overwhelming circumstances, to be able to provide services or to continue their businesses. So, I can´t blame all those that actually attempt to get privileges to be able to sustain. However, what´s lacking is our national leadership, to be able to address this is a comprehensive way, and not to leave the decision to every individual citizen of how he/she interacts with the Israeli occupation.

Unfortunately, the Israelis – and Barak is leading this effort now – are able to open up a civil administration office without the cost of having their soldiers in our cities 24 hours.

The PA is serving as part of his apparatus of occupying, and he, being a decision-maker on the ground in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, has opened up channels with Palestinians directly. That is a clear failure of not only Oslo, but a clear failure of the Palestinian leadership, creating that huge gap which caused individual Palestinians the need to follow-up with the Israelis directly. This is a very dangerous development, if you ask me.

Q: You complained about the Palestinian government being inefficient. What do you think would work? What changes would you like to see, in the near term?

A. I would like to see the Palestinian Authority (PA) dismantled. I don´t believe the Palestinian Authority has a purpose anymore, based on the reason it was created. The reason it was created was a political reason, as part of the Oslo Peace Process. It was a political entity that was temporary until they reached final status negotiations. Oslo has expired – it not only failed, but it expired. And the government today, given that it has outsourced the financial and the security part of the government to foreign parties, being Israel and the U.S., I do not see that they are adding any value on policy making or otherwise in the community.

I feel that the Palestine Liberation Organization, which is the organization that actually signed Oslo, is the fall-back position, and not only is it an organizational fall-back position, but I believe that by dismantling the Palestinian Authority, we will be contributing to resolving the Fatah-Hamas conflict, and more so, we would be giving that fall-back position the opportunity to be the incubator to bring all political parties under one roof again. That´s a bold statement, but it´s one that´s being spoken about much more these days.

We´ve become a donor society, where donors are driving the economy; donors are driving our finances. The U.S. Government issues a boycott on us, or removes the boycott, based on the actual individual who is elected. That U.S. Treasury Department releasing or lifting of the sanctions that were placed on us after Hamas was elected was because of the Fayyad government, by name. So, does that mean if the Palestinians decide to change Fayyad, all of a sudden the sanctions are reapplied automatically?

This kind of very shallow politics needs bold moves on the Palestinian side, and not to remain in a reactive mode. We have many, many diplomatic tools to become more pro-active. One of them is defining our own future in terms of how we govern ourselves. And if the Palestinian Authority is not providing anything – especially because there´s no Palestinian Legislative Council operating, so there´s no oversight on that body as well –

then the government is incompetent to be able to serve. Because, in my opinion, I come from the States, I may be a little bit biased, government has three parts to it, not only one.

And if one of them is missing, then the others are not able to perform their duties properly.

So, the Palestinians need to take a decision. Do we accept the occupier´s forcing us to become immobile, and we sit and wait for the international community to bring Israel in line with international law? Or, do we pro-actively act, in response, by acknowledging that the Palestinian Authority has had all of its potential stripped from it, and thus no longer is able to serve … There is no longer an ability to operate, given the environment the Israelis have created for us.

Q: There have been several news stories recently about the corruption of Palestinian politicians and businessmen – there´s so many of them, all of a sudden, it looks as though somebody is outing them on purpose. Is there a reason why so many of these sub rosa business deals are being exposed now?

A: There´s no way to know. I don´t see any indication that there´s someone behind this specific thing. However, I don´t think they´re limited to what we´re seeing – nor is it something new. I think the amount of corruption and the amount of wrong business dealings that are in Palestine are deep, and are rather many. And I think that – I´ve been here for 15 years – many of these kinds of cases have come up. Being exposed is not the problem, because many have been exposed. What happens after they´re exposed is the issue. Are corruption cases, are they prosecuted properly to be able to set an example of better governance? … My main observations: no one has been prosecuted, no one has been put in jail, money has not been recovered … And what we see is that, although things are revealed, they´re not followed through.

We have the best case now, which is – people think that the government may actually crack down on now, publicly, to make a statement of it – which is a whole network of counterfeit drugs, pharmaceuticals, that were being imported from China. It started with catching a huge cache in Nablus, and now they´re finding out that it´s a network throughout the West Bank. And these are not cheap drugs. These are drugs for cancer patients and heart patients, so the use of them will kill you, because the drug is nothing but water and salt or sugar, or whatever it is. And people are waiting to see if the Fayyad government wants to set a different example that what had been previous, then we should be cracking down on people who are responsible for this … It´s something that was revealed in this new government, which is claiming to be more transparent and more accountable. But on the ground, people are still waiting for those words to be translated into actions. If it´s happening for a reason now – I´m not sure; if it is being set up to be exposed, I hope so. I mean, I hope all people who are working illegally are exposed – and the more senior they are, the quicker I hope it happens.

Q: Do you have Palestinian citizenship?

A: No, I don´t, and that´s one of the problems of just being here, that as a foreign national, a U.S. citizen – because I was born in the States – I joined the hundreds of thousands, probably 200,000 people that are here, who basically are married to Palestinians and have requested permanent residency, which means our ability to remain here permanently with our children and our families. And the Israelis who are in full control of our borders and our immigration, up until now have refused the vast majority of those people.

And, that´s another sign that if the Palestinian Authority does not control its borders or natural resources or entry-exit visas, or economic levers of society … I don´t think we should remain in this position, because it´s not our goal to remain politically correct, and morally correct, and remaining caged in an agreement because of our good will, while the other side has created all the negative will possible to destroy them. You know, political agreements are there, only if both sides agree to abide by them. And if one side stops abiding by them, I don´t believe the other side is obliged to remain engaged – especially if that engagement is going to bring about its destruction totally.

The entity that issues Palestinian residency is the Israeli occupation. The population registry – who is Palestinian and who is not, as far as the Israelis are concerned – is in Israeli hands. And it´s the Israeli occupation that registers new births in Palestine. It´s the Israeli occupation that registers deaths and removes people from the population registry. And it´s the Israeli occupation that approves foreign nationals, like myself, requesting permanent residency, to be added to the population registry. I´ve requested it – not only do I want it, I´ve already requested it. I requested it in 1994, and I´ve been waiting ever since, without a response from the Israeli side.

If I´m issued an Israeli-issued Palestinian ID card, because we should call it only a Palestinian ID card – it´s an Israeli-issued Palestinian ID card – if I´m issued that, and become equal to my wife, for example, who has one because she was born here, that restricts my movement tremendously. No longer can I meet you in Jerusalem, no longer can I go see my business partners in Israel, no longer can I travel from the Ben Gurion Airport. Life becomes totally confined to the movement venues that the Israelis have set up for Palestinian nationals, which is for example, if you live in the country and want to live in the West Bank, there is one exit point and entry point, which is the Allenby Bridge towards Jordan.

And of course Israel and Jerusalem would be off-limits. And Gaza´s already off-limits for everybody, including Palestinian ID holders. So, it limits your ability to operate, however, it gives you permanent residency status, so at least we can be with our family, and that´s something very important to us as Palestinians, not to have family separated.

Q: But, how come they´re refused you this, because I thought Israel required Americans with Palestinian families or backgrounds from entering Ben Gurion – or, if they do, they then require them to go and get a Palestinian ID (which then requires them to exit only from the Allenby Bridge)…?

A: You need to ask them. That´s a question we´ve put ourselves into a campaign, the Campaign for the Right of Entry, to try to address. It´s saying that not only people who wanted to visit here, or to come and work here, should be allowed access, but also that those of us who are requesting, as Palestinians, to live here permanently, should not be denied. Under international law they have an obligation to define the Palestinian resident in the most flexible way possible, as defined by the Palestinians themselves …

It´s the only place in the world where the occupier gets to define who they´re occupying … My father, who was not in Palestine when Palestine was occupied in 1967 – he was in the States in 1967 – all of a sudden, as far as the Israelis were concerned, became a non-Palestinian, and is only, even until today, is only able to come back to his home, where he was born, as an American citizen, and he can only come back for three months at that, if given three months. So, overnight, Palestinians who were not here when the occupation took place became non-Palestinians, and yet another category of Palestinians being refugees which is a political problem that we´re aware of. Or, if you´re a Jerusalem Palestinian, yet another set of criteria applies to you.

Again, it´s an age-old kind of policy of fragmenting the society, creating different privileges or different constraints for different parts of it, in hopes of breaking down the continuity of the Palestinian people.

At one point, I actually had a two-day visa, so they allowed me to come in for two days. At one point, I was given a two-week visa, which I had to leave after two weeks, and come back in again. And, at one time I was given a stamp saying this would be my last permit, the last time I can come into the country. And that´s when we put ourselves into a large campaign. Now, we still have a problem going and coming, but it´s less than it was a year ago, because of the campaign, I would say, but it´s very arbitrary.

The Israelis have an arbitrary policy, like they do in many things – so I can´t tell you, the next time you even try to come in, if you´ll be able to come in or not, even though you got in this time. And we see, as a campaign, on a weekly basis, cases, things you would never think of as being cases to be denied entry. Mothers whose kids are here, and she went out for health care or something, and when she tried to come back, she was denied entry – things like that, where there´s just actually no rhyme or rhythm to it.

But I think that is the policy, that there be no rhyme or rhythm to the occupation, so the Palestinians are not able to plan forward. And without the ability to plan, it´s very difficult to build a country, or even to build the conditions to build a country…

We have had correspondence with Condoleeza Rice specifically around this issue. On October 18th, 2006, she actually stated publicly that there is an issue of discrimination happening at the borders, with American citizens trying to come into Israel, and that she would do everything in her powers to make sure that it was stopped. This was at an ATFP [American Task Force for Palestine] event.

They just mentioned – and this is why we sent the letter today – the State Department just issued another statement [n.b. it was an advisory notice to U.S. citizens] ten days ago, stating the same thing. In response to two Arab-American organizations that complained, the State Department made a rather strong statement saying that they acknowledge that the problem still exists, and they call on Israel not to discriminate … [But] We don´t see the U.S. using all of its leverage to bring Israel into line with international law, and bring Israel in line with not discriminating against American citizens – or any other citizens, for that matter…

We´ve had several meetings with the American Consulate. We had one with Consulate-General Jake Walles himself, and we had several – more than I can remember – with the consulate [staff]. Unfortunately, none of these meetings have resulted in serious action on the ground, for two reasons: one is that many of the officials on the U.S. side continue to believe that Israeli immigration law applies to the occupied territory – and that´s rather sad, because the whole reason the U.S. Consulate is sitting in East Jerusalem is because official U.S. policy is that even Jerusalem is yet occupied, and thus does not fall under Israeli sovereignty, and falls into the realm of international law.

The second reason why it´s so sad is that the U.S. refuses to address the policy side of this, and continues to look at individual cases. So, whereas they may have acted on an individual case that has been brought to their attention, we as a campaign continue to ask the U.S. to deal with the more strategic thing of actually addressing Israelis on defining a more transparent and accountable process that is not arbitrary. The policy is more important to us than resolving an individual case, as important as that individual case is.

Up until now we haven´t seen the U.S. side use its toolbox to be able to do that in an official way.

The issue of the information is no longer a limitation. Every entity that needs to know about this specific issue, and about other issues relating to the general conditions that we’re living in under occupation already knows.

There isn´t an international agency – including the U.S. State Department Human Rights report – that hasn´t already acknowledged the dire situation that we´re in. The … amount of humanitarian organizations on the ground who have reported on every facet of the occupation, is tremendous. It´s probably the most written-about conflict in the world.

What´s missing is the political will to actually do something about it. And I think the Palestinians are fed up with the international community continuing to measure our spiraling downward despair in every measurement possible, instead of trying to mobilize to stop the downward trend. It doesn´t really mean much to me if our GDP is falling 4% or 3.7% or 3.6%. It matters to me that the elements of being able to build an economy have been withdrawn from the Palestinians.

And I think the Palestinians need to wake up very quickly on how to regroup – first, internally, and second in terms of how we resist the occupation, to become much more smarter in how we resist, and to use civil disobedience in a much more aggressive manner, to be able to put pressure on the Israelis so that there´s a cost to the continuation of their occupation. Today they´re occupying us at a very minimal cost. First, the international community is underwriting a lot of this, via the humanitarian aid, and the Palestinian Authority is helping by not mobilizing the community to act in any other way. So, I think that they´re [the Israelis are] getting away with a free ride.

Filed under: Israel, Journalism and Journalists, Middle East Peace Process, Palestine & Palestinians