What's New in Haniyeh's Speech

by Dr. Abdul-Sattar Kassem

Mr. Ismail Haniyeh, prime minister of the Gaza government, touched, in his speech dated October 19, 2013, on several traditional Palestinian subjects, referring to some of them with well-known words and phrases circulated at least within Hamas circles, but the speech overall contained some new elements I think important to highlight:

1. Haniyeh delivered a written speech, which usually means the speech is institutional, not merely the vision of an individual leader or particular figure. This means the speech was crafted by an institution, which may be the Hamas movement or the Gaza government, and this is important, because the Palestinian arena greatly lacks institutionalism. We, like Arabs in various Arab countries, turn public institutions into personal ones, where the director or president gathers his clientele of relatives, friends, and sycophants, causing the institution to lose its national dimension.

2. Ismail Haniyeh’s language was good — he did not misconjugate the subject or drag the object incorrectly. This is a great development in the Arab arena, because the Arab leader is usually expected to be ignorant and a poor example in using the Arabic language.

3. Haniyeh addressed the Palestinian mind, and did not resort to bluster, manipulation, lies, and fiery, useless enthusiastic phrases. The speech was free of wretched, false slogans, remaining within the bounds of addressing the mind.

4. Haniyeh used rhetorical language proportionate to capabilities whose limits he himself knows. Usually our speeches are bigger than our capabilities, and our sticks longer than our own height, and we always entangle ourselves in words we cannot follow through on, or we carry out something contrary to them, but this speech did not fall into the policy of big mouths and small muscles.

5. Haniyeh focused on resistance, mentioning it about thirty times, which expresses his conviction that the cause of Palestine needs the strong, not newcomers and beggars. The matter of strength and its role in escaping predicaments should have been given wider space, because of the importance of planting this idea in the minds and behavior of the rising Palestinian generation, which hears so much about negotiations.

6. He reassured people that there are those working underground for their comfort. My assessment is that he meant the resistance fighters’ arms continue preparing and readying themselves, and that these efforts will not go to waste, appearing on the day of reckoning. But it was important to give this matter wider space, aimed at raising the morale of people who have come to believe the solution to the Palestinian cause lies in others’ hands, not Palestinian hands. Expanding on this matter does not require speaking of secrets, but of activities known and expected of a resistance faction, yet unknown to ordinary people who could easily be influenced by the media.

7. Mr. Haniyeh was not clear regarding the foundations upon which reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas must rest. Is reconciliation merely an emotional act the Palestinian street temporarily approves of, only to wake up two months later to new disputes, or is it an act built on clear, evident, unambiguous principles and foundations? The question also raised: are we searching for strength or for reconciliation? National unity is one of the elements of strength, or this is supposed to be the case, and if national unity comes at the expense of gaining strength, then gaining strength takes priority. For example, how might Gaza’s military performance against Israel in the 2008/2009 war, or the 2012 war, have looked had there been national unity within the standards now governing the Palestinian street generally?

8. It was necessary to focus on the unity of the resistance in the Arab-Islamic region in confronting Israel and the American-Western projects in the region. The unity of the Arab peoples rests essentially on the unity of the resistance, which is a vital, fundamental source in building the forces of resistance.

9. Mr. Haniyeh was clear regarding relations with Egypt, and on the position toward what is happening in Egypt. Egypt has so far been unable to present a single piece of evidence of Palestinian resistance fighters’ involvement in fighting the Egyptian army, and Egyptian media, or part of it, alone weaves accusations unsupported by facts. Hamas took sides, in media and political terms, with one team over another, but did not carry out field actions to favor one over the other, and if Palestinians did undertake intervention, their intervention was individual, its price not paid by the Palestinian people.

Source: Translated from the original Arabic, “الجديد في خطاب هنية” by Dr. Abdul-Sattar Kassem.