Palestine: narrowing the great divide

Gazan Arabs were not included in the survey because it was deemed too risky an undertaking. One suspects that their viewpoint would be very different to each of the two groups surveyed.

Indeed it would be very interesting if the same survey was conducted among Palestinian Arabs living in Jordan, Syria and Lebanon - where their experiences have been entirely different to those of the three Arab populations in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.

The results of this research herald the need for both Hamas and the PLO to give up their declared political aim of wiping Israel off the face of the map - the only thread they have had to unite Palestinian Arabs since the formation of the PLO in 1964.

Are we indeed witnessing the genesis of a people movement not marching in step with the declared political aims of either Hamas or the PLO - as evidenced by the easing of entry restrictions enabling 120000 West Bank Arabs to visit Israel during the holy month of Ramadan?

Israel’s decision last month elicited the following comment from Daoud Kuttab:

Naturally, Palestinians were delighted to be able to pray in Jerusalem's Aqsa Mosque and visit relatives and friends in Jerusalem and inside the Green Line. Many had not been in Jerusalem for decades. Parents took their children (some teenagers) to see a Jerusalem they had never seen. Many flooded West Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa and other locations.

Palestinians shopped (the Malha mall is said to have sold goods worth 2 million shekels in one weekend). They hit the beaches and stores, enjoying a rare occasion to get out of the closed area of the West Bank.

Denied any vote for six years - the West Bank Arabs had voted with their feet - indicating to their political masters that the time had come to narrow the divide between the 1948 Arabs and the 1967 Arabs - not by trying to eliminate the State of Israel but co-existing peacefully with it.