“ARABIC TV does not do our country justice,” President Bush complained in early 2006, calling it a purveyor of “propaganda” that “just isn’t right, it isn’t fair, and it doesn’t give people the impression of what we’re about.”

The president’s statement, along with the decision by the New York Stock Exchange to ban Al Jazeera’s reporters in 2003, is a prime example of how the Arab news media have been demonized since the 9/11 attacks. As a result, America has failed to make use of what is potentially one of its most powerful weapons in the war of ideas against terrorism.

For proof, in the last year we surveyed 601 journalists in 13 Arab countries in North Africa, the Levant and the Arabian Peninsula. The results, to be published in The International Journal of Press/Politics in July, shatter many of the myths upon which American public diplomacy strategy has been based.

Rather than being the enemy, most Arab journalists are potential allies whose agenda broadly tracks the stated goals of United States Middle East policy and who can be a valuable conduit for explaining American policy to their audiences. Many see themselves as agents of political and social change who believe it is their mission to reform the antidemocratic regimes they live under. When asked to name the top 10 missions of Arab journalism, they cited political reform, human rights, poverty and education as the most important issues facing the region, trumping Palestinian statehood and the war in Iraq. Overwhelmingly, they wanted the clergy to stay out of politics. And, aside from the ever-present issue of Israel, they ranked “lack of political change” alongside American policy as the greatest threats to the Arab world.

Though many Arab journalists dislike the United States government, more than 60 percent say they have a favorable view of the American people. They just don’t believe the United States is sincere when it calls for Arab democratic reform or a Palestinian state, as President Bush did again this month in Egypt.

Make no mistake, the Arab press has many flaws, including being subject to state control; only 26 percent of our respondents said they felt their fellow Arab journalists “act professionally” and only 11 percent said they were truly independent in their work. Nevertheless, Arab news outlets are more powerful and free today than at any time in history. If the next administration is going to try to reach out to the Arab people, it won’t get far by blaming the messenger.

Palestinian youths form one of the largest sectors of Palestinian society, a sector that is often overlooked and requires close attention when trying to solve the challenges facing it.

Broadly speaking, young Palestinians face challenges and conflicts on three fronts: "family" conflicts, "social" conflicts and "political" conflicts.

A subject that is rarely broached in Palestinian society is that of family conflicts. There are enough dysfunctional families in society for this to be an issue of serious concern and there is now also a major problem of families that have been separated, especially in the past seven years and as a result of the difficulties imposed on the movement of Palestinians within and between the Palestinian areas.

Youths from such families become victims as their insecurities at home affect behavior. It is clear that young people who suffer conflict within their families face a lack of motivation in school and at work, can become violent and generally lack confidence in themselves.

Another important challenge Palestinian youth face is the "social" conflict, pitting traditional values against modernity, fundamentalism against liberalism. With developments in technology, youths are very exposed to other cultures and traditions. These new ideas and influences often contradict, or seem to contradict, the values they have been brought up with or that they see around them. Often, young people start to make comparisons and contrasts that don't actually help them realize a transition in their thoughts. Consequently, one of two things is likely to happen: they blindly imitate another culture, leaving them alienated from their surroundings; or they totally reject any outside influence, turning away from new ideas and thoughts.

The final and greatest challenge Palestinian youths face is of course the political conflict with Israel. As in so many areas of Palestinian lives, any resolution or progress toward resolution of the many challenges facing young Palestinians will be extremely limited in the absence of a resolution to the one conflict that all Palestinians have to deal with on a daily basis and that affects so many areas of life.

The suffocating occupation affects young people in a multitude of ways, whether directly and in the short term in the form of the absence of decent employment opportunities, the inability to move freely from area to area let alone country to country, and the lack of control over their own political destinies, or in the long term, where psychological factors may inflict more damage insofar as the occupation instills a deep sense of mistrust toward authority and creates enormous anger. Witness how young people identify with the suicide bombers of the intifada. Look at the disruptions to normal life that they have to suffer on a daily basis, whether in terms of curfews, fear of simply walking the streets should a military incursion be under way or the humiliation of waiting in endless lines at checkpoints with not even a guarantee that one can cross. This anger is real, deep and will not go away overnight.

But the political conflict is evolving now to include more than just Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The growing Palestinian-Palestinian conflict, which started in Gaza, is moving slowly but surely, infiltrating other parts of the land, especially between young people because of their misinterpretation of authority and power.

Palestinian youth, like any nation's youth, plays a key role in the development of the country's culture, politics, economy and education. The PA, interested organizations and individuals should work hard to guarantee a peaceful life for active non-violent youths by building their capacities, training them on issues related to society and communication, opening their horizons to other cultures, reinforcing conflict management training courses on a community level and creating a fruitful basis to enable them to achieve their ambitions and improve their skills.- Published 30/7/2007 © bitterlemons.org

I cannot describe the events since the formation of a committee to investigate into the defeat of Fatah in Gaza as anything but a second coup  that is, following the coup Hamas staged against Fatah in Gaza. However this time, the coup was led by President Mahmoud Abbas, the leader accused of having a weak personality and the incapacity to elicit any change.

President Abbas chose the critical time and the appropriate event to finally stage his coup after enduring a long wait since he assumed the presidency in 2004. And thus the most powerful figures in Fatah, including Mohamed Dahlan and Yasser Abd Rabbo, in addition to 60 other senior Fatah officers have either fled or fallen at the first sign that the president meant business. Abu Mazen has abandoned his position as a peaceful leader to become a combatant leader who seems to be leading the new battle himself.

Apart from his hesitant decisions, Abu Mazen remains a Palestinian necessity after the Palestinians were orphaned following the death of Yasser Arafat; a nation without a real leadership that is embroiled in war. The Palestinians had become accustomed to Arafat who was their front in the Diaspora and who governed over them internally for 36 years. Abu Ammar succeeded in overshadowing all those who tried to compete with him for the seat of power, including the late Sheikh Ahmed Yassin who despite his huge following and popularity still could not take his place, like many others who tried before him.

But Arafat was not simply a leader by virtue of heading the Palestinian Authority and Fatah, but rather for a number of traits he possessed, including his shrewdness, focus, decisiveness, reconciliatory approach and the complex alliances he forged on an Arab and Palestinian level.

As for Abu Mazen, he inherited the leadership of Fatah without any challenges posed from the leadership of the movement by reason of his seniority and the respect he had gained. However, over the past three years, he has shown no signs of leadership qualities. He did nothing to resolve the recurring internal crises in the Palestinian arena, or even within Fatah itself. Abbas was disdained to the point that emboldened his partners in Hamas against him, despite the fact that he was the one responsible for admitting them to power. In turn, they plotted to kill him then turned against him and seized Gaza in a manner that intended to demonstrate their challenge of Abu Mazen’s leadership.

Perhaps this was the last straw that woke the president up, after which he broke his silence and began shooting at his potential opponents.

Nabil Amr’s unexpected proactive statement was met with amazement after he made some announcements, before the Friday prayers, that 60 officers in Fatah will be held accountable and that Dahlan had resigned, and before them was the news of the formation of Salam Fayyad’s two governments. The president commenced with a harsh speech in which he revealed that Hamas had made attempts to assassinate him.

This series of bold steps could mean a new awakening on Abu Mazen’s behalf, one in which he has come to realize that it was not only his power that was targeted, but that there had also been a conspiracy to take his life. Perhaps these developments might indicate a plan in which Abu Mazan has waited for the right moment to attack his adversaries, both at home and abroad.

Should he succeed in his internal coup, Abu Mazen will have taken charge of the full reins of leadership and the absolute right for the Palestinian Authority, especially after shutting the cage on Hamas, which it had willingly backed itself into after seizing Gaza. Hamas put itself on the frontline to face Israeli gunfire and the faces of 1.5 millions Palestinians who require it to provide them with their share of water, electricity, gas, pensions and food.

Today, the aftermath of this ‘counter-coup’ has set the scene for Mahmoud Abbas to take action. He has become obligated to adopt reforms, reorganize the order of power and change the bad image that has come to represent Fatah, and finally, to lead the Palestinian people towards their dream project: the Palestinian state.

The Israeli-controlled Erez crossing point into the Gaza Strip looks is like an airport terminal to nowhere. After showing my passport and press pass, I enter the glass, air-conditioned and almost completely empty building and walk down a long corridor at the end of which, instead of a waiting airplane, there's a room with seemingly no exit. Then a metal door mysteriously opens, and I leave Israel. Outside there are no customers officers, no passport control, no port authority, just long caged passageways and a huge empty lot with a couple of taxis baking in the summer sun. This is the quietest border crossing in the Middle East.

The Gaza Strip, which is home to about 1.4 million people, is almost fifty day into an Israeli siege. Almost all shipments except for basic humanitarian supplies are barred from entering, and almost nothing comes out. And no one but journalists, members of international organizations like the United Nations, and a tiny number of Palestinians from special professions are allowed to come or go.

The Israelis have sealed the crossing in part as a response to the rockets that are regularly launched from Gaza into Israeli towns in the Negev, occasionally killing civilians, and often damaging homes. But the siege is also the key element of an Israeli and American strategy to isolate Hamas, the Palestinian militant group and political party which after a few short days of internecine Palestinian warfare in June, took control of Gaza from its political rival, Fatah. The hope is that by letting Gaza simmer in its own juices, average Palestinians will turn away from Hamas, which has never recognized Israel, and towards Fatah, which is willing to restart the peace process. Unfortunately, the siege of Gaza appears to be having the opposite effect.

The damage done to the Gazan economy has in fact been catastrophic. Unemployment is up to about 87 percent . About 79 percent of the population is receiving food from the United Nations. Nasser El Helou, a spokesman for the Chamber of Commerce and a hotel owner, estimated that the Gazan economy -- which is based on light manufacturing, agricultural exports, and the wages brought home by day laborers in Israel -- would collapse within two weeks if the siege continues. But he was also clear about whom he blamed for the situation. "If we are free we should control our own borders," he said. "But we do not control our borders, so the full responsibility is on the Israeli side. "

I spent Thursday talking to other business owners -- pragmatic, apolitical people -- who uniformly blamed Israel, the United States and Fatah for the destruction of the Gazan economy. In fact, after years of living with the gangsterism and warlordism that plagued Gaza while it was run by Fatah officials, most are happy with the Hamas takeover. "I blame Fatah and Abu Mazen because they made us live in garbage," said the owner of the largest factory in Gaza, which makes cookies and ice cream, but which is now almost totally shut. "They never wanted to see anyone else prosper. They just wanted to live on top, through corruption."

The business owners pointed out that not only joblessness and poverty pushing average people towards extremism, but they also said that the Israeli embargo was destroying the only class of Palestinians who still looked favorably towards Israel: them. Most of them speak Hebrew, have -- or used to have -- Israeli clients, partners, and friends, and most had once looked forward to the day when there would be no trade barriers at all for an independent Palestine at peace with Israel. "The majority of Gazans do not like Israel'" said Amassi Ghazi, the chairman of a company that imports building materials. "Until now only the private sector had good relations with Israel. So please open the border before you loose the last sector, and all Gaza will be enemies of Israel."

Has the Arab League finally broken its taboo on ties with Israel by sending a delegation to Jerusalem? Depends who you ask. The Israeli government has declared Wednesday's visit by the foreign ministers of Egypt and Jordan a historic landmark on the road toward acceptance of Israel by the Arab world. "In the past, the Arab League has opposed dialogue, normalization and any contact with Israel, and this is the first time the Arab League has authorized a delegation to visit Israel," said Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev. Not so fast, say the visitors. The Egyptian government released a statement on Saturday saying that the foreign ministers are not, in fact, representing the Arab League in Jerusalem, but only their own countries — Egypt and Jordan are the only Arab League countries that have full diplomatic relations with Israel, and the League's position is that normalization of ties can only occur when Israel agrees to withdraw to its 1967 borders.

So what are Egypt's Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit and his Jordanian counterpart, Abdulelah al-Khatib doing in Jerusalem? Well, the Arab League did, in fact, ask Jordan and Egypt to formally present its peace proposals to Israel. And his government's last-minute case of stage fright didn't stop Abul Gheit from going through the motions of the day's protocol and pleasantries. But the Egyptian identity crisis may be a sign that Arab enthusiasm for a renewal of peace talks with Israel is fading even in those countries that once supported it.

The Arab peace initiative began in 2002 as a Saudi proposal that called for all Arab countries to normalize relations with Israel in return for a full Israeli withdrawal from territories it has occupied since 1967, the creation of a Palestinian state, and a fair solution to the Palestinian refugee problem. But Israel reacted coolly to the idea at the time, and with Washington showing no greater enthusiasm for pressing the issue, little more was heard of it. But following the collapse of the Hamas-Fatah Palestinian unity government, and with a greater sense of urgency over the need to rally Arab moderates against Iran and its allies, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has begun expressing interest in the Arab peace initiative, and in restarting dialogue with the Palestinians.

But Arab countries are concerned that Olmert is more interested in the symbolic value of a peace process rather than in the substance of concluding it. Burdened by rock-bottom popularity thanks to his mishandling of last summer's war in Lebanon, Olmert is hoping that the Israeli public will be wary of tossing out a leader engaged in peace negotiations. And even if he were serious about concluding a deal, his domestic political weakness would make it difficult for him to lead the country through the wrenching changes that peace would require. Thus Olmert's announcement Wednesday that he intends to reach an agreement with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas over the principles for resolving the easy issues — the characteristics of the Palestinian state, its economy, and the customs arrangement it will have with Israel — and postpone addressing the difficult issues such where to draw the border between Israel and Palestine, the status of Jerusalem, and the fate of the refugees. Olmert's plan, in fact, is the reverse of the Arab initiative, which attempts to jump straight to the heart of the matter.

The problem with Olmert's approach is that the Arab world has run out of patience. It is well aware that the Oslo process floundered, at the end, not over customs arrangements and the Palestinian economy, but over borders, Jerusalem and refugees, and those issues are the ones that must be resolved if the process is to be about anything more than marking time. And the Arab League regimes don't have much time to lose: Between the radicalizing impact on their own populations of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict and also the war in Iraq; the rising power of Iran; and growing tension between Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims, the Middle East is ready to explode. Countries that were once ready to bury the hatchet with Israel are now looking over their shoulders at their angry citizens, increasing numbers of whom see more to be gained by standing up to America and Israel than by trying to revive the peace process. Saudi Arabia, for example, which drafted the Arab initiative, is now warning that peace between Israel and the Palestinians is impossible unless Israel also negotiates with Hamas.

The Saudi warning is a sign that those in Fatah such as President Mahmoud Abbas who are closest to the U.S. and Israel have lost support not only among Palestinians, but among Arab countries as well. Not coincidentally, Saudi Arabia is also the country with perhaps the biggest jihadi problem in the region — a significant proportion of suicide bombers in Iraq are reported to be Saudi citizens.

Likewise, time may have run out for peace between Israel and Syria. Since the end of last year, Syria has been repeatedly calling for a resumption of the peace talks of the late 1990s premised on Israel returning the Syrian Golan Heights, captured in 1967. But while Olmert has largely evaded the overtures — questioning their sincerity, quibbling about who if anyone should mediate — Syria may have given up. Last week, the Israeli press was filled with rumors that Iran gave Syria $1 billion to purchase weapons in return for abandoning peace overtures towards Israel.

The Arab League country most eager to get the peace process back on track is Jordan. Even as its foreign minister talked peace in Jerusalem on Wednesday, its head of state, King Abdullah II, was visiting Washington to seek U.S. support for the Arab initiative. Jordan certainly has more to lose than any of its Arab League partners if peace fails. The pro-U.S. Hashemite Kingdom may have a peace treaty with Israel, but the majority of its population is Palestinian, and it is quickly filling with Iraqi refugees growing angrier by the day. Jordan's enthusiasm for peace, then, may be less a sign of hope, as much as a sign of desperation.

It sounded very inspiring. In a major speech last night out of the White House, U.S. President George W. Bush called for a revival of peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians, and proposed that Israel and some Arab states hold a regional peace conference this fall. "The international community must rise to the moment," he said. "The world can do more to build the conditions for peace." All this from an Administration that was once wary of repeating the patterns of previous presidencies by devoting time and prestige to solving a conflict that refused to be solved.

The difference now is that the Bush Administration, with just 18 months left in office, is in dire need of some policy victories in the Middle East. In particular, it must show its Arab allies, such as Saudi Arabia — whose help Washington needs to stabilize Iraq — that the U.S. is willing to put its weight behind the peace process. But in looking to score points in the Middle East, Bush is likely to be as disappointed as his predecessors. That's because the core of his strategy to bolster moderate Arab states and moderate Palestinians while shunning the region's radicals is a case of too little too late. The sad reality is that the moderates of the Arab world have little to offer Israel and less and less power to promote peace in the Middle East.

Under the new Bush plans, Israel would begin peace talks with the Palestinians on the condition that the Palestinian Authority (PA) crack down on terrorism and corruption. This is understandable but unrealistic. The Fatah leadership that has controlled the PA since the 1993 Oslo Accords has been unable or unwilling to curb Palestinian militants. A key reason terrorist acts continue is that many Palestinians simply don't see the benefits of giving up armed struggle. With no end in sight to the growth of Israelis settlements and security barriers in the occupied West Bank, most Palestinians have lost faith in the ability of Fatah's notoriously corrupt leadership to lead them to the promised land of a Palestinian state, and have instead put their trust in Fatah's rival, the puritanical militants of Hamas.

Even though Hamas is the democratically elected representative of the Palestinian people, Bush's plans continue to embrace Fatah's failed leaders, and to exclude Hamas from the proposed peace talks. So whatever agreements the peace negotiations produce are unlikely to have any legitimacy on the ground. And while the Bush Administration is doing what it can to bolster the legitimacy of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (the head of Fatah), this could also backfire. The $190 million package of U.S. aid Bush proposes to send to the Palestinians includes money to bolster Fatah-controlled security services — effectively arming Fatah thugs to fight Hamas thugs. This is a recipe for renewed Palestinian civil war, not nationhood. And if Hamas' recent victory over Fatah in Gaza is any guide, it's a civil war that America's allies might not win.

Just as Bush would exclude Hamas from Palestinian-Israeli peace talks, his call for a regional peace conference notably excludes countries that are hostile to Israel, especially Syria and Iran. A peace conference that doesn't involve enemies sitting down across from each other isn't much of a peace conference. The countries that might show up, such as Saudi Arabia, don't border Israel and have never fired a shot in anger at the Jewish state. (The Saudis just try to ignore Israel.) The Bush Administration merely wants these countries to take some initial steps toward recognizing Israel, such as sending heavyweight cabinet-level ministers to the meetings. But many of America's Arab allies are autocratic regimes whose populations are becoming increasingly anti-American and anti-Israeli, thanks to the American invasion of Iraq and the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. These governments are unlikely to make substantial gestures toward Israel without significant progress toward a Palestinian state, lest they incur the growing wrath of their fast-radicalizing subjects.

The reality is Israel's safety will never be assured, and a Palestinian state will never be secured until the U.S. and Israel begin some level of cooperation with their enemies, or until they defeat them. And if dealing with the devil seems naïve and impractical, it's worth remembering that victory in the Middle East is just as elusive as peace.

Imposing order on the rival gunmen of Hamas and Fatah would have been a tall order for a leader far stronger than Palestinian Interior Minister Hani Kawasmeh. Kawasmeh, a career civil servant rather than a tough-guy commander of either of the two main Palestinian factions, was appointed to the position as a compromise candidate after Hamas and Fatah brokered their unity government in Mecca earlier this year. And it came as no surprise when he announced his resignation on Monday, amid a fierce resurgence of fighting between the two camps that has claimed at least eight lives since Sunday. Absent a power base of his own, Kawasmeh's prospects for integrating the fighting forces of the rival factions into the Palestinian Authority's security forces were always slim. But his resignation may nonetheless portend the collapse of the unity government, and the onset of a full-blown Palestinian civil war.

Kawasmeh's failure results in part from the refusal of Fatah hardliners to cede power within the Palestinian Authority to Hamas, despite the fact that the latter won last year's Palestinian parliamentary elections. Even after their leaders agreed to a power sharing arrangement in Mecca last fall, many Fatah officials have done their best to make it fail — perhaps encouraged by the U.S., which has refused to have any relations with a Palestinian government that includes Hamas, and has made isolating the Islamist ruling party a focus of its Middle East policy.

But Hamas has its own hard-liners, who have plenty to gain from the collapse of the unity government. One of the main reasons for sharing power with Fatah — to circumvent the U.S.-led financial siege of the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority — has turned out to be moot. The U.S. and the EU continue to refuse to give direct aid to any Palestinian government with Hamas in it, despite the unity government. A narrower Hamas government would also be in a better position to prevent the already fragile Arab League initiative offering Israel a comprehensive peace agreement in exchange for a returns to 1967 borders.

Despite frantic efforts by the leaders of both parties to restore calm, fighting raged on the streets of Gaza on Monday. Masked gunmen have reportedly taken up positions at major buildings and intersections all over Gaza city, and Fatah officials predict the collapse of the government in a matter of days.

The chaos in Gaza is a disaster for a Palestinian population suffering the stress of more than a year of sanctions, but it also bodes badly for Israel. Qassam rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel have become an almost daily routine since March, when Hamas ended its unilateral cease-fire. If the Palestinian government collapses, Israel may soon resume strikes against militant leaders and rocket cells, which in turn will likely escalate the attacks. Israeli security officials have admitted there is no military solution to the rockets, but they may be drawn further into the conflict if Gaza militants begin using longer range Katyusha rockets, of the kind used by Hizballah from Lebanon last summer, and which Israel fears may have been smuggled into Gaza.

The area evacuated by Israel in 2005 is well on its way to becoming a kind of seaside Falluja, a safe haven and training ground for extremists of all kinds. Aid workers recently returned from Gaza describe a city breaking down into tribal and gang formations, much like Iraq. The fact that these groups can act with impunity is clear in the ongoing captivity of BBC journalist Alan Johnston, who was kidnapped in March, and has been held despite the fact that his release has been demanded by the top leadership of both Fatah and Hamas. Last week, Palestinian President Mahmhoud Abbas said that his security forces are aware of Johnston's location and the identity of his kidnappers, but have been unable to act on that information, ostensibly out of concern for Johnston's safety. Without a government in Gaza, near term prospects for Johnston's return will look even worse.