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Letter from Qalqiliya

From Graham Usher in Qalqiliya

July 7th, 2005 -- Yaser Arafat was a symbol of the Palestinian people who believed he would never have to face this day,” says Mustafa Sabri, with a glint in his eye. We are sitting beneath a portrait of the late Palestinian leader in the mayor’s office in the West Bank town of Qalqiliya. Sabri is a city councillor from Hamas, which won all 15 council seats in local elections in May. The reverberations have been felt far beyond this town of 43,000 people.

Brussels, for instance, where the European Union has been trying to loosen the knot caused by Hamas’ democratic rise to power. The EU channels millions in aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA) through municipalities like Qalqiliya. But Hamas is a proscribed organization on the “terrorism” list. European diplomats, wriggling, have said that, while they will deal with elected Hamas officials, they will have no truck with those involved in violence against Israel.

This may prove difficult in Qalqiliya: the newly elected mayor, Wajih Qawas, is currently serving a 32-month term in an Israeli jail for unspecified “terrorist offences”.

But it is Arafat’s Fatah movement that is feeling the heat the most. Historically, Qalqiliya was known not only as a nationalist town but a moderate one. Before the Intifada 6,000 Palestinians from Qalqiliya worked in Israel. Thousands more, Arabs and Jews, flooded its market, drawn by cheap prices and the allure of its apricots, grapes, guava and honey.

Five years on, Qalqiliya is another country. Unlike its sister West Bank towns — wracked by Israel’s reconquest — Qalqiliya’s bane has been the Wall. Enclosing the town on three sides, sometimes with concrete eight metres high, the Wall has not only barred all work in Israel; it has confiscated or isolated 83% of Qalqiliya’s arable land and disrupted access to the 32 neighbouring villages. The result has been to turn the oasis into a desert. Unemployment stands at 63%, poverty is rife, shops are shut and 3,000 of Qalqiliya’s ablest people have fled. So was Hamas’ electoral victory a protest against the Wall?

“Yes”, says Ma’ruf Zahran, Qalqiliya’s mayor for the last ten years and Fatah’s leading candidate in the local elections. “Those displaced by the Wall felt despair. They saw Yaser Arafat and Abu Mazen’s moderate policies had brought them nothing. The Wall radicalized Palestinian opinion and Hamas provided the social welfare — free of charge — to nurture the radicalism.”

But the Wall can only explain so much. Another cause for Hamas’ success was the legacy of years of Fatah misrule. Zahran gives one example; there are many others.

“In the last 17 years, 70 families in Qalqiliya have had a father or brother killed by Fatah militia for alleged collaboration with Israel but with no due process. In Qalqiliya a family means 100 people. So how do you think they voted? They voted for revenge.”

Sabri agrees Hamas gained from the failure of Fatah and the PA’s “national project” of peace with Israel and mismanagement at home. Instead he advocates an “Islamic project”, based on resistance and service. “Our policy priorities are to rebuild Qalqiliya’s infrastructure, reduce unemployment, alleviate poverty and provide compensation for those damaged by the Wall.”

But what is “Islamic” about it? “We want to spread Islamic influence throughout the administration. This means greater self-accountability, greater social responsibility and greater transparency in public affairs. It is our faith that drives us to offer the best service for our people’s sacrifice.”

It remains to be seen whether this zeal survives the cold realities of governance, especially for a municipality hamstrung by a $5m debt and 75% non-payment of taxes. Or whether Palestine’s future really is going to be “Islamic”. For Zahran, only two things can stem the Hamas tide.

One is for the world to force Israel to pull down the Wall, or at least move it inside its own borders. The other is for Abu Mazen to replace a Fatah leadership that has failed with a new national coalition based on accountability, democracy and law. Without these, Hamas’ democratic rise will continue, he predicts, whether the EU or anyone else talks to it.

“Hamas is already a significant force in local government. It will become an equally significant force in national government when it contests the PA’s parliamentary elections. Once you control local and national government, you control everything.”


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