A big loss

Without fanfare Palestine’s most high profile female politician, Dr. Hanan Ashrawi resigned from the Palestinian Liberation Organisation’s Executive Committee on the grounds that it was out of the decision-making loop. She protested in particular two actions taken without consultation by President Mahmoud Abbas.  

The first was the May 20 decision taken unilaterally by Abbas to end security coordination and cooperation on other issues with Israel and his declaration that Israel, as occupying power, would have to assume responsibility for the Palestinian civilian population. He adopted this course of action following Israel’s announcement of its plan to begin annexing parts of the West Bank on July 1. The second was his Nov.17 decision to end the boycott.

Writing in Al-Monitor on Dec.10, Daoud Kuttab said Ashrawi’s resignation “appears to reflect the demise of a movement that has been hollowed out from the inside by the [one man] rule of the 85-year old Palestinian president who was elected in 2005 and whose leadership has not been publically confirmed since.”   

Her resignation is a blow to Abbas because she is the first woman to attain the senior leadership level in the PLO by breaking through the glass ceiling which prevents talented women from reaching the apex of power globally. While she has not taken part in national decision-making, she has deployed words which have carried around the world. Her words have counted and made a difference because of her directness and eloquence and because she is the rare woman speaking out.

Ashrawi believes there is no point in continuing as a member of the PLO’s Executive Committee because it does not meet regularly and has lost its central role. She has called for reform of the PLO and fresh leadership which is now dominated by elderly men. In her statement she said, “The Palestinian political system needs renewal and reinvigoration with the inclusion of youth, women and additional qualified professionals. I believe it is time to carry out the required reform and to activate the PLO in a manner that restores its standing and role.”  

She spoke of the PLO — the Liberation Organisation — rather than the Palestinian Authority or the Palestinian government. She and Palestinians of her generation understand full well that Palestinian institutions and governance have stagnated and Palestinian politicians have focused on self-interest rather than national interest under the limited autonomy granted to the Palestinians by the defunct Oslo process.

Therefore, it is essential to revive the PLO, devise strategies for countering Israeli expansionism, and promote the Palestinian cause internationally with the aim of claiming Palestinian rights.

Ashrawi stands out because she is a woman who has made her way in a harsh world where Palestinians have been deprived of their lands, homes, rights and identity as a people. Born into the Christian Mikhail family on Oct.8, 1946, in the West Bank city of Nablus, from an early age she has endured the multiple traumas suffered by her people. Soon after her birth, the Mikhails moved to Tiberias where they remained until Israel’s 1948 war of establishment when they fled to Amman before settling in Ramallah in the Jordanian-ruled West Bank.

Ashrawi attended the Quaker school for girls and the American University of Beirut at a time pan-Arab nationalism was rising across the region and the Palestinian cause predominated. In Beirut she was involved in the Palestinian students’ union.

Caught away from home by Israel’s 1967 occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza, Ashrawi was forced to remain in exile while completing a PhD in Medieval and Comparative Literature at the University of Virginia. She was finally permitted to return to Ramallah in 1973 under a family reunion plan. Two years later she married Jerusalemite Emile Ashrawi, theatre director and photographer, and established the English department at Bir Zeit University and launched her life-long career as an activist by founding the university’s Legal Aid and Human Rights Project.  

In 1988, Ashrawi joined the Intifada Political Committee during the uplifting three years Palestinians mounted their popular revolt against Israeli occupation. Palestinians marched, threw stones at Israeli troops, engaged in civil disobedience, boycotted Israeli goods, refused to drive vehicles with Israeli licence plates, and ceased working in settlements.

When schools closed, classes were held underground in homes. Israel responded to demonstrations with tear gas, live rounds and arrests.
Ashrawi became an international spokeswoman for her cause by debating on US television with then Israeli Jerusalem mayor Ehud Olmert who later became a Likud prime minister. Her appearance projected her into the diplomatic realm where she served on the Palestinian delegation to the 1991 Madrid peace conference and became the official spokesperson of Palestinian Delegation to the peace process.

Following the establishment of Palestinian self-rule under the 1993 Oslo accords, she was elected in 1996 to the Palestinian Legislative Council.

She served as minister of education but stepped down in 1998 in protest against corruption and former Palestinian President Yasser Arafat’s handling of the peace process. At this time, she also founded MIFTAH, a society promoting Palestinian human rights and democracy. In 2006, she was again elected to the Legislative Council for the Jerusalem district on the Third Way list. This was a vote of confidence in Ashrawi and a major achievement as Hamas won the majority of seats in that election.

Ashrawi’s defection from the Arafat clique was significant as she was among the Palestinian residents of the occupied territories who rose to prominence during the First Intifada. She and other insiders publicly objected to Arafat’s singular rule and the domination of PLO leaders who returned with him from exile. When Abbas succeeded Arafat he adopted the same style of leadership.

However, they differed in one significant aspect. Arafat retained the armed struggle as an alternative to peaceful negotiations as an option to gain Palestinian rights. Abbas renounced arms and put his trust in talks alone. But talks have failed to deliver an end to the Israeli occupation and Palestinian statehood. Constant Israeli colonisation of East Jerusalem and the West Bank has made this an impossibility. If Palestinians are to deal with this situation, Ashrawi is correct: there have to be fresh faces in the leadership and new thinking.

Hanan Ashrawi was the first woman to attain senior leadership level in the PLO by breaking through the glass ceiling which prevented talented women from reaching the apex of power globally.