False rumors about Mahmoud Abbas’ health reveal disturbing truth

Read More

Over the weekend, Palestinian and Israeli social media sites were awash with false rumors about the health of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. The unfounded stories were spreading so fast that Israeli officials rushed to brief the Israeli media that Abbas was alive and well. At the same time, Palestinian Authority officials also briefed Palestinian media outlets that the president was at home in Ramallah and in touch with his government ministers.

The rumors turned out to be false, but the truth about Abbas is disturbing enough in its own right. He is an 85-year-old chain-smoker who has ruled over the PA since 2005 and has no apparent plans to relinquish his hold on power anytime soon. After 15 years in office, he has shown no signs of preparing anyone else to succeed or replace him. If it is up to him, it seems, he will continue to lead the PA from his compound in Ramallah until the day he dies.

That is potentially a major problem for Israel’s new government, as well as for the Biden administration. Because one day, whether five weeks or five years from now, rumors about Abbas’ health might once again start circulating – and this time they could be true. If by the time that happens there is no clear plan for a new leadership to succeed him, the Palestinian arena would face a power vacuum that could easily deteriorate into violence.

Abbas is often ridiculed by Israeli pundits and politicians, who like to refer to him as old, weak and irrelevant. But that view is not shared by Israel’s intelligence and security chiefs, who have a more nuanced approach toward the Palestinian elder statesman. They know very well how committed Abbas has been over the years to the ongoing security and intelligence coordination between the PA’s forces and Israel, despite how deeply unpopular that coordination is on the Palestinian street.

They also know that for all his deficiencies, Abbas has managed, through a tumultuous decade of Arab revolutions and civil wars, to keep his limited area of control in the West Bank relatively stable and quiet, to Israel’s great benefit.

There is also a growing sense of appreciation in Israel’s top security echelons for Abbas’ simple ability to survive: Since his first and last election victory, mighty Arab dictators lost their power, American presidents came and went, and even the supposedly eternal Benjamin Netanyahu has been replaced in Israel – yet Abbas is still here.

But these traits – stability, survivability, reliability (at least in the field of security coordination) – have all come at a price, which Israel and successive U.S. administrations have chosen to conveniently ignore over the years.

In rare meeting, Israeli and Palestinian ministers agree on medical service cooperation

How Bennett found himself trying to save the Palestinian economy

Abbas fires Palestinian library director who criticized activist’s death in custody

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas during a press conference with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Ramallah earlier this year.Alex Brandon/AP

That price has been Abbas’ adoption of a dictatorial, authoritarian and paranoid style of governing. He has silenced journalists and political rivals, canceled elections time after time, and tried to shut down civil society groups for dubious reasons. People he used to consult with have been frozen out of his orbit for saying things he didn’t want to hear.

How Israel, Fatah and the PA join forces to silence Palestinian protest: LISTEN to Amira Hass

Some of these problems were already visible during his first years in office, but things deteriorated rapidly in recent years as Abbas became ever more isolated in his presidential compound.

One especially troubling aspect of Abbas’ approach has been his constant refusal to set in motion any form of succession process, or to make any kind of preparations for the day after his rule eventually ends.

That Abbas has no plans to resign and allow an election or an organized transfer of power is clear to all regional players at this point. He hasn’t taken any clear steps to point toward a potential successor who could step in after he eventually dies, either.

There was a moment three years ago, after he appointed Mahmoud al-Aloul as his deputy in the Fatah party, when the latter seemed a leading candidate to replace the octogenarian president. But if that was Abbas’ intention, he has made no further effort to communicate it to the public or to countries who support the PA.

Palestinian protesters calling on President Mahmoud Abbas to leave, last month.ABBAS MOMANI – AFP

Israel’s main problem with the inevitable Palestinian succession crisis is that it has no interest in being seen as meddling in internal Palestinian politics, leaving it with no real options to influence the process. Israel’s dream scenario is that a friendly neighboring Arab country, like Jordan, Egypt, or Saudi Arabia, would take responsibility for this delicate issue and pressure Abbas into appointing a successor or allowing his party to do so via its internal institutions.

So far, though, no Arab country has expressed any interest in doing that – too many of them have been burnt over the years by failed attempts to mediate an end to the Fatah-Hamas schism that has destroyed Palestinian politics.

One bit of good news on this front is the recent change of power in Washington. The Trump administration was disinterested in the issue, was correctly viewed by Abbas as hostile toward the Palestinians, and was in general committed to keeping Netanyahu in power more than it was to advancing Israel’s real security needs. Half a year after taking over, the Biden administration has displayed a more serious and thoughtful approach to the Israeli-Palestinian issue, and has been welcomed with a sigh of relief by Abbas and his allies in Ramallah.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett will travel to Washington later this month for his first meeting with Biden. High on the list of issues they plan to discuss will be Iran, as well as America’s concerned view of Israel’s growing relationship with China.

The two leaders, however, would be wise to also treat the post-Abbas abyss as an urgent issue that deserves their immediate attention. No one knows when Abbas will eventually depart – but what is very clear is that, if it were to happen tomorrow, the United States and Israel would be dangerously unprepared for it.