Why The Palestinian Authority Will Not Be Able to Control Gaza
The US Must Cut Ties with Qatar, Designate the Muslim Brotherhood a Foreign Terrorist Organization
by Khaled Abu Toameh • February 3, 2025 at 5:00 am
The failure of the Palestinian Authority's security operation against the Jenin gunmen shows why the PA cannot be trusted to assume control over the Gaza Strip, where thousands of Hamas and PIJ terrorists continue to operate, especially after the recent US-brokered ceasefire-hostages deal between Israel and Hamas.
Like Abbas, no Arab country will invest in or get involved in the Gaza Strip as long as Iran's Islamist proxies continue to dominate it. Given the recent return of hundreds of convicted terrorists released from Israeli prisons to the streets in exchange for hostages -- many of whom are dead -- the possibility of another October 7-style atrocity against Israelis is still all too real.
President Donald J. Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, may have the best of intentions, but unfortunately appears to have placed his trust in his real estate business associate, Qatar, which is a major funder of Hamas.
Witkoff, who regrettably took a terrible, ready-to-wear deal from the Biden administration... is proving an unfortunate embarrassment to Trump.
From the beginning, the deal should have been, as then-President-elect Trump put it, that all the hostages must be released before his inauguration or "all hell will break out." Such a warning presupposes that all the hostages, dead and alive, are placed at the border, on a certain date at a certain time. No negotiations, no release of hundreds of terrorists, nothing... It would be interesting to know how Trump's strong, original vision got so badly derailed.
"Qatar is at the top of funding terrorism worldwide, even more than Iran." — Ehud Levi, retired head of the Mossad's unit for economic warfare against terrorist organizations, Ynet, April 18, 2024.
Qatar's plan undoubtedly is to see that Hamas, one of its preeminent clients, remains in power. As the mouthpiece for the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas through its vast television empire, Al Jazeera, Qatar does not want to see Israel in the region any more than Hamas does.
There is only one viable way to address the Gaza Strip's problems: discard Qatar as a supposedly honest broker (it is not), designate the Muslim Brotherhood a Foreign Terrorist Organization (it is), disarm all the terrorist groups, and oust Hamas completely from power.
Qatar and Egypt are now spearheading efforts to bring the Palestinian Authority (PA) back to the Gaza Strip. The two countries are apparently trying to persuade the US administration to back the idea.
If the PA has been unable, or perhaps unwilling, to rein in dozens of gunmen in the West Bank, how can anyone expect it to take control of the Gaza Strip, where thousands of terrorists from Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) continue to operate? PA President Mahmoud Abbas is not foolish enough to send his men to the Gaza Strip, where they are likely to be slaughtered again, as they were in 2007.
In the eyes of Hamas and many Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, Abbas and the PA are traitors, mainly because they conduct security coordination with Israel in the West Bank. Abbas is aware that if and when he dares to enter the Gaza Strip, he will meet the same fate as Palestinians suspected of "collaboration" with Israel: he will be murdered.
