The missing peace of a region in pieces

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas maintains that all Palestinian prisoners should be freed from Israeli jails. In an interview with Herman Grech, the man often portrayed as the face of Palestinian moderation says that size does not matter and Malta too can play a major role towards peace.

When Mahmoud Abbas visited Malta recently, the local media spotlight was on the streets - as public transport drivers stalled the country with a nationwide strike. It was chaos by our standards, though some joked that it made the Palestinian leader feel more at home. The Middle East has been torn apart by disruption and violence on a massive scale.

The government got Mr Abbas past the traffic jams caused by the bus and van blockades, but in the process public attention was diverted from possibly one of the most high-profile and important visitors in recent years.

Mr Abbas - also known as Abu Mazen - co-founded Fatah, the main political grouping of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation, along with the late Yasser Arafat.

He served as the first Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority from March to October 2003, but just as he was notching up credibility points among the international community, he resigned, citing lack of support from Israel and the US as well as internal incitement against his government.

His break from politics was short-lived. He served as chairman of the PLO Executive Committee after Mr Arafat's death, and in January 2005 he convincingly won the election for president of the Palestinian Authority.

Widely regarded as the architect of the Oslo peace process, Mr Abbas's election was received with the enthusiastic approval of all those who have been waiting to leap at any opportunity to revive the failed peace process.

He visited Malta for the first time, en route from Paris, where he was invited by French President Nicolas Sarkozy for the setting up of the Union of the Mediterranean.

Sinking into a sofa at the VIP lounge before boarding his aircraft home, Mr Abbas picked on a Maltese word I exchange with the cameraman.

"Ah, it's also a word we use in Arabic," he smiles, as his security men, one of whom held an ominous-looking briefcase, gazed nervously at my voice recorder. "We have a lot in common," the 73-year-old president says.

This may have been Mr Abbas's first visit to Malta, but the respected leader knows a thing or two about the island's sympathies with the Palestinians along the years.

"We know of the policy that Malta has adopted since 1975 in connection with the rights of the Palestinian people. Until now, Malta has been consistent - and it has been trying to help the Palestinian people both economically and politically," he says.

Indeed, during his visit to Malta, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi offered to pass on Malta's experience in education, water technology and IT. But the island has gone beyond that. Over the years it has been vociferous over the plight of the Palestinians in the Middle East conflict, sometimes upsetting Israel in the process. Asked if a small country like Malta, now officially an EU member state, could punch above its weight in the peace process, he replies:

"There are no small and big countries, we talk about sincere countries - and Malta is a sincere country. Malta also has good relations with Israel, so why shouldn't this small country play an important role? It's confident, it's credible and it's respected by other nations - so we count on Malta to play this role. We admire Malta."

But Mr Abbas knows that he has to bank primarily on the big and influential countries, as well as his own countrymen, if talk of peace in the Middle East is to stop being taken with a pinch of salt.

Does he honestly believe peace can start to reign during his term in office?

"Of course, I have great hope that we can reach a peace agreement within a short period. I know we have many difficulties and obstacles, but I also believe peace is in the interest of the Israelis and Palestinians."

During the Paris meeting, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he is still optimistic of reaching the goal to strike a peace agreement by the end of 2008, after peace talks were restarted last November at a US-sponsored peace summit. Does Mr Abbas share the same optimism?

"I hope it will be this year. But if it's not, we should remain hopeful in order to finalise the peace process later on. At least both we and the Israelis are working very hard and I hope we can overcome all the difficulties in a short period. Why not?"

But he also knows that progress has been hindered by vehement mutual recriminations. One of the parties which can scupper any hopes of a deal is Hamas, which kicked Mr Abbas's more secular Fatah rivals out of the Gaza Strip in June 2007. And tensions between Hamas and the Fatah faction have been high since the Islamist movement wrested control of the territory of 1.5 million people.

At the time it looked as though the peace process was dead but, surprisingly, Mr Abbas and Mr Olmert have ventured on, holding a series of in-depth talks which has revived hopes of peace. The recent Hamas ceasefire, brokered by Egypt, is a step in that direction. But for many the picture still looks bleak.

Can Mr Abbas see Hamas dropping its weapons and recognising Israel's right to exist?

"We have problems with Hamas, which has committed a coup against the legal Palestinian Authority. Now everyone talks about Palestinian reconciliation. We know that Hamas should comply with international legitimacy, which means that they should accept all the obligations that the people and the authorities took before them - one of these obligations is the recognition of Israel."

Mr Abbas knows that Hamas still holds a prized pawn in Gilad Shalit, the soldier captured outside the Gaza Strip in June 2006 - who is believed to be alive.

The interview took place on the day the Lebanese militant group Hizbollah handed back the bodies of two Israeli soldiers to the Red Cross in exchange for five Lebanese prisoners - a move viewed as a triumph by the Lebanese Shi'ite guerrilla group and a necessary evil by the Israelis.

The Israeli soldiers had been captured in 2006, sparking a 34-day war that killed about 1,200 people in Lebanon and 159 Israelis. Despite the pain and anger from the Israeli people and media, the Palestinian president applauded the swap - a move severely criticised by some political commentators.

One editorial in an American newspaper said: "Abbas' gesture of goodwill to (freed convicted killer Samir) Kuntar only reinforces the paranoid culture of hate in Palestinian society and undercuts his responsibility to tone down official expressions of hate."

The Palestinian president replies: "We believe that resolving this issue of prisoners between Israel and Hizbollah will fast resolve our own... We are looking forward to the release of the Israeli soldier in captivity which will enable thousands of our prisoners to come back home," he says with reference to some 11,000 Palestinian prisoners detained in Israeli jails.

Hamas has pledged to heed lessons from Israel's prisoner swap with Hizbollah by demanding a higher price for Mr Shalit. To what extent can Mr Abbas exert his influence to secure his release release and what are the Palestinians expecting in return?

"Unfortunately, we don't have any access to Hamas to be able to exert any sort of pressure but I believe they should release this soldier. On the other hand, I ask the Israeli government to release thousands of Palestinian prisoners. I don't want to see anybody in prison - whether he's Palestinian, Israeli, Arab... Nobody should be in prison, without liberty."

What if these individuals are incarcerated because they committed a crime?

Abbas replies: "Everybody, whether he committed a crime or not, should be released. By the way, the Palestinians didn't commit crimes. Maybe they wanted to liberate their country - maybe by weapons, by violence, but whatever they did, this is a liberation act. We consider it this way. When we have peace and we are working for peace with the Israelis I don't think there is any reason to keep these people in prison."

But while Mr Abbas is trying to pacify his own countrymen, he also has to look across the border into Iran to try and keep its president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in check.

Ahmadinejad is not exactly a figure of stability as he persists with his inflammatory comments that he wants to wipe Israel off the map. Tehran test-fired some of its long-range ballistic missiles recently to signal that it is taking the threat of an attack by Israel or the US seriously.

Mr Abbas refused to be drawn into commenting on the Iranian president, but he underlines his objection to nuclear weapons in the region.

"We are against any nuclear weapons in the Middle East. This is what we ask of Iran, or even Israel, because Israel has its own nuclear weapons. We call for co-existence with Israel - we are not calling on Palestinians to destroy Israel. This is our opinion; this is our commitment to the international community. We want to live with Israel, and not destroy it. On the other hand, Israel has to recognise our right and our independent state."

But while he looks at Mr Ahmadinejad as an uncomfortable ally, Mr Abbas sees former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's new role as Middle East peace envoy as a positive thing.

The Palestinian leader believes Mr Blair is gaining a deep understanding of Palestinian concerns as the former British prime minister continues touring the region.

"He's lived with us for about a year now, he understands exactly what we're in need of. I believe he's doing an excellent job and he's working very hard in order to help the Palestinian people."

Of course, Blair's closeness with the Israelis and his support for the so-called War on Terror has alienated him from many Palestinians. But this has mattered little to Mr Abbas. Mr Blair himself was recently quoted as saying: "When a journalist asked if my closeness to the Americans was a problem between us, Abbas looked at me and said: That's the reason he's useful. If you can't get on with the Americans and the Israelis, you can't help us."

That is one of the reasons why Mr Abbas openly welcomed US presidential hopeful Barack Obama (who has been touring the Middle East and Europe) in Ramallah last Wednesday.

Asked what advice he could give the Democratic presidential candidate, he replies: "I have known this man as a senator for a long time - of course, if he becomes the US president we want him to adopt the same policy and principles - he should back the road map, which had been articulated by the Americans and the quartet (Russia, the US, the European Union and the United Nations) in general. So what we want is for Obama to follow up the peace process, if he succeeds."

George W. Bush will not be credited by historians for his Middle East legacy, but asked whether he believes the US President has worked hard enough for peace in the region, Mr Abbas replies:

"Yes, he worked very hard and seriously when he hosted Annapolis (peace summit last November). I believe he was serious with the invitation for 50 countries to come together to have a peace conference.

"I believe he's a credible man and from the beginning he worked very hard to achieve and realise peace in the Middle East," he says.

As the interview comes to an end, Mr Abbas is dwarfed by security men and shuttled away to the waiting aircraft.

One local minister jokes: "Aren't you going to ask him what he thinks of the transport strike?" as local soldiers and policemen in the VIP lounge heave a sigh of relief that they managed to keep him away from the chaos on the roads.