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Fourteen years ago.

On May 4, 1994, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat reached agreement in Cairo on the first stage of Palestinian self-rule.The agreement was made in accordance with the Oslo Accords, signed in Washington, D.C. on September 13, 1993. This was the first direct, face-to-face agreement between Israel and the Palestinians and it acknowledged Israel’s right to exist. It was also designed as a framework for future relations between the two parties.

This lead to:

The Israeli Defense Forces withdrew from Jericho on May 13 and from most of the Gaza Strip on May 18-19, 1994. Palestinian Authority police and officials immediately took control. During the first few days there was a spate of attacks on Israeli troops and civilians in and near the Strip. Arafat himself arrived in Gaza to a tumultuous, chaotic welcome on July 1.

Here’s Clyde Haberman’s sentimental tribute to Arafat’s arrival in Gaza from the NYT:

Yasir Arafat, the fiery, flawed and indomitable symbol of the Palestinian struggle for a homeland, entered the Gaza Strip today, completing his odyssey to territories that he hopes to turn one day into a state.With tears in his eyes, Mr. Arafat knelt after crossing the border from Egypt and kissed the ground — land he has not seen in decades and that for the first time has come under Palestinian authority and, for now, his personal stewardship.

Michael Kelly recalled the scene somewhat less charitably (“Promises but never peace, Washington Post, April 3, 2002)

On July 1, 1994, Yasser Arafat entered Gaza to establish the Palestinian Autonomous Region — betwixt-and-between creature of the Oslo peace process that was supposed to become, under the guiding light of the Oslo peace process, the physical base of another ambivalent notion, the Palestinian National Authority. I went as a reporter to Gaza a few hours before Arafat arrived, and I stayed there for about five weeks, observing the early days of life and governance under the Palestinian Authority. Arafat ‘s entry into Gaza was an object lesson: a purposely uncaring display of brute power. He arrived from the Sinai in a long caravan of Chevrolet Blazers and Mercedes-Benzes and BMWs, 70 or 80 cars packed to the rooflines with men with guns. The caravan roared up the thronged roads and down the mobbed streets, with the overfed, leather-jacketed, sunglassed thugs of Arafat ‘s bodyguard detail all the time screaming and shooting off their Kalashnikovs to make their beloved people scurry out of their beloved leader’s way.This was the whole of the Palestinian Authority from the beginning, an ugly little cartoon of Middle East despotism. There was never any pretense of democracy, of rule of law, of a free press, of a working system of taxes or courts or hospitals. There was never any real government. No one ever bothered to build an economy or create jobs or even pick up the trash or pave the streets. There were only security forces — many, many of these — and villas by the sea for Arafat ‘s cronies, and millions of dollars in foreign aid that seemed to always turn up missing, and prisons and propaganda. And in the middle of it all: “President” Arafat sitting in a room — surrounded by waiting sycophants and toadies and respectful ladies and gentlemen of the press — and complaining.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

The Washington reports that Palestinian Recruits Hit Streets Unprepared

The first class of Palestinian security officers trained under a multimillion-dollar U.S. program to strengthen the Palestinian Authority is deploying to one of the West Bank’s most restive cities without promised supplies of body armor, helmets or even flashlights after Israel blocked a shipment of equipment.The shortage in U.S.-funded supplies threatens the Palestinian government’s ability to provide security in the West Bank, which Israel has made a condition of future withdrawals from the occupied territories. There have also been significant problems with the training, including a final round that one American involved in the program described as “a complete fiasco.”

Of course given the past “success” of training Palestinian security forces Israel’s reticence is somewhat understandable.

This is accounted for in the article that observes:

Israeli officials contacted Friday said they could not immediately comment on what supplies had or had not been approved for the Presidential Guard. But they said Israel has been as cooperative as possible in approving equipment, given its own security needs.A senior official in Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s office said Israel had approved most requests related to the Palestinian security training — “both weapons and equipment.”

“Believe me, it wasn’t easy,” this official said.

Last month, an armored personnel carrier that had been donated to the Palestinian Authority years ago was used by Hamas fighters to attack a crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip, wounding 13 Israeli soldiers.

(Israel has in fact approved much more sophisticated equipment, so what has happened?)

Schwartz said the unit involved in that exercise “was given additional training before returning to the Palestinian Authority,” adding, “It achieved the standard.”The American, who talked on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, also spoke of the training supervisors putting on what he called “a dog-and-pony show” when U.S. congressional delegations or other visitors came to the site.

Visitors “do a bus tour where they view various training sessions that are completely staged,” the American said.

Dog and pony show? That’s certainly the impression I’ve gotten from all those newswire photos. The Palestinian security forces have been trained but it looks like a lot of choreography.

Unfortunately the article fails to mention one other matter and that is the makeup of the Palestinian Presidential Guard. In response to the State Department’s announcement of the training, the Skeptical Bureaucrat reminded us:

The Presidential Guard’s personnel overlap to a large extent with al Fatah’s Force 17 (of Black September infamy) and even with the al Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade. So, watch for future news of U.S.-trained and equipped terrorists – maybe even HAMAS infiltrators in the Guard – committing atrocities against Israel.

I don’t trust these security forces. Unfortunately, the State Department has a stake in ensuring that they succeed, even if it means denying their failures.

Isabel Kershner writes in Israel’s tactics thwart attacks, with tradeoff.

Suicide bombings in Israel have dropped off so significantly that the nation’s security officials now dare to speak openly of success. But the very steps they are taking to thwart bombers appear to collide head-on with the government’s agenda of achieving peace with the Palestinians.It is a classic military-political dilemma. The progress in stopping suicide bombers, the vast majority of whom cross into Israel from the West Bank, has brought enough quiet for Israel to resume peace talks with the Palestinian leadership there.

But the current calm is fragile, and to maintain it Israeli security officials say they must continue their nightly arrests and sometimes deadly raids in the heart of the West Bank — tactics at odds with a peace effort that envisions a separate Palestinian state, an eventual Israeli withdrawal from much of the West Bank and, in the meantime, a gradual transfer of authority to the Palestinian police.

“The price of staying out” of the West Bank, said one senior Israeli military official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of military restrictions, “might be one that we don’t want to pay.”

The dilemma to Kershner is, of course, that how can Israel take charge of its own security and not allow the Palestinians control of their own territory. But it’s not really a dilemma. Kershner ably points out the terror that was an outgrowth of trusting the Palestinians when the Palestinians didn’t accept Israel’s right to exist.

As the military official said, trusting the Palestinians may entail a price that’s too high. Certainly history has taught that lesson.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.