The PLO’s central council recommended that the Palestinian Authority end security cooperation with Israel, but it won’t happen unless PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas gives an official order.
The resolution raises to a higher level the oft-repeated threat by Abbas to cut off the Palestinian Authority’s head to spite the rest of its body, which exists courtesy of the Israeli security services that help keep Palestinian Authority terrorists from assassinating Abbas.
The PLO council’s decision followed Israel’s withholding of tax funds in response to the PA’s decision to breach what was left of the Oslo Accords after its unilateral steps to apply for membership in the International Criminal Court.
Without the funding, the PA will probably collapse. Without the security cooperation the PA will possibly collapse.
Israel is not taking any chances.
Earlier this week, the IDF carried out its largest training exercise in Judea and Samaria in years, preparing for various contingencies emanating from a collapsed PA or an escalation of terrorism from the PA.
If the PA does collapse, Israel has various options it can implement, such as reinstating the Civil Administration or giving governance of the Arab population over to the local sheikhs, tribal leaders and families, most of whom would be happy to take back control from the PA.
If it does not collapse, the same results might follow because the Ramallah regime increasingly exists on paper, not in reality.
The European Union is running out of money to prop up what has been one of the worse investments since the Edsel, and a New York federal court last week helped tighten the noose on the Palestinian Authority by ruling in favor of relatives of terror victims and ordered the PA to pay damages, which may run up to more than half a billion dollars.
The bottom line is that the EU funds the PA, and Israel turn over tax revenues collected for Ramallah, in order that Abbas can pay salaries to terrorists in Israel jails. Now he has to pay the victims of some of the terrorists whom he pays.
The Palestinian Authority last week also took another suicidal move by publicly destroying some Israeli-made products, such as milk, so that its residents can suffer like their brethren in Gaza and then blame Israel for their misery.
The constant threat to break off security ties is another blank bullet in the revolver the Palestinian Authority holds to its own head.
It has decided not to put a real bullet in the gun.
The Bethlehem-based Ma’an News Agency reported Friday, “PLO officials Nasser al-Deen Shaer and Sameer Abu Aisha, who attended the session, told Ma’an that the decision to halt security coordination will be executed at the appropriate time following discussions with the executive committee.”