Between confederation and federation, the compass is lost in Palestine
Hamas Political Bureau Deputy Chairman Dr. Mousa Abu Marzouk ended last year with a tweet in a TV interview that sparked a storm of criticism and disapproval from many Palestinian factions and figures. On Friday evening, December 30, Abu Marzouk stated: “Confederation with the West Bank is one of the solutions and better than the continuation of Palestinian division.”
I do not know if Dr. Abu Marzouk, the seasoned politician, intentionally used the word confederation or if he made a linguistic mistake and replaced the word federation with confederation.. but since Abu Marzouk did not amend his statement more than a week after his tweet, this became conclusive evidence that he meant confederation and that he certainly knows the difference between the two terms… Yes, Abu Marzouk promotes a confederation project between Hamasstan in Gaza Strip and Fathstan in the West Bank.
The reactions to Dr. Abu Marzouk’s statements by political factions and media comments caught my attention, but Dr. Abu Marzouk is not the only one in the Palestinian political class and media scene who confuses terms and manipulates scientific political terminology either out of ignorance or a desire to cloud the issue.
In some statements and analyses on Abu Marzouk’s tweet, they write federation but their comments and arguments mean confederation and vice versa. Demonizing some terms and sayings in Arab society has made the Arab nation’s people avoid some of these terms as one avoids the devil saying 'There is no god but Allah'... In my opinion, this demonization and placing barriers before free, rational, innovative thinking and using terms out of context is one of the reasons for the entrenchment of reactionary and authoritarian regimes in the Arab East.
For decades, everyone has written, called for, and demanded Arab unity while meaning and aiming for Arab confederation… Unity’s components, foundations, and rules differ from those of confederation!
Before I return to analyzing Abu Marzouk’s tweet and understanding the reasons for his utterance now, I want to define the two terms: confederation and federation to separate the wheat from the chaff…!
First, federation: means voluntary union, i.e., coexistence among peoples, minorities, and even within one people in multiple regions as in Germany, Austria, and other countries worldwide. Voluntary union is one of the practices of the right to self-determination, stipulated in international human rights treaties and the United Nations Charter.
So, federation means voluntary union within a sovereign state between regions sharing common goals and a shared national destiny.
Federation is not new; it is an old idea, but its applications appeared in modern times in 1787 in America, 1901 in Australia, 1917 in Mexico, 1948 in Switzerland, and today there are more than 30 federal countries worldwide.
The strong guarantee of federation and the relationship between regions and the central government is that the basis of the federal system is constitutional. Since the constitution is the highest legal authority (the supreme law), rulers, their activities, and resulting rules are subject to this law (the constitution), and regional rulers and parliaments cannot enact laws contradicting the constitution.
Second: confederation:
It is a union between two or more fully independent states with complete sovereignty after signing a treaty defining the common goals the confederation alliance seeks to achieve. Each member enjoys full independence from the others and is governed by joint bodies composed of representatives from member states to achieve common goals. This body is called the confederal general assembly, conference, or confederal parliament, and its members express the views of the states they represent. Decisions are made unanimously and become effective after member states’ approval.
Thus, a confederal state consists of a union of two or more independent states (not regions) to achieve common goals under a treaty. Joint bodies oversee the implementation of the treaty’s provisions. Member states in the confederal union enjoy full independence and are linked by military, economic, or political interests, as in the European Union.
Third: the difference between a federal state and a confederal state:
Each member state in the confederal union independently conducts foreign policy and diplomatic representation separate from other members.
Members of a federal state do not have this right; diplomatic representation and foreign policy are the prerogative of the federal state’s executive authority (central government). The same applies to the army and national defense, which are exclusively under the central government.
Member states of a confederal state have the right to declare war, unlike members of a federal state (regional governments), as this is the central government’s prerogative (federal government). War between confederal members is international, while war between federal members is internal (civil). Any breach of international law by a confederal member is borne solely by that member, unlike in a federal state. Confederal states are overseen by joint bodies among member states, whereas federal states are managed by the central government, which leads the army and safeguards national interests. Each confederal member state may withdraw at will as it is independent, unlike federal members who are regions and inseparable parts of the federal state (Catalonia in Spain is a prime example of this strong bond). Citizens of a confederal state hold their country’s nationality; there is no unified confederal nationality. Federal state citizens hold only the federal nationality. In a confederal union, there are multiple heads of state corresponding to member states, whereas a federal state has a single head of state and unified sovereignty. The confederal state is not a unified state but a union of member states, unlike the federal state, which is unified internally and externally.
Returning to Palestine and Dr. Abu Marzouk and his tweet, which did not come out of nowhere. The Palestinian political situation allows for such a destructive intellectual contribution to national unity.
The Palestinian political situation is tragic. Hamas’s military coup in 2006 and the resulting political, geographic, and social division, along with its entrenchment and prolongation benefiting a narrow dominant segment from both conflict sides—Hamas and Fatah—is not the sole cause of the miserable political situation but the main factor and greatest reason for the deterioration of political conditions in occupied Palestine.
In occupied Palestine today, there is no unified political program or convictions among the entire Palestinian political spectrum. This situation is not new; it has clouded the Palestinian condition since the PLO’s departure from Lebanon. At that time, the political and struggle program split with the so-called rejection front and factions leaving the PLO, and political division continued despite attempts to end it and the PLO factions’ unification conference culminating in the 1988 independence declaration with the start of the first intifada. Hamas then diverged from the Palestinian mainstream, positioning itself as an alternative to the PLO and solidifying the Muslim Brotherhood project parallel to the Palestinian national project. Attempts to deter Hamas and its divisive exclusionary program and to include it in the unified Palestinian front failed, increasing Palestinian political loss with the signing of the surrender agreements called Oslo Accords and the worsening situation with the establishment of the Palestinian Authority, which destroyed the PLO and the national project, becoming the primary political reference while the PLO became a powerless, ghostly entity with ineffective institutions.
Today, we face Palestinian political loss and bankruptcy on all levels. The Palestinian issue has once again slipped from Palestinian hands and returned to a state resembling the pre-adoption of the phased program as a Palestinian political line for all Palestinian factions. The two major political forces in the Palestinian arena—Hamas and Fatah—have their political agendas and decisions taken in Arab capitals, supported by global parties, disregarding Palestinian unity. The Palestinian situation has become hostage to narrow regional and Arab calculations far from the Palestinian people’s aspirations for self-determination and state-building. The third party in the Palestinian organizational equation—the leftist democratic current—has not yet succeeded in fully reading the Palestinian reality to draw lessons and take necessary steps to build a leftist democratic front alternative to political Islam and the traditional conservative current, proposing a realistic political program considering the new reality of Palestinians in occupied Palestine and the new Palestinian diaspora in neighboring countries.
Today, daily Palestinian struggle in occupied Palestine and the struggle of our displaced people worldwide lack political coverage. Struggle is in one valley and politics in another, with no common denominator or unifier.
Crying over ruins and calling for rebuilding the PLO and ending division are now hollow slogans that neither satisfy hunger nor meet the demand for a new political program to rescue the Palestinian political situation from the path of extinction entered in 1993 and worsening daily.
Palestinian federalism could be part of the new political program if we handle this idea and this form of power-sharing well, but it could cause destruction if not supported by a modern electoral program based on full proportional representation for all Palestinian institutions. Only thus can we close the doors to domination and monopolization of power that led the Palestinian situation to its current fragmentation and loss of direction.
