The Palestinian Authority was very much opposed to the economic workshop in Bahrain. Ramallah believes that the Israeli government, with the aid of US President Donald Trump's administration, is trying to forge an alliance with some Arab states – those with which it has official diplomatic ties, as well as those with which it has intelligence ties – in order to lead the Palestinians toward an agreement that does not take its minimal demands into account. The PA is worried there will be an attempt to bypass the Palestinian issue, and maybe even make an agreement with the Palestinians unnecessary by reaching a regional agreement that does not include Ramallah.
The Palestinians believe that Trump is trying to buy everyone off with money, and trying to coerce them with some $7 billion worth of economic initiatives over the course of a decade and pressure in the form of closing its office in Washington and making their lives more difficult in general. The Palestinians are angry, and determined to prove that their nationalist aspirations are not for sale. It is for this reason they decided not to cooperate with Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner's presentation of 179 economic initiatives.
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One can argue with the Palestinians' approach, suggesting instead that they rush to take everything on offer, because they will offered less later on. One can also see where they are coming from: Politically and diplomatically weak, they are left to a great extent with the power of the veto. As soon as they announced their decision not to go to Manama, the workshop became a secondary affair, with most of its participants not holding senior government position and no prominent business leaders in attendance. Their refusal to cooperate has also succeeded in preventing any official Israeli participation in the event, and caused the Americans quite a bit of embarrassment, as they have been forced to announce the "paradox of the century": The Bahrain conference was "not political" and that is why Israel was not invited, they explained. But if such an event is not political, what is?
But there is a big difference between the official Palestinian leadership's decision not to accept the invitation to the conference and the cruel treatment of Palestinians who did go to the event. The arrest of a Palestinian businessman from Hebron by the PA intelligence services last week crossed the line. Furthermore, the move, which saw the PA adopt a policy we have seen in authoritarian governments, backfired on Ramallah.
Those who interpret Palestinian participation in Kushner's workshop as a transgression create a regime of fear. I spoke over the weekend with a few Palestinian figures who expressed shock at the incident and compared it to the abuse of the Palestinians' most consequential Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. Sayyad, known for his valiant struggle against corruption in the PA, was forced to resign over his alleged corruption by PA President and Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
The Palestinian leadership is furious at the American attempt to strangle its financial resources on one hand and make it economic offers on the other, all without revealing the details of the Trump administration's peace plan. That is a legitimate, and in my opinion, a justified response. But by arresting someone who took part in the conference, the PA shot itself in the foot.
