Abu Mazen’s great betrayal of the Palestinians by suppressing the student movement

report Mehr News Agency, Al Jazeera news channel, in a series of articles, examined the role of the Palestinian Authority in the process of the 6-month war after the Al-Aqsa storm operation, and wrote that the issue of Palestine today is at a crucial stage. .

The Americans have declared that they need an updated self-governing organization. In this regard, the former prime minister of the self-governing organization, Mohammad Ashtiyeh, announced that the organization that the Israelis and their allies want is not our organization. At the same time, after announcing this issue, he submitted his resignation to Mahmoud Abbas, head of the self-governing organization, because according to his quote, “the future stage and its challenges require a new political and governmental structure that takes into account the new situation in the Gaza Strip.” give.”

In this way, the self-governing organizations signaled their agreement with the American-European innovation within themselves, so that they could, in what was introduced by the West’s plan for the day after the war, have a role In this collection, we will try to review the articles related to the positive and negative actions of the self-governing organizations during the Gaza war:

Unprecedented Palestinian unity in the battle of “Al-Aqsa Storm”

October 7, 2023, which is the day of the Al-Aqsa storm operation by the Palestinian resistance, is considered a central axis in the history of the Palestinian issue, which caused the Palestinian issue to return to the center of world attention and Perhaps one of the most important analyzes in this context is the role of all Palestinians, regardless of their ideology and social classes, etc. in this battle.

The role played by all Palestinian elements, both inside the Palestinian territories and outside it, in the Battle of al-Aqsa, in any way, compared to the roles they had in the past periods. , is very different and interesting; Where we see all the Palestinians gathered and standing behind the resistance against the occupation regime’s aggression. Of course, this unheard-of unity approach of the Palestinians showed itself before during the battle of Shimsher Quds in May 2021, and now it has reached its peak during the battle of Storm Al-Aqsa.

We can clearly see this approach especially in the West Bank; Where the United States had tried hard to neutralize the West Bank and keep it away from Al-Aqsa storm, and the US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken had repeatedly warned in his frequent visits to the region after the Gaza war that the full entry of the West Bank into the arena Confrontation can change the political equation of war.

The root of the Palestinian student movement against colonialism and occupation

But the Al-Aqsa storm battle became an excuse to address the role of one of the most important Palestinian organizations in the Palestinian people’s fighting actions. In the meantime, among the most interesting Palestinian people’s groups that play a significant role in supporting the resistance against the occupation, we can mention the student movements in the West Bank, whose roots go back to the period of British colonialism in Palestine and before the beginning of the Zionist regime’s occupation of the Palestinian lands, i.e. The Nakbat of 1948 comes back with different stages and here we are going to examine them briefly:

The first step: establishing the student movement of Palestinian groups

Before the Nakbat Day in 1948, when the Zionist regime had not yet officially started its occupation of Palestine and Palestine was under British colonialism, Palestinian students formed a movement for Liberation from British colonialism and opposition to Zionist gangs were launched and they participated in many events, including the 1929 and 1936 revolutions. Speech societies were one of the important student organizations in Palestine at that time, which had a campaigning, awareness-raising and educational role to confront British colonialism. But the events of 1948 and the Nakba that the occupying regime launched against the Palestinian people with the help of its supporters caused student movements to enter a new phase.

After the day of the Nakbat, student movements were formed in Palestine among the Palestinian refugees and in an effort to defend the Palestinian identity, to activate the role of Palestinians before the international community and order. The formation of student ranks in all places was to fight the occupation. One of the most important Palestinian student movements at that time was the Palestinian Students Association in Cairo, which was recognized by the Arab League.

The General Union of Palestinian Students, whose foundation goes back to the period of British colonialism in Palestine, was also one of the most famous student movements, which after the occupation of Palestine by the Zionist regime He continued. Finally, the Union of Palestinian Students was formed by the gathering of all movements, and after the conference of 1962, two years before the establishment of the Palestine Liberation Organization, the position of this union was strengthened more than before and later became one of the institutions of this organization.

Palestine Authority file – the role of the Palestinian student movement

After its formation, the General Union of Palestinian Students officially introduced the armed struggle as its mechanism for the liberation of Palestine. This union established military training camps and considered itself a “reserve battalion” in the Palestinian revolution. It is important to note that most Palestinian groups were founded by leaders of student movements after they graduated from universities, including the Fatah movement. This movement was founded by former leaders of student movements in the Palestinian Students Association and the General Union of Students such as Yasser Arafat, Salah Khalaf, Tissir Qala, Farouk al-Qadoumi and Salam Abdul Hamid. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine was also established by the leaders of student movements.

The second step: integrating the student movement with Palestinian groups

The development and expansion of higher education institutions and universities in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the 1970s led to the revival of the role of the student movement in Palestine, where students of different economic classes and The social community participated in them, and then students belonging to different strata and regions from Palestinian cities, camps and villages entered the universities and joined these movements.

After 1967 and the defeat of the Arabs against the Zionist regime and the intensification of the Palestinian struggle, the student movement matured and became an important tool to defend the Palestinian identity, and then Student movements became famous, one of the most famous of which was the Student Battalion in the late 1970s, which became the military arm of the Palestine Liberation Organization.

The role of the Hamas student movement in resisting the occupation

At the same time, there was a high degree of coordination and integration between the Hamas movement and its student faction, especially in the resistance activities at the beginning of the first Palestinian intifada from 1987 to 1993. . After the Oslo Accords in 1993, the Islamic student faction affiliated with the Hamas movement was one of the important means of gaining legitimacy for this movement, especially in the circumstances that the Palestine Liberation Organization had angered many people by signing the Oslo Accords.

During this period, the Hamas resistance movement and the Palestine Liberation Organization were somehow competing with each other. The student faction of Hamas participated in the student council elections in West Bank and Gaza Strip universities and won between 30 and 50 percent of the votes, and this is the same thing that happened in the Legislative Council elections in 2006. where Hamas won approximately 7.5 percent of the seats.

Universities were also suitable platforms for the free expression of Hamas’s political position due to their lack of presence in official institutions such as the Liberation Organization, later known as the Palestinian Authority. Therefore, the Palestinian student movement played a pivotal historical role in the Palestinian issue and its resistance.

The beginning of Zionist oppression against Palestinian universities

The student movement contributed a lot to the formation of the Palestinian national identity after British colonialism and the occupation of the Zionist regime, and universities played an important role in forming a resistance front against the occupation, and students who They came out of student movements and later played their role in the form of resistance groups to defend their land.

After the role of universities in resisting the Israeli occupation became prominent, he tried to deport many academics in the West Bank in 1974.

All Palestinian classes from all families and clans and from all regions were present in these student movements, and their role was not only limited to political and resistance roles. Rather, these movements were engaged in educational activities, social and voluntary services, helping Palestinian refugees and participating in many economic activities to help Palestinians.

Therefore, the occupying regime understood well the effective role of the student movement in preserving the Palestinian national identity and resisting the occupation. Accordingly, in 1980, the Zionists issued a military order according to which Palestinian higher education institutions must be under the military control of Israel, so that the Zionists can control the registration of students and the appointment of teaching staff in these universities, and an organization A military was formed to monitor the universities.

This organization imposed a series of repressive measures on the Palestinian university system, which faced the anger and opposition of the students, and they suffered a lot due to breaking the military orders of the Zionist regime. and were suppressed. This prompted student movements to develop their work and actually play the role of Palestinian organizations in many fields.

Third step: compliance with Palestinian groups and institutions

The signing of the Oslo Accords by the Palestine Liberation Organization created new forms of unity between Palestinian student movements, and these movements, despite their ideological differences, for the first time in In 1993 and 1995, they formed a coalition in Barzit and An-Najah universities, and the purpose of this coalition was to oppose the Oslo agreement.

During this period, resistance and armed struggle remained the main focus of the political discourse of student movements affiliated with Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front of Palestine, and a large number of leaders of these After the Oslo agreement, the movements turned to military operations in the fight against the enemy, the most prominent of which was Yahya Ayash. After the second Palestinian intifada in 2000, Palestinian students relied on the discourse of armed struggle. Even after the security coordination of the Palestinian Authority headed by Mahmoud Abbas with the Zionist regime, Palestinian students did not pay attention to the Mahmoud Abbas project and continued their discourses in the field of armed struggle.

Self-governing organizations and suppression of Palestinian student movements

But one of the major changes that occurred in the Palestinian arena after the Oslo Accords is the suppression of student movements by the self-governing organizations, which had become a tool to serve the Zionists. The Palestinian Authority managed universities within the framework of its vision in the Oslo Accords, and many Palestinian universities lost their independence after coming under the authority of the Palestinian Authority. After restricting student activities and the control of security services over universities to control their space, this situation worsened.

In the period after the Oslo agreement, the security agencies affiliated with the self-governing organizations arrested a large number of members of the student movements against the Oslo agreement, especially the student branches affiliated with Hamas; Islamic Jihad and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

The number of students in Palestinian universities and colleges increased exponentially, and this amount reached approximately 226,000 male and female students in 2022. This large number of students represent a group of Palestinian youth who have the ability to organize the student community and raise the demands of the Palestinian people, but the Palestinian Authority has continued to suppress these students in a large way.

Fourth stage: dismantling student movements and confiscating their role

After the partition of Palestine in 2007 and the separation of the Gaza Strip from the West Bank, the security services of the self-governing organizations launched a big campaign to weaken and destroy the Hamas movement, which this campaign It affected every institution and branch related to Hamas and the Palestinian resistance, including student movements related to it. This also applies to the student arms of the Islamic Jihad movement and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

However, student movements related to the resistance continued to operate with strength and in the student council elections of Barzit University, they won 28 seats over the affiliated student youth movement. They won over the Fatah movement, which was under the supervision of the self-governing organization. At that time, Jabril Al-Rajjub, the secretary of the Fatah movement’s central committee, said that the Fatah movement should not pay for the mistakes of the self-governing organizations and that the nature of the relationship between this movement and the self-governing organizations should be discussed. However, the process of victory of the resistance-affiliated student movements in student councils in various universities continued, and the student movement affiliated with the Fatah movement was also defeated by the Hamas-affiliated student movement in the elections of Najah University in May 2023.

How did the Abu Mazen organizations marginalize the role of students in the battle of Al-Aqsa storm?

After the Palestinian Authority took control of the universities in the West Bank due to the loss of independence of the universities, student movements faced many restrictions and the security services and university guards They started oppressing and harassing students. The security campaigns of the Zionist regime and the Palestinian Authority, which is in full coordination with this regime, against the activists of the Palestinian student movement never stopped and continued. But despite all this, the Palestinian student movement remains as an important element in preserving the national identity of Palestine and uses its historical role for this purpose.

Moreover, many members of these student movements were forced to participate in service activities to help their people, and many of them were subjected to campaigns of repression and persecution. The occupiers and the security services of the self-governing organizations were placed. Also, many activists of student movements were arrested by the Zionist enemy forces and self-governing organizations, and some are wanted.

The Palestinian Authority’s betrayal of the Palestinian people by suppressing students

But the self-governing organization’s treacherous actions against students were not limited there and continued after the Al-Aqsa storm operation. Where the self-governing administration suppressed many demonstrations in the West Bank, which were held in solidarity with the Gaza Strip, in which a large number of students affiliated with student movements also participated, using excessive violence; Because he was worried that these events would turn into a widespread popular uprising that would take the West Bank out of the control of the self-governing organization.

The self-governing organizations killed 5 Palestinian citizens and arrested dozens of people, including the activists of the student movements, in suppressing the demonstrations of the West Bank people in solidarity with the Gaza Strip. However, a number of student movement leaders continued to call for support for the Gaza Strip.

Also, the Zionists arrested dozens of student activists in all West Bank universities in the period after the Al-Aqsa storm operation and attacked many universities. For example, on November 8, the occupying regime attacked the campus of Barzit University and attacked the students. Zionist forces also attacked Khazuri University in Tulkarm and injured 11 students.

by creating a repressive atmosphere at the West Bank universities as well as closing in-person classes and arrests of a large number of resistance students, as well as in the student movement. Fatah also follows the orders of the PA’s organizations, the student movements failed to play their role as it deserves to play in the battle of the Al -Aqsa Storm against the Zionist enemy. Thus, nearly 6,000 students in Palestinian universities and colleges were banned from participating in the Gaza Strip support activities.