What is in common between Salam Fayyad and Gamal Mubarak? Everyone wants their achievements, but the opposing halves in both their countries do not want the persons behind these achievements. Hamas opposes the Palestinian Prime Minister no matter what he does, although it is Hamas that helped put him in office: He was the Minister of Finance, and did not become Prime Minister until Hamas broke off with the Gaza Strip in 2007. He then also returned to office on 15/5/2009. What has Salam Fayyad achieved so far? As soon as he was appointed Prime Minister, the U.S administration ended a 14 month moratorium on financial assistance to the Palestinian National Authority (PA), Israel released 500 million dollars in tax money owed to the PA that Israel had seized, and then the U.S Congress approved a 200 million dollars aid package to the PA in 2009. On 23/8/2009, the Prime Minister announced his plans to build the Palestinian state- not to declare it- a bid endorsed by the Quartet. The plan involves the establishment of all the institutions of an independent state by the end of the summer of 2011, a date that was deliberately chosen as it coincides with the end of the agreed period of one year of direct negotiations. It seems that Salam Fayyad believes that these negotiations will not lead to anything, at which point only his plan for a state will remain in the negotiation scene. The Israelis consider Salam Fayyad to be the David Ben-Gurion of Palestine, and the op-eds of the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal strongly support him and urge the administration to do the same. In truth, foreign aid is closely linked to Fayyad and the confidence placed in him. Also, Israel had reduced [the number of] its checkpoints in the West Bank, something that facilitated the movement of persons and goods. The government of Salam Fayyad approved more than one thousand projects including planting trees, building roads, digging wells, and building schools, government departments, courts and industrial areas. A report issued by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that the GDP in the West Bank grew by 8.5 percent in 2009, a record number in view of the global financial crisis. Every Palestinian wants to see these achievements, which are great. However, they come at the high price of direct security cooperation between the Palestinian security services and the Israeli occupation forces, especially against Hamas and its supporters. Furthermore, this cooperation allowed Israel to send more troops to the Gaza Strip during the 2008-2009 war, after the Palestinian forces took the task of circumventing mosques and preventing pro-Hamas demonstrations, while prosecuting pro-Hamas partisans. Hamas used to call the PA security services “the Dayton forces”, named after the American General Keith Dayton who coordinates security activities between the PA and Israel. General Dayton confirmed this in a speech he gave at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (which is an Israeli lobby), prompting Salam Fayyad to refuse to receive the general. Dayton was supposed to retire this month and to be succeeded by General Michael Muller from the U.S Air Force. What matters in all of the above, which consists of facts and is not a matter of opinion, is that the choice for the Palestinians is between economic security ensured with Salam Fayyad, and resistance with Hamas, because they cannot have both at the same time. In Egypt, brother Gamal Mubarak is to be credited with the best results achieved by the Egyptian economy in half a century. I hope I will not be accused of blasphemy when I say that the socialism brought about by the Egyptian revolution had ruined the Egyptian economy for decades. I fast forward to Gamal Mubarak's appointment as the Chairman of the Policy Committee in the ruling National Democratic Party in 2002, and his role in the formation of a government of economists, businessmen and experts headed by Ahmed Nazif in 2004. Egypt might have a surface area of one million square kilometers. However, only 10 percent of that is inhabitable, and the population of Egypt is increasing by more than 1.5 million each year, while the country is being threatened in [its share of] the Nile waters, no less. The source of my information is brother Gamal Mubarak himself. I then compared them with the figures of the World Bank and the IMF, and asked the colleagues in the economic section in Al-Hayat to examine them one more time before publication. Briefly, the Egyptian economy was growing by 7 percent prior to the financial crisis, and this year, it recorded a growth rate of 4.27 percent (July) and is expected to rise to five percent, and these all are good rates. Between 2004 and 2009, the government worked on creating 4.5 million new jobs. Also, a major process of reform began, encompassing customs, general taxes and cooperatives. Meanwhile, Egyptian exports increased to certain countries, including the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, by nearly a double. These exports included engineering industries, air conditioners -that Egypt until recently used to import-, kitchen appliances, fertilizers and agricultural products that can now be shipped to Europe within two or three days, with the Egyptian government guaranteeing a minimum load for shipping vessels. Also, the government is currently working on reaching African markets; however, the difficulty here lies in the lack of reliable shipping lines. At the same time, electrical linkage began with Jordan, and the next step will be with Saudi Arabia followed by gas and then oil linkages that will cover Syria and Turkey as well and perhaps Iraq and Libya. These and other projects of economic integration among the countries of the region are unprecedented in modern history. There is corruption, and the improved performance of the economy has not yet spread to the poor, who are numerous. However, these achievements cannot be denied or isolated from Gamal Mubarak. Those who oppose his candidacy – and I support the candidacy of dissenters for the presidency - are in fact opposing political inheritance, or a sixth term for President Mubarak. The good performance of the economy does not deserve its name if all the citizens do not benefit from its results. However, I insist that it is closely linked to Gamal Mubarak and the Egyptian government, and every Egyptian dissenter interested in the future of his or her country must think well and then decide, and of course, he or she is free about what this decision is. [email protected]
