Palestinian revolution

What has happened in the PA is nothing short of revolutionary. The cabinet
of 24 Ministers proposed by PM Querei was rejected in its entirety by the
Palestine Legislative Council, dominated by the Fatah faction. The reason
was because 20 of these were holdovers from Arafat's time, and the PLC let
it be known that they would not accept such a list of former Arafat cronies,
but insisted on a completely new set of Ministers untainted by corruption.
Pres. Abbas also criticized Querei for his choices, and faced by this total
opposition Querei had no choice, either to resign or change the list. He
opted for a new list of young "technocrats," people who are untainted by
association with Arafat and who are technically qualified to carry out a
professional job rather than political hacks. In any case Querei's
long-term tenure as PM is in doubt
Of the new 24 Ministers only one is a former Arafat loyalist, Nabil Shaath,
who becomes deputy PM. Nasser Kidwe, nephew of Arafat and former UN
representative, takes over from Shaath as FM.
Nasser Yussuf is an interesting choice for Interior Minister since although
he is an old-timer, he was out of favor with Arafat because he was too
independent, and he is the only person previously to have ever cracked down
on Hamas, physically with weapons. Mohammed Dahlan is the Civil Affairs
Minister, and the security apparatus is known to be generally loyal to him.
He speaks fluent Hebrew and is the main point man in security negotiations
with Israel. Saeb Erakat is in charge of political negotiations with
Israel, but lost his Cabinet position.
Salam Fayyad, who proved himself to be honest and transparent by exposing
most of the secret accounts of Arafat, continues as the Finance Minister.
Ten of the others hold PhDs, and most significantly none of the others has
ever spent time in an Israel jail for security offences. Maybe this is the
clean break that we have been waiting for, a forward looking body to wrest
power and carry out a democratic job without corruption but with
transparency. If this indeed happens it will represent the first indication
that this is a true revolution in the politics of the Palestinians. All of
this may not mean anything when it comes to peace negotiations, but we must
see it as a hopeful sign that Arafat's cronies have largely been swept away,
and the democratization and reform of the Palestinian entity continues.
It would be nice if Israel followed the lead of the PA, and Ministers were
chosen for their ability and expertise, not their role as Party
representatives providing votes for a specific political policy and being
bought with Government handouts. Would it be too much to expect the
Minister of Science to be technically qualified, and the Minister of the
Environment to be environmentally active? But, that would be expecting too
much.