Abbas in wonderland

Pres. Mahmud Abbas of the PA finally got his visit to the White House. In
an unusually gushing joint press conference, Pres. Bush spoke about
Palestinian democracy, transparency, economic development, contiguity etc,
etc. Abbas repeated the need for Israel to do practically everything,
including withdraw to the positions before September 2000 (when the
Palestinians started the intifada), stop settlement activity, stop
unilateral withdrawals, allow refugee returns, start negotiations, divide
Jerusalem, etc. etc. It all sounded so easy, but the problem is that its
mostly pie in the sky.
Pres. Bush said that you can't have democracy with groups of men running
around with guns! But, that's precisely the situation that exists in Gaza
and the West Bank. He also said that you can't have democracy without due
process of law, but there is no effective civil law in the PA. Pres. Bush
said that progress can't occur until there are two democracies side-by-side,
but while Israel is a stable democracy, and has been for over 50 years, the
PA is nowhere near democracy, just because it had one election.
Security is the main issue that is the key to everything else. You cannot
have Hamas doing its own thing, with its own army and ability to attack
Israel any time, and have a stable democratic PA. Bush and Abbas know this,
but the fact is that Abbas has done nothing about this so far. He has not
bitten the bullet. In the PA he is known as a "wet rag," because he has not
faced the problem of armed groups of men doing what they like throughout the
PA. Reorganization of the security forces is continually underway but has
not made actual progress.
The one feat that he can claim is that he has presided over a period of
"calm" for the last few months, that has seen a great reduction in terrorism
and reduced deaths on both sides. But, whether or not he has the guts or
the means to carry out actual reorganization and stop Hamas and other groups
having militias in the streets with their own weapons seems unlikely.
One of Bush's main points to Abbas was that the US opposes any settlement
activity by Israel since it could prejudice the final outcome negotiations
of the road map and the incorporation of the whole West Bank in the
Palestinian State. As the CNN commentator said this seems like a
contradiction to what Bush promised Israel regarding the modification of the
lines to take account of large Jewish population centers. Hopefully these
apparently irreconcilable issues can be worked out in negotiations, as Bush
also implied, as long as both sides are democratic.
Abbas was also promised m$50 by Bush in direct aid for Palestinian renewal.
But, the Congress has very carefully put strings on recent money given to
the PA in order that it does not disappear like the previous funds. It's
true that Arafat is gone, and that the current Minister of Finance is
considered to be honest, but it is unlikely that Congress will agree to
simply give such a large sum to Abbas without strict accounting.
So while Abbas is currently in wonderland, when he returns he will have to
face once again a PA in which the reality is quite different, where there is
no transparency, where gangs of armed men roam around without control, where
Hamas threatens the calm at any moment, where there are no reliable security
forces, and where there is no democracy. At present he is the only game in
town and he is a lot better than Arafat was, so Israel is likely to go along
with him. But, the situation seems familiar, to strengthen the leader of
the Palestinians in order to get an agreement at any price, the US is
prepared to lean on the Israelis to make concessions to him so that he can
show his people that he can deliver. Am I missing something, or have we
been here before?