Rima Tarazi "Legitimacy?"



Rima Tarazi – "Legitimacy?" (part of the First Word War)

By Guest Post • Oct 28th, 2009 at 15:38 • Category: Israel, Newswire, Palestine , Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance

legitimacy I think most of us feel completely lost these days, not merely in the labyrinth of the Road Map, but in that of words, some of which are deeply cherished in our hearts and others, strewn, aimlessly in our path. Words such as legitimacy, rights, freedom, steadfastness, unity, dismemberment, hope, despair, impotence, boycott, normalization, apartheid, armed struggle and peaceful resistance. A barrage of charges and counter charges and a network of TV channels with a wide spectrum of points of view do not seem to help us find the right direction toward achieving our national goals.  It is indeed disastrous to realize that the only seeming constant around us at this juncture, is the Occupation and its ramifications, a bulldozer taking its course  and heading unflingchingly towards our destruction and our displacement and replacement.
 
I would like to question first and foremost the banner of the legitimacy of elections that most factions seem to be raising valiantly and enthusiastically. Has Oslo become the permanent framework for our struggle for liberation? Elections for the PA were supposed to be for an interim period. This period is long gone; so how can we, Palestinians, justify ourselves by holding on to an agreement that overrides our national rights and every other international resolution that recognizes loudly and clearly the inalienable rights of our people which we have become hoarse in clamoring for? Why don't we take a step forward and base our actions on the internationally recognized legitimacy of self determination which requires us to make a fast move towards the Elections for the Palestinian National Council, not elections for less than half of the Palestinian people. If we keep harping on the legitimacy of Oslo or its outcome, we would be complicit in allowing the world to reduce the question of Palestine to the West Bank and Gaza!!
 
This is a simple appeal to Palestinians everywhere to pull themselves together before our youth loses faith in their once venerated leadership and the ideals and principles it upheld, and falls in the quagmire of despair, which is the most potent enemy of any nation struggling for liberation and national dignity.

http://palestinethinktank.com/2009/10/28/rima-tarazi-legitimacy-part-of-the-first-word-war/