The Palestinian Authority’s diplomatic activity in the international arena appears to have declined significantly over the past month.
This downward trend stands in sharp contrast with a flurry of diplomatic activity by Israel and Hamas, especially in the past few weeks.
The 11-day war between Israel and Hamas last month saw an upsurge in diplomatic activity in Ramallah as PA President Mahmoud Abbas received the foreign ministers of Egypt, Jordan, Germany and Britain, as well as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
In addition, Abbas received the first phone call from US President Joe Biden on May 15. He also received during the same period phone calls from a number of leaders, including the French president, the Jordanian monarch, the emir of Qatar and the presidents of Tunisia and Iraq.
The contacts between Abbas and world leaders focused almost entirely on the situation in the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the Israel-Hamas fighting and ways of maintaining the Egyptian-brokered ceasefire that went into effect on May 21.
After the ceasefire, Abbas dispatched PA Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh to Kuwait, Qatar and Oman to discuss reconstruction efforts in the Gaza Strip. The main purpose of the visit was to rally support for Abbas’s demand that the reconstruction effort be carried out through the PA government and not Hamas.
Earlier this month, Abbas was scheduled to travel to Cairo to participate in Egyptian-sponsored reconciliation talks between his Fatah faction and Hamas. The Egyptians decided to cancel the meeting at the last minute after realizing that the gap between the rival Palestinian factions remains as wide as ever.
Some reports in Arab media have suggested that the Egyptians are fed up with Abbas and are no longer prepared to work with him.
The last time Abbas traveled abroad was in April, when he went to Germany for “routine medical checkups.”
Now 85, Abbas does not have plans to leave Ramallah in the near future, Palestinian sources said on Tuesday.
The Biden administration has still not invited Abbas or any senior PA official to the White House for talks on the possible resumption of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, the sources said.
Earlier this month, a Palestinian security delegation headed by Majed Faraj, head of the PA’s General Intelligence Service, was invited to the US for talks limited to security-related matters.
The US and Israel are working to coordinate a White House visit for Prime Minister Naftali Bennett in July, the American website Axios reported on Tuesday. On Monday, outgoing President Reuven Rivlin met in the White House with Biden.
The report about Bennett’s planned visit to Washington came as Foreign Minister Yair Lapid arrived in Abu Dhabi to inaugurate the Israeli Embassy to the United Arab Emirates. As Lapid was in Abu Dhabi, Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa issued a royal decree appointing Khaled Yousif Al Jalahama as head of his country’s diplomatic mission to Israel.
The PA, which had condemned the normalization agreements the UAE and Bahrain signed with Israel last year, did not comment on Lapid’s visit to Abu Dhabi or the appointment of the Bahraini ambassador to Israel.
Palestinian criticism of the Arab countries that signed normalization agreements with Israel has itself been strongly criticized by many Arabs, particularly in the Gulf. Following the backlash, the PA leadership decided to stop its attacks on the Arab countries involved.
From his office in the Mukata presidential compound in Ramallah, Abbas is now watching as the Bennett government is improving and strengthening Israel’s relations with the Biden administration and the Arab world.
It has been months since Abbas and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi met or talked over the phone. This week, Sisi called to congratulate Bennett on taking office, and the two discussed a “broad range of bilateral, regional and international issues.”
The PA, meanwhile, seems more worried about the diplomatic activities of Hamas than the Bennett government’s contacts with the Biden administration and the Arabs.
While Abbas has been busy coping with two crises that hit the PA in the past two weeks, Hamas leaders have been visiting a number of Arab and Islamic countries as part of their effort to win political and financial support for their group.
The first crisis is related to the Pfizer vaccine exchange agreement between the PA and Israel. The PA was forced to cancel the deal after it came under attack by many Palestinians for bringing soon-to-expire vaccines from Israel.
The second crisis, which seems to be more serious, erupted last week when Palestinian anti-corruption activist Nizar Banat was allegedly beaten to death by PA security officers in Hebron.
Earlier this week, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh met in Beirut with Lebanese President Michel Aoun. The meeting, the first of its kind, elevated Haniyeh to the status of president, earning him and Hamas the legitimacy they have long been seeking in the international arena.
Haniyeh arrived in Lebanon after visiting Mauritania and Morocco together with several senior Hamas officials. Hamas leaders said they were hoping to visit Algeria in the coming days.
The PA is concerned that Hamas’s diplomatic blitz could further bolster its standing among Palestinians and other Arabs and Muslims.
The timing of Hamas's diplomatic activity comes amid a dramatic surge in the group’s popularity among Palestinians, especially in wake of the last round of fighting with Israel. It also comes amid growing resentment with the PA and its leaders after Abbas called off the general elections that were supposed to take place in May and July and the death of the Hebron activist.
While thousands of Palestinians on the streets of Ramallah and Hebron over the past few days were chanting slogans calling for the downfall of Abbas, Haniyeh and other Hamas officials were receiving red-carpet treatment in the countries they visited.
This, needless to say, is bad news for Abbas and the PA leadership as they face one setback after the other because of their policies and actions.