COMMENTARY: By Eugene Doyle
The world’s most important hostage — must be released. The powerful Western countries have signalled that in the face of the genocide they may recognise the state of Palestine.
States need leaders. That’s why Marwan Barghouti – often dubbed the Palestinian Mandela — must be freed.
A former head of Israel’s Mossad spy agency, Ephraim Halevy, agrees with calls by leaders from across the Middle East for Barghouti’s release: “Barghouti is popular with his people, he has a clear position, he speaks Hebrew well and can negotiate; all of which qualifies him to lead a new path.
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“We have to be creative in dealing with the future in the West Bank as well and the rest of the territories, as there are millions of Palestinians, and transferring two million Palestinians from Gaza is unrealistic,” Halevy told Middle East Monitor.
States need leaders
The UK, France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and a baker’s dozen of Western-aligned states have signalled they may finally join humanity and recognise the right of Palestine to exist as a state.
They are doing so at a moment when the physical existence of the Palestinian people in Palestine is in peril due to the US-Israeli genocide.
If this is not simply another hollow, performative gesture, real things must happen: first and foremost the lifting of the siege and the ending of the man-made famine.
Simultaneously, Palestine needs a credible leadership to negotiate its future. Why call for recognition of a state when hundreds of the top leadership of that future state are held in cruel captivity?
These hostages seldom receive any attention — in contrast to the remaining 20 or so living hostages held by Hamas and other groups.
Who decides who represents Palestine?
In typical Western fashion the announcement of potentially recognising the Palestinian state comes with a swag of conditions — foremost that Hamas, the most popular movement in Palestine, the winner of the last free and fair elections in both the West Bank and Gaza, must not be part of any government.
OK, so, if the Palestinians bow to that condition, who will be the leaders of this state? Who has the standing with all the factions of the Palestinian polity?
Marwan Barghouti could be such a man. The geriatric and thoroughly discredited Mahmoud Abbas, unelected leader of the Palestinian Authority, is largely seen as a tool of the US and Israel.
More than 90 percent of Palestinians want him gone. In contrast, Barghouti is a revered figure, respected by all Palestinian organisations. He consistently polls as the most popular leader.
The Israelis have murdered many of the Palestinian leaders (along with targeted assassinations of hundreds of writers, professors, lawyers, doctors and other people crucial to state-building). They even killed the lead negotiator in the hostage release process.
It is vital that the West ensures Barghouti is protected from further mistreatment. It is also worth dismissing the lie that Israel has no Palestinian partner to negotiate with; Barghouti has the will and the attributes.
The blockage is actually Western complicity in ethnic cleansing, land stealing and the overall Greater Israel Project.
Barghouti: the most important political prisoner
During the past 23 years in Israeli prisons Barghouti has been beaten, tortured, sexually molested and had limbs broken, as documented by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. What hasn’t been broken is the spirit of the greatest living Palestinian — a symbol of his people’s “legendary steadfastness” and determination to win freedom from occupation.
As I wrote in 2024:
“Barghouti, the terrorist, rotting in jail. Barghouti, the indomitable leader who has not given up on peace. Barghouti, loved by ordinary people as ‘a man of the street’. Barghouti, supporter of the Oslo Accords. Barghouti, the 15 year-old youth leader standing beside Yasser Arafat.
“Barghouti, once a member of parliament and Fatah secretary-general. Barghouti, leader of Tanzim, a PLO military wing, choosing militancy after the betrayal of the Oslo promise by the Americans and Israelis became fully clear.
“Barghouti, a leader of the intifada that restored hope to a broken people. Barghouti, the scholar and thinker. Barghouti, the political strategist and unifier.”
Marwan is the most famous Palestinian prisoner but it should never be forgotten that the entire Palestinian people have been held in bondage for generations.
The West should force the Israelis to release Barghouti — and thousands of other hostages held by Israel. To do so publicly and successfully would be a powerful statement of future intentions.
The release of one man cannot, however, change the world: it will take a genuine course correction by the West to use their collective power to force the Israelis to abandon the endless killings, starvation, land thieving and other lawlessness in the Palestinian lands.
The West must stop posturing and start acting
If the Western states fail to quickly move to change facts on the ground, it will suggest that the whole exercise was only intended to achieve political cover for the pro-genocidal forces of the US and the other enablers like Australia, New Zealand and Canada.
Netanyahu is driving both the Palestinians and Israel to destruction.
Ironically, the Palestinian Marwan Barghouti could save Israel from moral death and, simultaneously, the Palestinians from further physical destruction. He is a leader that the West and the Israelis, if they chose, could negotiate with.
As Alon Liel, formerly Israel’s most senior diplomat, said a couple of years ago: Barghouti is “the ultimate leader of the Palestinian people,” and “he is the only one who can extricate us from the quagmire we are in.”
One final point: negotiating with ‘terrorists’
The West has made it clear they believe Hamas are too monstrous, too terroristic to be involved in a peace process.
But the West is entirely comfortable with the racist, fascist, genocidal leaders of Israel remaining at the helm of their country. There is a reason for this and one the West needs to front up to: racism and contempt for the Palestinians as a people.
Barghouti and hundrds of other leaders have endured torture and worse without our side raising even an eyebrow. The recent skite videos posted by IDF soldiers committing rape-murder inside Sde Temein prison says it all — they rightly assumed their depraved criminality would be sanctioned by the state and silently tolerated by the West.
War crimes are fine and no barrier to leadership if these crimes are committed by regimes that we are deeply committed to. After all, as our leaders repeatedly tell us: we share values with the Israelis.
I’ll give the last word to Marwan Barghouti.
“Resistance is a holy right for the Palestinian people to face the Israeli occupation. Nobody should forget that the Palestinian people negotiated for 10 years and accepted difficult and humiliating agreements, and in the end didn’t get anything except authority over the people, and no authority over land, or sovereignty.”
It is time to change that and to stand with humanity. Free Marwan Barghouti!
Eugene Doyle is a writer based in Wellington. He has written extensively on the Middle East, as well as peace and security issues in the Asia Pacific region. He contributes to Asia Pacific Report and Café Pacific, and hosts the public policy platform solidarity.co.nz
