Response to Fateh Azzam's "A Bold Proposal: Palestine Should Give Its Refugees Citizenship" by Fellow Mouin Rabbani:
While the Palestinian national movement is in desperate need of creative and innovative proposals like that put forward by Azzam, that movement no longer exists. Its rival claimants, for the time being based in Ramallah and Gaza City, have essentially abandoned anything remotely resembling a genuinely national project, consistently put factional privilege ahead of the national interest, and have become past masters at sabotaging any effort at popular mobilisation.
For such initiatives and the surrounding discussions to become meaningful and politically consequential, the first order of priority remains the reconstruction of Palestinian national institutions on an inclusive and representative basis.
