On Tuesday, the IDF and Shin Bet killed three wanted terrorists in a shoot-out in Nablus. The story has shifted Palestinian attention away from a meeting of the PLO central committee earlier this week, which was widely seen as a power-grab by the aging Palestinian Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah party. And it benefits Abbas in other ways as well, as Khaled Abu Toameh explains:
[T]hat the three militants belonged to Fatah’s armed wing, al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, allows the faction to boast that its members, and not only Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, are involved in military action against Israel.
The al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades were quick to publish a statement endorsing the three slain gunmen as its “martyrs.” The statement aims to send a message to the Palestinian public that Fatah remains committed to the “armed struggle” against Israel despite its leaders’ talk about the need for a peaceful “popular resistance.” This is Fatah’s way of scoring points with a disillusioned Palestinian public.
[Moreover], the Nablus incident allows the PA leadership to continue its campaign of incitement against Israel and urge the international community to exert pressure on it.
On the other hand, the incident in Nablus is a sign of the huge challenges facing the PA and its security forces. The presence of various armed groups on the streets of major Palestinian cities is seen by many Palestinians as a sign of the PA’s failure to enforce law and order and to rein in the militias, most of which are affiliated with Fatah and feuding clans.
Read more on Jerusalem Post: https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-695884