At 90, politically weak Palestinian leader struggles for a role in Gaza

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas turned 90 over the weekend, still holding authoritarian power in tiny pockets of the West Bank but marginalized and weakened by Israel, deeply unpopular among Palestinians and struggling for a say in a postwar Gaza Strip.

- BY LEE KEATH

MAHMOUD ABBAS campaigns in Ramallah, West Bank, in December 2004.

(NASSER NASSER Associated Press)

The world’s second-oldest serving president — after Cameroon’s 92-year-old Paul Biya — Abbas has been in office for 20 years, and for nearly the entire time has failed to hold elections. His weakness has left Palestinians leaderless, critics say, at a time when they face an existential crisis and hopes for establishing a Palestinian state, the centerpiece of Abbas’ agenda, appear dimmer than ever.

Palestinians say Israel’s campaign against the militant group Hamas that has decimated Gaza amounts to genocide, a view echoed by many international legal experts, organizations and other countries. Israel denies the accusation and has tightened its lock on the West Bank, where Jewish settlements are expanding and attacks by settlers on Palestinians are increasing. Right-wing allies of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are pressing for outright annexation, a step that would doom any remaining possibility for statehood.

For now, the U.S. has bent to Israel's refusal to allow Abbas’ Palestinian Authority to govern postwar Gaza. With no effective leader in the war-decimated territory, critics fear Palestinians there will be consigned to live under an international body dominated by Israel's allies, with little voice and no real path to statehood.

Abbas “has put his head in the sand and has taken no initiative,” said Khalil Shikaki, head of the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research.

“His legitimacy was depleted long ago,” Shikaki said. “He has become a liability to his own party, and for the Palestinians as a whole.”