US To Bring Abject Failure Of Security Assistance To West Bank, Renew Pressure On Israel. What Could Go Wrong?

Fatah has just shown a total (a) inability and (b) willingness to stand up to the fundamentalists in their midst. The generous read of the situation is that decades of training and cutting edge weaponry weren't enough to stand up to a band of armed thugs that had popular support. The more honest reading is that not only were they unable to do it, but Abbas waited way too long to order his people into action. So it would be bad enough if the US was responding by literally the exact same thing...

the United States announced over the weekend that it plans to continue financing and training military forces loyal to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, despite Hamas's takeover of the Gaza Strip... US Lt.-Gen. Keith Dayton was responsible for training and financing equipment used by the Presidential Guard, Abbas's elite force that was in charge of the Rafah and Karni crossings... the forces proved their ineffectiveness and together with the rest of the Fatah military and political wing, failed to demonstrate a real opposition to Hamas... Dayton plans to continue assisting the Palestinians but will shift the focus of his attention from Gaza to the West Bank.

... but they actually intend to do more of the same. We mean that in a literal sense - they're not just going to do the same, they're going to do it with more enthusiasm, more money, and more pressure on Israel.

Here's the real problem: the Americans working with Fatah have a bad habit of assuming that they're much better at their jobs than they actually are. So they pressure Israel to make concessions, because they think that they're actually doing good work:

"Dayton's plan completely failed," a senior defense official said. "The Presidential Guards which he was responsible for were easily run over by Hamas." The official expressed satisfaction with Israel's decision to oppose Dayton's "benchmark plan" - presented last month - which called for free passage between Gaza and the West Bank. "Thankfully we rejected the plan," the official said. "Imagine if we would have succumbed to American pressure and accepted the plan and then Hamas would have taken over."

In his mind, Dayton is a superstar building up the Fatah security forces. And so you can understand that he gets frustrated when Israel doesn't recognize what a bang-up job he's doing. And you can imagine how he brings the Pentagon and the State Department to bear on Israel for - in his mind - underestimating him. If you're wondering - no, apparently reality doesn't seem to have much to do with his estimation of his grandeur.

The frustrating thing is that these people can just be wrong - predictably wrong - over and over again and they still get credibility when they open their mouths. The UNIFIL commander says that there's not a corner of South Lebanon that his people don't control, and two days later Katyushas are falling on northern Israel. Dayton promises that benchmarks will help the Palestinians, when in retrospect they would have been disastrous for Israel and gained nothing. But that won't stop him from condescendingly instructing the Israelis on their security next time.

References:
* Israeli official: Dayton failed [JPost]
* Katyushas Hit Israel Two Days After UNIFIL Commander Promises Peace [MR]

Previously:
* Palestinian Non-Civil War Watch - Abass: Palestinian Government Is Dissolved; Haniyeh: No It's Not
* US: Yeah, We'll Keep Giving Weapons and Training To Fatah. What Could Go Wrong?
* US To Lift Embargo, Pour Money and Weapons Into West Bank