Since the signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993,
under the guise of an innocent police force, the Palestinian Authority (PA)
has created a military organization with noteworthy fighting capabilities
which could pose a significant military challenge to Israel in the event of a
full-scale military confrontation. The army of the PA is presently a complex,
multifaceted apparatus consisting of at least a dozen different branches with
overlapping responsibilities. The proliferation of security apparatuses was a
manifestation of Yasser Arafat’s style of leadership during the peace process
period, but with the outbreak of the second intifada, the PA has
confronted many problems in the application of military force due to the
cumbersome nature of its security apparatus.
The intifada has also created a false
perception in Israel and the world about the PA’s real military capabilities,
since the forefront units of the Palestinian military, the National Security
Forces have, so far, been excluded from the fighting. These units, the most
capable part of the PA’s military apparatus, should be counted on to confront
Israel if the conflict escalates.
This paper examines the milestones in the
buildup of the Palestinian armed forces, their structure and organization,
weapons, capabilities and tactics. It describes the peculiar nature of the
relations between Arafat and his lieutenants and the complex relations between
the Palestinian security services and the plethora of paramilitary forces that
have emerged during the second intifada such as Tanzim, the Popular
Resistance Committees and the al-Aqsa Martyr Brigades.
The
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has met the Palestinian security services in
battle in at least three major rounds of violence since 1994. In all of these
engagements, the PA’s security services, despite their rudimentary image,
proved that they have sufficient capacity to become one of Israel’s most
challenging adversaries. What remains unclear is what would be their role in
the context of a wider regional conflict between Israel and an Arab coalition.
The paper concludes that in such an event, the presence of a Palestinian army
west of the Jordan River would change the existing Arab-Israeli military
balance and introduce new operational as well as psychological challenges
which deserve serious care.
