Colonizing the Gaza Strip: two phases of governance: a critique of the idea of state

Abstract

Since the year 1948 the landscape of the Gaza Strip has been significantly mutilated. I will assess the transformation that has occurred in both the sense of time and space. In chapter one, I will highlight the Zionist project's refashioning of the landscape of the land called Palestine as a prelude to assessing the reshaping of landscape under the governance of two rivaling Palestinian parties. Following, I will narrow my analysis more closely on the Gaza Strip by highlighting two different phases of governance of the discursive spatial enclave. Chapter two takes into its scope the post-Oslo era starting in 1994 until the Hamas' takeover in June of 2007. Here I will highlight Fateh's re-ordering of the Palestinian imaginary and refashioning of space in the Gaza Strip. In chapter three, I will focus my analysis on the period following Hamas taking power after being denied its legitimate claim to control. I will look closely at how these two political movements transformed themselves during their transition from emphasizing liberation struggle to aspiring to governance. I will use both oral and written sources to assess the transformation of the Gaza Strip in time and space. I will base my findings on three rounds of participant-observation and interviews carried out in the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007, January 2008 and summer of 2008. I will also include a number of interviews from the West Bank and Cairo. I will further rely on academic writings, media articles and blogs. I will claim that by giving up on revolutionary visions of liberation both movements open the doors for co-option by the ideas of global governance. The Fateh leadership fully capitulate their original raison d'être after being tempted with the possibility of political representation at Oslo. Hamas, in a similar trend of prioritization tries to maximize its popularity by adopting narratives of nation-statism that the movement had previously strongly opposed. I will use these two instances to deeply question the nature and effectiveness of the container of nation-state. I will highlight the Intifada of 1987 as a moment of difference. Here a non-centralized uprising threatens the occupation and its supporting global economic regime. Through the trope of the Intifada I will provide signposts that reveal moments that resist and undermine the status quo of globally sanctioned nation-statism.