Governance and Resistance in Palestine: Simulations, Confrontations, Sumoud,

Abstract

With the Madrid peace conference of October 1991 and the subsequent Israeli—PLO Oslo Accords of 1993, the West Bank and Gaza became established as key sites for the project of liberal global governance. Following the 1991 conference, multilateral working groups were set up to address region-wide problems such as economic development, the environment and arms control, these bringing together both core Middle East parties and a range of state, inter-state and non-state actors from outside the region, especially Europe and North America (Peters, 1996). With the 1993 Accords (Israel and the PLO, 1993) the level of international involvement grew even greater. The accords themselves established a framework for a five-year ‘interim period’ of Palestinian self-rule within the West Bank and Gaza, during which time various territorial, administrative and security powers would be progressively transferred from Israel to the Palestinians. This period would be brought to an end through the signing of a ‘permanent status agreement’ based on UN Security Council Resolution 242, which had called for ‘withdrawal of Israel from territories occupied’ in the 1967 war, and ‘the termination of all claims or states of belligerency’.