By: Dr. Abdel Aziz Tarekji
— Investigative journalist and researcher in international human rights violations —
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On the first anniversary of the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s dictatorship, the central question is no longer how that regime fell, nor at what cost, but rather why it managed to endure for so long, and why the Arab world remains incapable of uprooting the roots of authoritarianism from the soil of power. The fall of Assad was not an isolated Syrian event, but a revealing moment that stripped the mask from all regimes that built their existence on repression, presented fear as a condition for stability, and treated popular silence as a political achievement.
This anniversary does not merely recall the past; it imposes a painful comparison with the present. While the dictatorship in Damascus collapsed morally and politically under the weight of its crimes, another dictatorship—less noisy and more cunning—continues to practice the same repression, but through “soft” methods that are internationally acceptable. Here, in Ramallah, stands Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority whose mandate expired more than fifteen years ago, as a model of functional authoritarianism—one that does not need tanks or barrel bombs, because it kills politics from within, confiscates society in the name of legitimacy, and represses Palestinians in the name of the “cause.”
The difference between Bashar al-Assad and Mahmoud Abbas is not one of substance, but of method. Assad ruled with fire and iron; Abbas rules through decrees and security apparatuses. Assad destroyed cities; Abbas destroyed institutions. Assad inherited power openly; Abbas seeks to inherit it silently. Assad declared a state of emergency; Abbas exercised it without declaration, in a more effective manner and at a lower cost to his international image.
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Expired Legitimacy and Power Without a Mandate
Since January 9, 2009, the legal term of Mahmoud Abbas has expired in accordance with the amended Palestinian Basic Law, which set the presidential term at four years. Since that date, no presidential elections have been held, the people have not been consulted, and the mandate has not been renewed. Nevertheless, Abbas continued to rule through a series of presidential decrees that paralyzed political life and transformed the Palestinian Authority from a transitional entity into a closed regime, governed by the will of a single individual.
Abbas did not stop at bypassing the presidential term; he went further by effectively freezing the Palestinian Legislative Council and then announcing its dissolution through a unilateral decision in 2018, concentrating executive and legislative powers in his hands, in a dangerous precedent that is no different in essence from the practices of Arab dictatorial regimes that ruled without parliament or oversight.
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The State of the Security Apparatus: Prisons Instead of Institutions
Just as the Assad regime relied on an overlapping network of security agencies, the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank built a fragmented security system that is not subject to real legislative oversight and that owes direct loyalty to the president. These agencies, which are supposed to protect the citizen, have been transformed into tools of political control and internal repression, targeting opponents, activists, journalists, and even ordinary citizens.
The Authority’s prisons and detention centers, such as the Jericho Central Prison and the headquarters of the Preventive Security in Beitunia, Nablus, and Hebron, have become known among Palestinians as places of arbitrary detention and torture. Beatings, stress positions, humiliation, sleep deprivation, and threats were not exceptions but repeated practices, which in some cases ended in death under torture, without real accountability or judicial transparency.
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Permanent Emergency Without Declaration
Abbas did not need to declare a formal state of emergency as Assad did, because he exercised it in practice. Detention without trial, arrests on the basis of opinion, political trials, the persecution of journalists, and the criminalization of criticism under vague pretexts such as “lengthening the tongue” or “threatening social peace” turned the West Bank into a closed political space, where public life is governed by fear rather than law.
Thus, the Authority was transformed into a Palestinian version of the security state, where politics is repressed in the name of stability and the homeland is reduced to the person of the president.
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Inheritance of Power: Family Before the Cause
Just as the Assad regime sought to inherit power, Mahmoud Abbas is working to reproduce authority within his own family. Yasser Abbas, who holds no official position in either the Authority or the Palestine Liberation Organization, and who is neither a historic leader nor an elected figure, is being promoted as the “political son.” As for Tareq Abbas, he has become a symbol of economic monopolization in the West Bank, dominating companies, contracts, and concessions, in a scene that strongly recalls the model of Rami Makhlouf in Syria.
Under Abbas, the Authority ceased to be an inclusive national framework and became a network of family interests, managed through personal loyalty and closed to transparency and accountability.
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From Security Coordination to Regional Complicity
Abbas’s role was not limited to security coordination with Israel, which shifted from a political commitment to a repressive doctrine against Palestinians themselves, but extended to highly dangerous regional security relations. The head of General Intelligence, Majed Faraj, played a role in coordinating with Ali Mamlouk, the chief of the security apparatus of the Assad regime, and in providing the Syrian regime with information about opponents and wanted individuals in Lebanon and in Palestinian refugee camps.
More serious still, diplomatic passports were granted to figures from the Assad regime to facilitate their movement and travel, at a time when that regime was accused of committing the most atrocious crimes against its own people. Here, any attempt to portray the Palestinian Authority as a victim collapses, and it is exposed as a partner within a regional system of repression.
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Total Silencing… and an Imposed Silence
Mahmoud Abbas succeeded in silencing almost all opposition voices. There are no prominent Fatah leaders who dare to confront him, no current officials who criticize him publicly, and no real political life. Fear, exclusion, and the cutting of salaries proved to be effective tools for taming the elites and turning silence into the norm.
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Israel: The Hidden Patron of “Soft” Authoritarianism
Despite repeated Israeli statements that superficially criticize Abbas, everyone knows that Israel is the greatest beneficiary of his continued rule. A president without electoral legitimacy, yet effective in security terms. An Authority without popular representation, yet capable of controlling the street. Thus Abbas’s image is polished abroad, while Palestinians are left without a voice and without a political horizon.
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The Last of the Arab Dictators… For How Long?
If Bashar al-Assad has fallen morally and politically, Mahmoud Abbas today stands as one of the last Arab dictators ruling without popular mandate and practicing repression in the name of legitimacy. The question is no longer whether this model will fall, but when, at what price, and how much pain it will leave behind before its collapse.
Is it conceivable that one day we will hear in Ramallah, as was heard in other Arab capitals, chants of joy at the fall of authoritarianism?
Will we hear the celebratory chant “Mandus-hum… Mandus-hum… the Abbas family, mandus-hum” in a square celebrating the return of politics, freedom, and dignity in the heart of the West Bank, heralding the end of the last remaining dictatorships?
History does not forgive, and tyrants—no matter how long they last—do fall. The only difference is between those who fall leaving destroyed cities behind, and those who fall after having destroyed politics and the human being from within.
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For Those Who Do Not Know the Truth About Them: Power, Wealth, and Family
Mahmoud Rida Abbas (Abu Mazen): power without mandate and accumulation of influence without accountability
Mahmoud Abbas has been President of the Palestinian Authority since 2005 and Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization. His legal term expired in January 2009 without electoral renewal. Throughout his years in power, executive and security authorities have been concentrated in his hands through presidential decrees that he continues to issue on a daily basis, alongside the effective paralysis of the Legislative Council and the absence of effective oversight mechanisms. Politically, his name has been associated with a model of governance based on managing the system rather than renewing it, and on controlling the public sphere through security means instead of opening it politically. Financially, no transparent data are published regarding the president’s or his family’s financial disclosures, while persistent questions are raised about conflicts of interest and the overlap between political decision-making and economic privileges granted to close associates, within the context of a power exercised without an updated popular mandate.
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Yasser Abbas: the businessman who rose under political influence
Yasser Mahmoud Rida Abbas, a Palestinian–Canadian, is one of the sons of President Mahmoud Abbas and is known as a businessman with diversified activities in construction, investment, insurance, and the tobacco trade, in addition to infrastructure-related projects. International reports and journalistic investigations indicate that companies linked to him obtained externally funded contracts and projects, which sparked widespread debate over the overlap between political influence and commercial activity. His wealth is estimated—according to unofficial media assessments—at hundreds of millions of dollars, and his name is listed within the category of Politically Exposed Persons (PEP) in financial analyses, a designation used internationally to indicate potential risks related to conflicts of interest, without constituting in itself a judicial ruling.
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Tareq Abbas: investments and silent economic monopolization
Tareq Abbas is the other son of President Mahmoud Abbas and a businessman active in the fields of investment, real estate, and services. Leaks and media reports, including those contained in the Panama Papers, revealed that he holds stakes in major companies operating in the Palestinian market, with estimates of asset values and investments that, together with those of his brother, raise the family’s financial classification to the level of millionaires. Analysts link this economic rise to a monopolistic environment characterized by weak transparency, in which privileges are granted through direct proximity to the center of political decision-making, deepening the debate over the fairness of economic opportunities and the independence of the market.
