"We cannot build foundations of a state without rule of law"
About this Quote
A state built without the rule of law is a house put up in a hurry: it might stand long enough for a photo op, then it starts to crack where it matters. Mahmoud Abbas’s line is doing two jobs at once. On the surface, it’s civics 101 - courts, procedures, predictability. Underneath, it’s a political boundary marker: legitimacy doesn’t come from revolutionary romance, factional muscle, or international recognition alone. It comes from institutions that can restrain everyone, especially the people who currently hold the keys.
The phrasing is deliberate. “Cannot” isn’t advice; it’s a veto. “Foundations” signals permanence and patience, a rebuke to the improvisational governance that thrives in emergency politics. And “a state” is pointedly abstract, almost aspirational. For Abbas, whose leadership is inseparable from the stalled project of Palestinian statehood, the quote reads as both a promise to external patrons and a warning to internal rivals: no sovereignty without discipline, no nation-building without monopoly over rules rather than guns.
Context sharpens the intent. Abbas has long positioned himself as the bureaucratic counterweight to armed resistance narratives and to Hamas’s competing claim to represent Palestinians. Invoking “rule of law” also speaks to donor-language realities: international aid and diplomatic support often arrive with governance benchmarks attached. So the subtext is triangulation: reassure the world, pressure opponents, and preempt criticism of his own administration by framing law not as a technocratic nicety but as the prerequisite for statehood itself.
The phrasing is deliberate. “Cannot” isn’t advice; it’s a veto. “Foundations” signals permanence and patience, a rebuke to the improvisational governance that thrives in emergency politics. And “a state” is pointedly abstract, almost aspirational. For Abbas, whose leadership is inseparable from the stalled project of Palestinian statehood, the quote reads as both a promise to external patrons and a warning to internal rivals: no sovereignty without discipline, no nation-building without monopoly over rules rather than guns.
Context sharpens the intent. Abbas has long positioned himself as the bureaucratic counterweight to armed resistance narratives and to Hamas’s competing claim to represent Palestinians. Invoking “rule of law” also speaks to donor-language realities: international aid and diplomatic support often arrive with governance benchmarks attached. So the subtext is triangulation: reassure the world, pressure opponents, and preempt criticism of his own administration by framing law not as a technocratic nicety but as the prerequisite for statehood itself.
Quote Details
| Topic | Justice |
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