Palestinian Elections

[Texsox]

So, we should give California, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona back to Mexico?

 

Texas was an Independent Country

[NorthSideSox72]

Texas was an Independent Country

 

So was New Mexico for a short time (included most of NM, AZ, parts of CO, NV), though the US didn't recognize them as a nation during that period.

Edited January 27, 2006 by NorthSideSox72

[Balta1701]

Here's Juan Cole's piece on the Palestinian elections. Lot of Bush Bashing, so if you're not into that, probably won't appeal to you. More than I expected from him on this topic too.

[King B]

Wrong turn on road map for peace in Mideast

 

January 27, 2006

 

The Palestinians have packed their government with a party whose most notable policy is suicide bombing. Yes, we know their voting reflected the Palestinians' understandable disgust with the corruption, incompetence, cronyism and lawlessness of Yasser Arafat's Fatah party. Still, the bottom line remains that Hamas is a terrorist organization -- founded to destroy Israel, to advance, in the words of its charter, "our struggle against the Jews."

 

The Palestinians have spoken and now they, the Israelis and the rest of us must live with that decision. Hamas is very clear about its aims, and a ballot-box victory has not brought any distancing by it from those goals despite all the mumbling from the chattering classes about how Hamas might be more responsible now that it's in power. Control of the reins of government has not produced moderation among the mullahs or president in Iran. Nor should we forget that Hamas is a manifestation of the Islamist fascism we fight. Hamas seeks "Allah's victory ... over every inch of Palestine" just as al-Qaida wants a radical caliphate over a broad stretch of the world.

 

If Hamas is so clear about its goals, the world must demonstrate the same resolve -- and moral clarity also. Not only does Israel have no peace partner, it must chart its future with the knowledge that an implacable enemy is turning Palestinian territory into what's already being called "Hamastan." President Bush admirably declared the United States will not have anything to do with Hamas unless it renounces its goal of destroying Israel. But we should never forget Arafat talked peace while waging terrorism. Should pacific-sounding words start coming from Hamas, those words must be accompanied by concrete actions to destroy the terrorist infrastructure and dismantle the propaganda machine spewing relentless hate and bigotry. We won't hold our breath.

 

Those who assert we have to deal with Hamas should recall just how effectively Arafat was isolated after Bush declared in 2002 that he was a terrorist with whom America could not work. No, we don't have to do business with Hamas. First, we don't negotiate with it. And the spigot of funding must be shut off for a Hamas-led government.

 

One interesting idea comes from John Hulsman and Nile Gardiner of the Heritage Foundation. They propose a U.S. campaign to make Israel a NATO member. Their idea came in response to Iran's nuclear aspirations. Now NATO membership also would serve notice on Hamas as well as Iran that one of history's most successful alliances won't tolerate a terror war against Israel. It's an idea worth considering. The weak link, of course, is Europe. Israel understandably wouldn't want any alliance that could tie its hands. And we're already hearing the European Union making noises that it can deal with Hamas. But in judging Hamas or Iran, history tells us that people who say they want to wipe the Jews off the face of the Earth usually mean what they say.

 

 

Copyright © The Sun-Times Company

All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

[Flash Tizzle]

Israel4ever, atleast bother to forward the link to your brother instead of creating a name for the purpose of posting a Sun-Times article.

[LowerCaseRepublican]

If Hamas is as bad as we know they can be, then why did Israel and the Knesset fund them for years?

 

http://antiwar.com/justin/

 

As Richard Sale pointed out in a piece for UPI:

 

"Israel and Hamas may currently be locked in deadly combat, but, according to several current and former U.S. intelligence officials, beginning in the late 1970s, Tel Aviv gave direct and indirect financial aid to Hamas over a period of years. Israel 'aided Hamas directly – the Israelis wanted to use it as a counterbalance to the PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization),' said Tony Cordesman, Middle East analyst for the Center for Strategic [and International] Studies. Israel's support for Hamas 'was a direct attempt to divide and dilute support for a strong, secular PLO by using a competing religious alternative,' said a former senior CIA official."

 

Middle East analyst Ray Hanania concurs:

 

"In addition to hoping to turn the Palestinian masses away from Arafat and the PLO, the Likud leadership believed they could achieve a workable alliance with Islamic, anti-Arafat forces that would also extend Israel's control over the occupied territories."

 

In a conscious effort to undermine the Palestine Liberation Organization and the leadership of Yasser Arafat, in 1978 the government of then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin approved the application of Sheik Ahmad Yassin to start a "humanitarian" organization known as the Islamic Association, or Mujama. The roots of this Islamist group were in the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood, and this was the seed that eventually grew into Hamas – but not before it was amply fertilized and nurtured with Israeli funding and political support.

--

How quick the Christian rightists and the Zionists forget Galatians 6:7 (that's the reap what you sow verse)

[King B]

If Hamas is as bad as we know they can be, then why did Israel and the Knesset fund them for years?

 

http://antiwar.com/justin/

 

As Richard Sale pointed out in a piece for UPI:

 

"Israel and Hamas may currently be locked in deadly combat, but, according to several current and former U.S. intelligence officials, beginning in the late 1970s, Tel Aviv gave direct and indirect financial aid to Hamas over a period of years. Israel 'aided Hamas directly – the Israelis wanted to use it as a counterbalance to the PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization),' said Tony Cordesman, Middle East analyst for the Center for Strategic [and International] Studies. Israel's support for Hamas 'was a direct attempt to divide and dilute support for a strong, secular PLO by using a competing religious alternative,' said a former senior CIA official."

 

Middle East analyst Ray Hanania concurs:

 

"In addition to hoping to turn the Palestinian masses away from Arafat and the PLO, the Likud leadership believed they could achieve a workable alliance with Islamic, anti-Arafat forces that would also extend Israel's control over the occupied territories."

 

In a conscious effort to undermine the Palestine Liberation Organization and the leadership of Yasser Arafat, in 1978 the government of then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin approved the application of Sheik Ahmad Yassin to start a "humanitarian" organization known as the Islamic Association, or Mujama. The roots of this Islamist group were in the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood, and this was the seed that eventually grew into Hamas – but not before it was amply fertilized and nurtured with Israeli funding and political support.

--

How quick the Christian rightists and the Zionists forget Galatians 6:7 (that's the reap what you sow verse)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Same reason that the US funded the Taliban when they were fighting against Russia.

 

Same reason the US funded Iraq when they were at war with Iran.

 

Times change. Things change.

 

Don't read more into it than you need to.

[King B]

I WISH BOTH SIDES THE BEST OF LUCK IN THEIR STRUGGLE!

 

Fatah and Hamas militias in Gaza shooting each other as chaos grows

By Israel Insider staff and partners January 28, 2006

 

 

Hamas gunmen ambushed a Palestinian police patrol early Saturday, wounding two officers, Gaza police said, amid mounting tensions in the coastal strip following Hamas' resounding victory over the ruling Fatah Party in parliament elections earlier in the week.

 

The shooting in the southern town of Khan Younis came just hours after an exchange of fire between Hamas gunmen and police in the same area. A Hamas member and two policemen were wounded in the firefight. One of the officers was shot in the head and remained in a coma Saturday, hospital officials said.

 

Most of the police are allied with Fatah and fear for their jobs under a Hamas-led government, while Hamas has its own armed force of about 5,000 gunmen in the strip. There are growing fears that tensions between disgruntled Fatah supporters and Hamas activists trying to assert control will now escalate.

 

Following bloody clashes Friday night and Saturday morning between his group and Fatah, Hamas leader in Gaza, Ismail Hania, told followers Saturday morning that, "weapons should be turned only against Israel.... Our battle is not against our own people," he said.

 

On Friday, thousands of Fatah supporters burned cars and shot in the air across the Gaza Strip, demanding the resignation of corrupt party officials and insisting their party do not enter a coalition with Hamas.

 

The protest against the party that dominated Palestinian politics for the past 40 years came after President Mahmoud Abbas, who was elected last year to a four-year term, said Friday he would ask the Islamic militant group to form the next government. Abbas later fired six Fatah officials.

 

Israel, caught off guard by the Hamas parliamentary landslide after its vaunted intelligence services predicted a slim Fatah victory, said it would have no contacts with a Palestinian government that includes Hamas.

 

Acting Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni appealed to the international community not to legitimize a Hamas government, saying elections "are not a whitewash for terror."

 

U.S. President George W. Bush said Friday in a television interview with "CBS Evening News" that the United States would cut aid to the Palestinian government unless Hamas abolishes the militant arm of its party and stops calling for the destruction of Israel.

 

Despite international pressure, Hamas leaders said Friday they had no intention of recognizing Israel.

 

"It's not in our mind now to recognize it as we believe that it's a state that has usurped our land and expelled our people. These issues should be handled before we talk about recognition," deputy Hamas leader Moussa Abu Marzouk said from Damascus, Syria.

 

Hamas held a celebratory rally in the central Gaza town of Khan Younis on Friday, as supporters waved green party flags and caps and chanted slogans.

 

Later Friday, Hamas gunmen fired in the air to chase off Fatah activists tearing down Hamas posters and banners in Khan Younis. The incident took place near the local office of the Palestinian Preventive Security, and officers fired toward the Hamas gunmen, wounding one Hamas activist in the leg.

 

Hamas return fire wounded two policemen, hitting one in the chest and one in the head.

 

At about 1 a.m. Saturday, a Palestinian police patrol in Khan Younis was ambushed by Hamas gunmen, and two officers were wounded, police said. Hamas officials were not immediately available for comment.

 

Wednesday's election exposed deep tensions within Palestinian society and was a clear rebuke to Fatah for its corruption and inability to maintain order. Before the vote, veteran Fatah leaders, those most tainted by corruption allegations, resisted repeated calls for reform by the Fatah young guard.

 

On Friday, demonstrators burned cars and shot in the air in front of the Palestinian parliament building in Gaza City. About 1,000 angry party activists went to Abbas' house in Gaza, and hundreds of gunmen fired rifles in the air. Abbas was in the West Bank city of Ramallah at the time.

 

The protesters then marched through Gaza City toward the security headquarters, tearing down Hamas election posters and banners and burning tires in the street. A small group called on Abbas to resign.

 

"We are against joining any coalition with Hamas because this means a disaster for Fatah and the Palestinian people," said Samir Mashrawi, a local Fatah leader who was defeated in the election. "Instead, we want to be a strong opposition and we want to fight and end the corruption of some of Fatah's historical leaders."

 

About 500 Fatah protesters marched through the West Bank city of Hebron, also calling for the resignation of party leaders.

 

Outgoing Deputy Prime Minister Nabil Shaath defended Abbas as the only hope for salvaging the peace process. "His resignation would lead to either total chaos or to Hamas taking over the presidency as well," he told CNN.

 

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said he asked Abbas to meet Sunday to discuss forming a government, but Abbas' office said no appointment had been made. Hamas, which has no experience in governing, took 76 of the 132 parliament seats up for grabs.

 

Ghazi Hamad, one of Hamas' top ideologues, said the group would consider forming a government of technocrats with no connection to Hamas. Such a government might relieve some of the international pressure on the group.

 

Hamas, responsible for dozens of suicide bombings on Israelis, has long called for the destruction of the Jewish state. In recent years, some Hamas leaders grudgingly accepted the idea of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, but only as a stage toward freeing the rest of Palestine -- meaning Israel.

 

Hamas is listed as a terror organization by the United States and the European Union. If the group fails to change its ways, Bush said, "we won't deal with them."

 

"The aid packages won't go forward," he told CBS. "That's their decision to make, but we won't be providing help to a government that wants to destroy our ally and friend."

 

Jacob Walles, the U.S. consul-general in Jerusalem, said the United States gives $400 million a year to the Palestinian Authority.

 

A Palestinian Cabinet minister, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic, said the government would have to fire 30,000 of its 137,000 employees immediately if aid was cut.

 

Israeli officials said they will make a decision soon on whether to stop transferring taxes and import duties it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, which make up about two-thirds of the authority's revenue.

 

The AP contributed to this report.

 

 

© 2001-2004 Koret Communications Ltd. All rights reserved.

[King B]

We Have No Peace Process”

By Robert Spencer

FrontPageMagazine.com | January 27, 2006

 

 

The denial started almost immediately after Hamas captured 57 percent of the seats in the Palestinian parliament. Associated Press reported that “Hamas capitalized on widespread discontent with years of Fatah corruption and ineffectiveness. Much of its campaign focused on internal Palestinian issues, while playing down the conflict with Israel.” Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice opined: “Palestinian people have apparently voted for change, but we believe their aspirations for peace and a peaceful life remain unchanged.”

 

But what kind of peace? And how does Hamas (Harakat Muqawama Islamiyya — the Islamic Resistance Movement) propose to rid the Palestinian Authority of corruption? To these questions the answer has been clear for as long as Hamas has existed; the answer to both is Islam. The Hamas Charter of August 18, 1988, quotes Hassan Al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, the first modern Islamic terror organization and the direct forefather of Hamas: “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it.” A Hamas supporter in Gaza amplified that principle on Thursday: “We’re happy that now we will have an Islamic state. God willing, Islam will prevail and we will get rid of corruption.”

 

The Iranian regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has joined Hamas in calling for the destruction of Israel, expressed delight at the election outcome. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman said: “Iran...hopes that the powerful presence of Hamas at the [political] scene brings about great achievements for the Palestinian nation.”

 

 

Others were not so joyful. Jasser Jasser, a Christian pharmacist in Ramallah, said of the prospect of Hamas rule: “We’re all afraid. We’re worried about the future, that we’ll become a second Iran.” Jasser and other non-Muslims have every reason to be afraid. Hassam El-Masalmeh, Hamas leader in Bethlehem, recently declared that his movement intended to reinstitute the traditional tax, the jizya, stipulated in the Qur’an for Jews and Christians in an Islamic state. “We in Hamas,” Masalmeh announced, “intend to implement this tax someday. We say it openly – we welcome everyone to Palestine but only if they agree to live under our rules.” Since along with this tax, Islamic law stipulates that Jews and Christians must submit to a series of humiliating and discriminatory regulations, ensuring their second-class status in line with the Qur’anic stipulation that they “pay the jizya with willing submission and feel themselves subdued” (9:29).

 

 

Some try to draw comfort from the fact that Hamas participated in the elections at all. Victor Batarseh, the mayor of Bethlehem and a Christian, echoed the view of many analysts when he said: “The only way to make Hamas more moderate is to bring them inside the system.” But that hope was belied by statements from Hamas operatives themselves, including Umm Farhat, a candidate for the Palestinian Legislative Council and the mother of a jihad terrorist who murdered five Israeli civilians. Umm Farhat emphasized that Hamas’ participation in elections did not mean it was moderating its jihadist goals one iota: “The jihadist project completes the political one and the political project cannot be completed without jihad.”

 

 

So now it should be clear to the world that exactly that – the jihad – is the agenda of Hamas, and now of the Palestinian Authority as a whole. While Mahmoud Abbas has been able to distance himself from terror attacks in Israel and claim that he was not able to stop them, now the government of the Palestinian Authority itself will be dominated by an organization that has celebrated such attacks.

 

Flush with victory, Hamas shows no sign of changing that posture. Hamas operative Ismail Haniyeh said the Islamic group will now work to “complete the liberation of other parts of Palestine.” In a sadly typical example of mainstream media cluelessness, the AP story reporting this adds: “But did not say which territories he was referring to or how he would go about it.” As if there were any doubt in the mind of anyone in Hamas at this point that “Palestine” refers to the entirety of Israel. The Hamas Charter states: “For renouncing any part of Palestine means renouncing part of the religion; the nationalism of the Islamic Resistance Movement is part of its faith, the movement educates its members to adhere to its principles and to raise the banner of Allah over their homeland as they fight their Jihad: ‘Allah is the all-powerful, but most people are not aware.’”

 

And how will Hamas go about “liberating” its “homeland”? Hamas’ Mahmoud Zahar reiterated after the electoral victory: “We have no peace process. We are not going to mislead our people to tell them we are waiting, meeting, for a peace process that is nothing.” Zahar was echoing the Hamas Charter’s declaration: “[Peace] initiatives, the so-called peaceful solutions, and the international conferences to resolve the Palestinian problem, are all contrary to the beliefs of the Islamic Resistance Movement.”

 

 

 

Those words should reverberate in the minds of all the world’s policymakers whenever they are tempted in the coming weeks to call yet again for Israel to moderate its stance toward Hamas and enter into negotiations with the group. Hamas is dedicated to establishing an Islamic state and will no doubt begin immediately to do so. Its Charter maintains, “the Islamic nature of Palestine is part of our religion, and anyone who neglects his religion is bound to lose.” The Charter follows this with a quotation from the Qur’an: “And who forsakes the religion of Abraham, save him who befools himself?” (2:130).

 

Hamas identifies itself in the Charter as “characterized by a profound understanding, by precise notions and by a complete comprehensiveness of all concepts of Islam in all domains of life: views and beliefs, politics and economics, education and society, jurisprudence and rule, indoctrination and teaching, the arts and publications, the hidden and the evident, and all the other domains of life.” That totalitarian vision, as Jasser Jasser knows well, bodes ill for Palestinian non-Muslims.

 

Nonetheless, Secretary of State Rice is, of course, correct: the Palestinian “aspirations for peace and a peaceful life remain unchanged.” But they are founded upon a societal model that is fundamentally different from that that Western analysts have so far imagined. “When Islam strives for peace,” wrote the Egyptian Muslim theorist Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966), “its objective is not that superficial peace which requires that only that part of the earth where the followers of Islam are residing remain secure. The peace which Islam desires is that the religion (i.e., the Law of the society) be purified for God, that the obedience of all people be for God alone, and that some people should not be lords over others.” In the Palestinian Authority, the voters have freely chosen such a society. Were they voting against corruption? So were many Germans who voted for Hitler in the early 1930s. The fact that much of the populace had not endorsed his agenda, however, did not prevent him from implementing it.

 

Ahmadinejad in Iran, Hamas in the Palestinian Authority: jihadists are closer than they have been in ages to realizing the Muslim Prophet Muhammad’s prediction that “the last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him” (Sahih Muslim, bk. 41, no. 6985).

 

 

Will the world stand ready to prevent this? Or continue to deceive itself with vain hopes that the men who won the Palestinian elections are men with whom they can deal?

[samclemens]

I don't bank on this, but I hope now that Hamas has 'real power' (whatever that means in Palestine) they will renounce the old and actually negotiate.  Time will tell.

 

kap, this isnt only directed at you, but other people here too...

 

you've got to be kidding. look at that headline about militants storming their parliament, which hasnt even been formed for a week. what more is it going to take for people to start to see palestine for what they are? and saying that hamas only doesnt specifically call for destruction of israel is a bit of a cop-out.

 

i blame much of this on arafat. he squandered so much of the aide he got for palestine on himself and....who knows what he spent it on?? all i know is he had over $1 billion in a multitude of bank accounts when he died (of AIDS....maybe he spent some on his treatment). seriously, arafat's deficient leadership was never meant to make peace with israel. he fostered the entire atitutde and environment in palestine today. think about how an entire generation of palestinian children have grown up listening to fatah and hamas preach hatred and arafat condoning it, sometimes openly and sometimes through his failure to call it what it was.

 

that entire country has some serious growing up to do. and by growing up, i mean becoming civilized and realizing they are only going to eventually force the rest of the world to straighten them out. for our boys in uniforms' sake, i hope we have nothing to do with it.

[Balta1701]

Aside from the unsourced rumor about Arafat dying of AIDS, that last post is actually very close to right on. With the amount of money lost to corruption by that government...it's not surprising that the people want new leadership, nor is it that surprising they're turning to the only people who are offering answers.

[southsideirish71]

Now the leader of Hamas suggests group could create Palestinian army.

 

 

Gee I wonder what their army is going to do?

 

Here we go

Edited January 29, 2006 by southsideirish71

[whitesoxfan101]

Now the leader of Hamas suggests group could create Palestinian army.

Gee I wonder what their army is going to do?

 

Here we go

 

I'm sure they have good, peace keeping intentions.

[southsideirish71]

"We have a new plan; to teach men the land of Palestine; the geography of Palestine; the history of Palestine; and the history of the Arab and Muslim Nation. Our plan has nothing to do with the Israeli enemy. We do not recognize the Israeli enemy, nor his right to be our neighbor, nor to stay [on the land], nor his ownership of any inch of land. Therefore, we do not see [israel] as an ally, not in policy, not in security, not in economy and not in any form of cooperation. Israel is an enemy who is interested in uprooting us, and we are interested in restoring our full rights to return all the people of Palestine to the land of Palestine. Our principles are clear: Palestine is a land of Waqf [islamic trust], which can not be given up."

[PA TV, January 17, 2006]

 

Yup, its like you can see the train coming down the tracks. This is going to get real ugly before it gets better. First the Iranian nut, and now this. This is what they ran on. Good lord.

[Balta1701]

Gee I wonder what their army is going to do?

 

Here we go

 

I'm sure they have good, peace keeping intentions.

Well, if nothing else...the Fatah armed factions have actually been more violent than Hamas over the last year or so. Hamas has mainly held to an uneasy truce with Israel, according to several published sources. (Just trying to keep some optimism).

[Rex Kickass]

In the long term, this will be good for the MidEast. In the short term, it won't seem that way.

[samclemens]

In the long term, this will be good for the MidEast. In the short term, it won't seem that way.

 

i swear i saw a post by you a few pages ago in this thread saying they were good for the long term.

 

anyway, how exactly are hate-mongering terrorists good for palestine? for the middle east?

[kevin57]

I believe that honest elections are always a good thing. We may not get the results we would like and frankly, it is hard to imagine how any free country could like the results of a Hamas victory, but now the Palestinians can't just point a finger at the US or Israel or anyone else. THEY have chosen THEIR own leaders, and those leaders will be judged on what they actually ACCOMPLISH.

 

Notice how already Fatah and Hamas are fighting. This 'civil' war has been a long time in coming. It was bound to happen and now it is. From a purely geopolitical point of view, this is not necessarily all bad. They'll have far less time and energy to attack Israel if they're squabbling among themselves.

[Rex Kickass]

Thank you.

[LowerCaseRepublican]

i swear i saw a post by you a few pages ago in this thread saying they were good for the long term.

 

anyway, how exactly are hate-mongering terrorists good for palestine? for the middle east?

It was more of the "f*** you" vote against the PA/Fatah.

 

Hamas is/was an organization that had no other outlet for their anger/frustration/outrage than to take up arms. As we both know, the PA was corrupt. Hamas did not run on a platform of "driving Jews into the sea" but rather ran on their cleanliness when it comes to the topic of corruption. Add in the fact that they are also a social organization giving food, medical care, etc. to people who need it -- and it is no wonder why people would vote for them. As Tex said before, people vote for beans and beds before other things. Plus, we all know how effective over-the-top nationalism can be as a rallying point for anything.

 

Look at when the IRA created Sinn Fein. After gaining political power, the attacks by the IRA went down since they had a legitimate avenue now to discuss their displeasure & do something about it diplomatically. While the IRA tried to use both attacks and political power for a while at the start, it blew up in their face (no pun intended), they found political power to be much more effective.

 

For the US/Israel to immediately say that they won't talk to them is f***ing stupid. At least show up for f***'s sake. I mean, Bush is the one saying that democracy needs to be on the march through the Middle East and they should be free to pick their leaders. Well, that's what happened.

[kevin57]

For the US/Israel to immediately say that they won't talk to them is f***ing stupid.  At least show up for f***'s sake.  I mean, Bush is the one saying that democracy needs to be on the march through the Middle East and they should be free to pick their leaders.  Well, that's what happened.

 

Don't you think that Hamas should at least have to first declare that they accept some sort of "two state solution" and renounce terrorism as a means to accomplish their goals?

[LowerCaseRepublican]

Don't you think that Hamas should at least have to first declare that they accept some sort of "two state solution" and renounce terrorism as a means to accomplish their goals?

I think, to be successful, they will end up doing something like that. However, I think it'll take time for them to get to that point, much like it did with Sinn Fein (in cutting down on the rampant use of IRA attacks), etc.

 

But you're also talking to a guy who thinks that Israel also needs to cut down on its abuses in the area as well. For some of the better research/discussion of that, I'd have to suggest Norman Finkelstein. http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/ He's a professor at DePaul who has written a couple books on the topic, including one that I found really interesting. It is called "The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitations of Jewish Suffering". In it, he gives a lot of evidence that there is some major league deception going on from different organizations using the Holocaust as a hammer to beat people over the head and shake them down for more and more money. Of course, he has a personal stake in being pissed off about the exploitation of the Holocaust -- both of his parents were camp survivors who were upset at different groups abusing the horrors of the Holocaust for financial gain. He's also got a good discussion about the exploitation of the term "anti-semitism" in another book called "Beyond Chutzpah". Both really interesting reads and solid from a historical/factual perspective.

[NUKE_CLEVELAND]

It was more of the "f*** you" vote against the PA/Fatah.

 

Hamas is/was an organization that had no other outlet for their anger/frustration/outrage than to take up arms.  As we both know, the PA was corrupt.  Hamas did not run on a platform of "driving Jews into the sea" but rather ran on their cleanliness when it comes to the topic of corruption.  Add in the fact that they are also a social organization giving food, medical care, etc. to people who need it -- and it is no wonder why people would vote for them.  As Tex said before, people vote for beans and beds before other things.  Plus, we all know how effective over-the-top nationalism can be as a rallying point for anything.

 

Look at when the IRA created Sinn Fein.  After gaining political power, the attacks by the IRA went down since they had a legitimate avenue now to discuss their displeasure & do something about it diplomatically.  While the IRA tried to use both attacks and political power for a while at the start, it blew up in their face (no pun intended), they found political power to be much more effective.

 

For the US/Israel to immediately say that they won't talk to them is f***ing stupid.  At least show up for f***'s sake.  I mean, Bush is the one saying that democracy needs to be on the march through the Middle East and they should be free to pick their leaders.  Well, that's what happened.

 

 

While I think its optimistic to think Hamas will go the way Sinn Fein did I suppose its certainly plausible. They are now in charge of something for the 1st time and with that, hopefully, will come a sense of responsibility. If they want official recognition and support from Isreal and the west, however, they have to do something concrete such as renouncing their terrorist policies and renouncing violence.

[LowerCaseRepublican]

Message from the political bureau of Hamas:

 

It is widely recognised that the Palestinians are among the most politicised and educated peoples in the world. When they went to the polls last Wednesday they were well aware of what was on offer and those who voted for Hamas knew what it stood for. They chose Hamas because of its pledge never to give up the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people and its promise to embark on a programme of reform. There were voices warning them, locally and internationally, not to vote for an organisation branded by the US and EU as terrorist because such a democratically exercised right would cost them the financial aid provided by foreign donors.

The day Hamas won the Palestinian democratic elections the world's leading democracies failed the test of democracy. Rather than recognise the legitimacy of Hamas as a freely elected representative of the Palestinian people, seize the opportunity created by the result to support the development of good governance in Palestine and search for a means of ending the bloodshed, the US and EU threatened the Palestinian people with collective punishment for exercising their right to choose their parliamentary representatives.

 

We are being punished simply for resisting oppression and striving for justice. Those who threaten to impose sanctions on our people are the same powers that initiated our suffering and continue to support our oppressors almost unconditionally. We, the victims, are being penalised while our oppressors are pampered. The US and EU could have used the success of Hamas to open a new chapter in their relations with the Palestinians, the Arabs and the Muslims and to understand better a movement that has so far been seen largely through the eyes of the Zionist occupiers of our land.

 

Our message to the US and EU governments is this: your attempt to force us to give up our principles or our struggle is in vain. Our people who gave thousands of martyrs, the millions of refugees who have waited for nearly 60 years to return home and our 9,000 political and war prisoners in Israeli jails have not made those sacrifices in order to settle for close to nothing.

 

Hamas has been elected mainly because of its immovable faith in the inevitability of victory; and Hamas is immune to bribery, intimidation and blackmail. While we are keen on having friendly relations with all nations we shall not seek friendships at the expense of our legitimate rights. We have seen how other nations, including the peoples of Vietnam and South Africa, persisted in their struggle until their quest for freedom and justice was accomplished. We are no different, our cause is no less worthy, our determination is no less profound and our patience is no less abundant.

Our message to the Muslim and Arab nations is this: you have a responsibility to stand by your Palestinian brothers and sisters whose sacrifices are made on behalf of all of you. Our people in Palestine should not need to wait for any aid from countries that attach humiliating conditions to every dollar or euro they pay despite their historical and moral responsibility for our plight. We expect you to step in and compensate the Palestinian people for any loss of aid and we demand you lift all restrictions on civil society institutions that wish to fundraise for the Palestinian cause.

 

Our message to the Palestinians is this: our people are not only those who live under siege in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip but also the millions languishing in refugee camps in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria and the millions spread around the world unable to return home. We promise you that nothing in the world will deter us from pursuing our goal of liberation and return. We shall spare no effort to work with all factions and institutions in order to put our Palestinian house in order. Having won the parliamentary elections, our medium-term objective is to reform the PLO in order to revive its role as a true representative of all the Palestinian people, without exception or discrimination.

 

Our message to the Israelis is this: we do not fight you because you belong to a certain faith or culture. Jews have lived in the Muslim world for 13 centuries in peace and harmony; they are in our religion "the people of the book" who have a covenant from God and His Messenger Muhammad (peace be upon him) to be respected and protected. Our conflict with you is not religious but political. We have no problem with Jews who have not attacked us - our problem is with those who came to our land, imposed themselves on us by force, destroyed our society and banished our people.

We shall never recognise the right of any power to rob us of our land and deny us our national rights. We shall never recognise the legitimacy of a Zionist state created on our soil in order to atone for somebody else's sins or solve somebody else's problem. But if you are willing to accept the principle of a long-term truce, we are prepared to negotiate the terms. Hamas is extending a hand of peace to those who are truly interested in a peace based on justice.