Hamas-Fatah Unity vs. U.S. Policy
But, while it might always be possible to brush off some inconvenient, unpleasant words, that policy met an even greater challenge on Wednesday as Fatah and Hamas signed (reports here and here) a deal in Cairo that is supposed to meld them into a joint Palestinian government. Fatah was represented by Abbas; Hamas by Damascus-based terror kingpin Khaled Mashaal, whom Israel tried to assassinate in Amman, Jordan in 1997.
Abbas said, “We announce to Palestinians that we turn forever the black page of division…the state of Palestine must be born this year” — referring to the planned attempt to get a Palestinian state recognized by the UN in September. If the unity deal holds up, it will be possible to claim that “Palestine” is now a coherent entity instead of two separate ones in the West Bank and Gaza.
Abbas added, “Hamas are our brothers, our family. We may differ a lot, but we agree a lot….Hamas is part of us.” Mashaal, for his part, said, “Our common enemy is Israel. Israel must be fought through force and diplomacy.”
So it’s official, even for those who doggedly believe in a moderate Fatah: the Palestinian government is now a terrorist government. Hamas is formally defined as a terrorist organization by both the United States and the European Union. These bodies offer Hamas conditions — something they would never do regarding al-Qaeda — to make itself respectable and join the “peace process”: renounce terrorism, recognize Israel, and accept previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements. There is no chance that Hamas will comply with any of these.
Already on Wednesday Mahmoud Zahar, sometimes referred to as Hamas’s “foreign minister,” reiterated that his organization would never recognize Israel nor give up the “right to Palestine, while recognizing the rule of Poles and Ethiopians” there (referring to two of the many Israeli Jewish ethnicities).
As for renouncing terrorism, it is possible that Hamas will try to hold its guns till September. Yet the new, post-Mubarak Egypt, the host and probably the driving force behind the Fatah-Hamas deal, is already rewarding Hamas by opening Egypt’s border with Gaza — seen universally in Israel as a grim development that will enable an increased influx of Iranian weapons to the Strip.
With many Palestinian-affairs experts rating this deal’s chances to endure as low, it may be understandable for the U.S. to hedge for a while and repeat the mantra about Hamas and the three conditions. But not for long. As Dick Morris asks starkly:
Will the United States continue to give the PA $600 million a year in foreign aid?… Will we aid an overtly terrorist state committed to the destruction of Israel?
It doesn’t make much sense to fight terror in Pakistan and bolster it elsewhere.
It’s really ironic how Al Qaeda is perceived as pure evil while Hamas is given all kinds of indulgence and open doors. Both organizations stem from the Muslim Brotherhood and both are totalitarian and fanatic to the same degree. Hamas currently wields political power so it has to make some deals and compromises with Fatah. Totally typical of totalitarian movements once they’re in power but haven’t yet attained total power over an entity.
When assessing a threat it is important to balance the intent of that threat versus the ability to carry it out.
Alongside this line of thought, it is also important to look solely at intent and reason out what would happen were it to be fully enabled.
In the case of Fatah-Hamas, we are definitely looking at Adolph Hitler without an army. The amount of hatred and disdain Islam’s radicals from the Muslim Brotherhood to Shia Iran, to salafis to Wahhabis have for America is monumental.
Why in the world we don’t look at these people as occupying the exact same philosophical space as the Nazi Party is something I don’t understand. Moderates like Rep. Keith Ellison from Minnesota are simply the dumb enablers of a hate group.
Islam and all its adherents should be banned from the United States as a subversive hate group, a fifth column within our midst. They announce their intentions to the world for all to hear and we sit like the dumb, deaf and blind monkeys.
Wave bye-bye America.
James May:
As always, your comments and analysis of the subjects at hand is amazing. I enjoy reading your comments, at times much better than the article you are commenting on (no offense please…). Please keep it up.
There are muslims within the U.S. who will use our Constitution only to whatever extent they can destroy it. The reality of such a thing is problematic but the ever increasing numbers of muslims from our nearly mindless immigration policy will only make life in the U.S. more heavily exposed to their crazy doctrines and hatreds and embroil us ever more in stupid feuds I want nothing to do with.
you want nothing to do with their stupid feuds? their feud is with you mr may
Please don’t associate me with our moronic immigration policies.
What is so disheartening is that 10 years after 9/11 it is still the same crazy anti-Western rhetoric that I believe led to 9/11 in the first place.
They whip each other into a frenzy with their madness and urban myths. Despite the “moderate” muslims in the U.S. who applauded the death of Bin Laden, there is not a single doubt in my mind that those same muslims emotionally side with the utterly moronic comments that come out of the middle east about America and Israel.
I cannot imagine why any thinking person would practice that religion and were it in my power I would ban it in the U.S. so strongly do I feel that it is nothing more than Nazism parading around as a culture hurt by Imperialism and colonialism. They are just plain nuts and they are wrecking an America that used to be a lot more peaceful in certain areas. I do not want this BS here and CAIR should be banned as a hate group. Let them all reside in their holy and fantastic land they will not shut up about for one single second.
true, and they want to kill us all, you, me, everybody, so we’re embroiled in their feud, like it or not.
And we still want to give Fatah foreign aid? We must do these stupid things for either one of two reasons: 1) We have people in the State Department who just hate Israel and want to support terrorists, or (2) We’re just plain stupid. Fatah always promised that they would be part of the “peace process” in exchange for big foreign aid, but they never delivered on anything. As long as they “talked” peace, they got the aid. Now they’re not even bothering to talk peace anymore. Don’t give them a dime. It was always wasted money, especially when Yassir Arafat was running Fatah. So let’s stop being fools for once and treat Fatah just like Hamas, a terrorist organization. It’s what Fatah always was and will be.
“Will the United States continue to give the PA $600 million a year in foreign aid . . .”
No, of course not. In light of the new Hamas-Fatah unity, Obama will triple that sum.
One of the strangest beliefs in Palestinian society, and one that is most harmful to their own self interest, is the idea that they can somehow turn back the hands of time itself. There seems to be the persistant idea that historical events can be treated as if they never happened.
In 1947 they sought to return to the 1800′s. Then they want to return to 1949, to 1967, to before Olso, before the second intifada… Rather than learn from mistakes and seeing what could be better this time they just insist that there is a reset button somewhere in Israel which can be pushed by whining enough.
Now they think they can return to the days before their election disaster and subsequent split.
By contrast Israeli culture is distinctively forward looking and self critical. Every event is taken apart and debated. ‘This is what happened and this is how we can do it better in the future.’
New ideas are constantly rising to the top. Leadership is informal. There is little hero worship. In operations and planning there is little deference to authority. A junior officer could walk right up to a general and say “look Yossi, you are doing it wrong. This will never work” without any thought of insubordination.
Palestinians are in a perpetual state of self denial and self delusion. No amount of aid, concession, or negotiation is going to fix that.
they’re not in perpetual denial and delusion. They like to kill, and they do.
arabs were shadow collaborators with the nazis during ww2 yet they were never dealt with as the axis was. this was and is the problem, they escaped “correction”.