And, Mr. Common Sense, when was the first Qassam rocket launched into a civilian area in Israel from Gaza? Was it after Israel had begun to truly strangle off Gaza’s economic development? Because I think it was, in fact, I believe the first Qassam fell shortly after Israel decided to start destroy all of Gaza’s citrus orchards during the Second Intifada (i.e. prior to Hamas taking power). And Israel’s “closure” policies since Israeli’s forces left Gaza, has done little but consolidate Hamas’s power in the area. Because Israel has cut off Gaza from import/exporting any goods at all – the people of Gaza have no choice but to smuggle supplies from the outside world through underground tunnels. And who controls those tunnels? Hamas. Which means, that most people in Gaza have to do business with Hamas if they want to, say, not starve to death or buy stuff from criminals who may rip them off. Which, in turn, means that Hamas gains even more power Gaza and gets to shoot even more rockets at Israel.
If you want to talk about “common sense” and a pragmatic perspective of how to end the growth of militant groups in Gaza bent on attacking Israel – then Israel needs to recognize that Gaza needs alternative poles of power to emerge through economic development in the society. Unfortunately, Israel’s policy over the last several years has simply been to bulldoze, sanction, and blow up any sign of economic development in Gaza and reduce the ability of any moderate (or even alternative) poles of power in the area to emerge other than Hamas’s. In 2000, Israel crippled Gaza’s economy by, effectively, bulldozing its citrus sector to death. In 2005, Israel’s closure policies led to over 90% of the factories in Gaza being shut down. The result has been that Hamas began to gain power. When people lose their jobs, they get angry. When they get angry, they give support to people who reflect that anger – and Hamas has been feeding off that anger to its advantage for years.
In short, if Israel wonders why Hamas took power in Gaza – it only needs to look at its own policies. Now, you could argue that Israel’s policies are only in reaction to militant activities, and are a legitimate attempt to get the Palestinian people to rise up against groups like Hamas who are the “real ones” to blame for their predicament. But can you think of a single example of when restricting economic development in a nation at odds with your own has ever actually worked?
Because, lets see, we (in America) have had sanctions on Cuba forever – which is right next door to us – and Castro’s still in power. We had sanctions on Iraq – and Saddam’s power within the country only became consolidated to the point at which we then had to go invade the entire country. Our sanctions on Iran apparently haven’t worked since it’s still an Islamic theocracy. During the Cold War, China didn’t begin to liberalize its economy and begin to make changes to their regime until Nixon opened up trade with them. In short, carrots always work better than sticks. You use a stick and people get mad and then they go and give immediate support to whoever is in power. We gave it to Bush after 9/11. He invaded our privacy, reduced our rights, and otherwise acted like an imbecile – and he still got re-elected.
In short, you want to get a group of people to stop hating you and shooting at you? Engage in trade with them and make it against their vested interests to shoot at you. Mexico doesn’t fire rockets at us because we’re their best client. That would be stupid. Who else would buy their fine manufactured goods? Or their drugs? Or employ their children? Unfortunately, the radical, nut-job – and I’m going to say it – racist elements within Israel refuse to trade with Palestinians or engage them in any manner other than to shoot at them or, as the ultra-Orthodox settlements in the West Bank like to do, go lynching and burning down Palestinian homes. They don’t want economic development in those areas because they believe that G-d has given them a mandate to take back ALL of the lands written about in the Torah. For them, the Six Day war was a miracle and sign from G-d that they have a religious imperative to eliminate all non-Jews from their biblical lands.
So, perhaps, a more balanced piece on this debate than the one Mr. Winter has written would analyze why Israel continues to allow its own government’s policies to continue to be dominated by a handful of insane religious fanatics instead of more “common sense” approaches.
