Hamas on Rye
This is it. This is historic.
Hamas has perhaps won an outright majority in the Palestinian elections--if so it could rule alone.
This outcome is the direct consequence of neoconservatism and the Bush presidency. Bush is a direct link to Hamas, a group it labels as terrorist in charge of the Palestinian territories. Right next to Israel our biggest ally in the Near East. Wow. The Bushies of course are going to be apes*&! over it, but it flows from the president's inaugural address. The Arab world is in the midst of a profound demographic shift with a huge percentage of the populace under 30. This is very much the case in Palestine. This generation of Arabs (and Iranians too for that matter) have been brought up with a deeply religious worldview.
Mahmoud Abbas is the last incarnation of the old secularist, pan-Arab nationalists of the 50s,60s, and 70s. He is presiding over the death of this movement. Arafat is gone, Hussein dethroned for Shi'ite clerics. Only Bashar Assad hangs on by the slimest of threads.
When Bush declared that US foreign policy would be predicated on building democracy worldwide, particularly in the Near East, this is what is going to happen. Democratically, one person=one vote, open elections means that the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq dominates there and Hamas wins in Palestine. If Egypt had truly democratic elections, the Muslim Brotherhood would prevail. In Pakistan, God only knows. Saudi Arabia, the list goes on and on.
The reason the US is so dismayed and confused by the reults of its efforts is that only Muslim groups, often with very conservative social-gender-religious views, has any connection to the people on the streets. There is no goverment assistance-social welfare in the Middle East. Only Muslim charity groups, groups like Hezbollah in Southern Lebanon, reach out to the poor through healthcare, education, monetary asssitance. These social welfare vehicles are part and parcel of the Muslim teaching of justice. They also of course are a wonderful way to reach the young and indoctrinate them into their ethnocentric, mythic worldview.
As I've said repeatedly on this blog, the major downside of the necon-Bush project is that it confuses democracy with rule of law. They believed Chalabi and Allawi would do well in Iraq (oops), assumed Fatah would continue its hold in the Territories--wrong again it appears.
What it will hopefully do, to the surprise of the conservatives, is integrate these groups into politics and slowly but surely force them to promote the rule of law.
Hopefully Hamas will be brought into the political sphere. This is the only positive outcome that can occur. Hamas for the future of its people must have the courage to integrate its militias into a legitimate police-defense appartus of the Palestinian territories and--the biggest of all--renounce its claim to perpetual revolution against Israel. It must finally recognize Israel as a state.
Fatah and Arafat never had the support to do such a thing. If Hamas did, it would be the ultimate Nixon goes to China.
The linkage between Islam and democracy (and hopefully, rule of law) is the only great movement left now. The autocracies of a Mubarak or the Saudi Royal Family have failed. The nationalism of Arafat and Hussein destroyed human beings across the board.
If Hamas does not grow up and grow up fast, then Israel may re-elect the far-right (Netanyahu). Kadima, the centrist party of Sharon, was the only hope for Israel. The construction of the security wall and the detachment from Palestine, and the eventual, God willing, withdraw from large sections of the West Bank, is their only hope. None of this liberal nonsense about peace and reconciliation will do. Until the Palestinian authorities officially recognize the state of Israel and let go of the notion of the right of return for the refugees (and what an "UNTIL" that is), there will be no peace. Until Israel withdraws and forces the Palestinians to govern themselves and criticize their own officials, then Israel will always be the scapegoat. Until that happens, there will be no peace.
It will be fascinating to watch Hamas. For it fails, who will be left? What movement would arise to carry the hopes and dreams of the Palestinian people? Will they despair and absent from the ballot box? Will there be civil war within the Palestinian territories?
There is hope now. But so much has to fall into place on both sides, with so many hoping to see it disintegrate. And without Sharon--this is the turning point. Israeli politics can not be the same without Sharon and Palestinian life has changed forever. What emerges within the next few months will decide whether a new opening for peace emerges or sadly, the darkest hour yet in this crisis.
God help us.
Hamas has perhaps won an outright majority in the Palestinian elections--if so it could rule alone.
This outcome is the direct consequence of neoconservatism and the Bush presidency. Bush is a direct link to Hamas, a group it labels as terrorist in charge of the Palestinian territories. Right next to Israel our biggest ally in the Near East. Wow. The Bushies of course are going to be apes*&! over it, but it flows from the president's inaugural address. The Arab world is in the midst of a profound demographic shift with a huge percentage of the populace under 30. This is very much the case in Palestine. This generation of Arabs (and Iranians too for that matter) have been brought up with a deeply religious worldview.
Mahmoud Abbas is the last incarnation of the old secularist, pan-Arab nationalists of the 50s,60s, and 70s. He is presiding over the death of this movement. Arafat is gone, Hussein dethroned for Shi'ite clerics. Only Bashar Assad hangs on by the slimest of threads.
When Bush declared that US foreign policy would be predicated on building democracy worldwide, particularly in the Near East, this is what is going to happen. Democratically, one person=one vote, open elections means that the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq dominates there and Hamas wins in Palestine. If Egypt had truly democratic elections, the Muslim Brotherhood would prevail. In Pakistan, God only knows. Saudi Arabia, the list goes on and on.
The reason the US is so dismayed and confused by the reults of its efforts is that only Muslim groups, often with very conservative social-gender-religious views, has any connection to the people on the streets. There is no goverment assistance-social welfare in the Middle East. Only Muslim charity groups, groups like Hezbollah in Southern Lebanon, reach out to the poor through healthcare, education, monetary asssitance. These social welfare vehicles are part and parcel of the Muslim teaching of justice. They also of course are a wonderful way to reach the young and indoctrinate them into their ethnocentric, mythic worldview.
As I've said repeatedly on this blog, the major downside of the necon-Bush project is that it confuses democracy with rule of law. They believed Chalabi and Allawi would do well in Iraq (oops), assumed Fatah would continue its hold in the Territories--wrong again it appears.
What it will hopefully do, to the surprise of the conservatives, is integrate these groups into politics and slowly but surely force them to promote the rule of law.
Hopefully Hamas will be brought into the political sphere. This is the only positive outcome that can occur. Hamas for the future of its people must have the courage to integrate its militias into a legitimate police-defense appartus of the Palestinian territories and--the biggest of all--renounce its claim to perpetual revolution against Israel. It must finally recognize Israel as a state.
Fatah and Arafat never had the support to do such a thing. If Hamas did, it would be the ultimate Nixon goes to China.
The linkage between Islam and democracy (and hopefully, rule of law) is the only great movement left now. The autocracies of a Mubarak or the Saudi Royal Family have failed. The nationalism of Arafat and Hussein destroyed human beings across the board.
If Hamas does not grow up and grow up fast, then Israel may re-elect the far-right (Netanyahu). Kadima, the centrist party of Sharon, was the only hope for Israel. The construction of the security wall and the detachment from Palestine, and the eventual, God willing, withdraw from large sections of the West Bank, is their only hope. None of this liberal nonsense about peace and reconciliation will do. Until the Palestinian authorities officially recognize the state of Israel and let go of the notion of the right of return for the refugees (and what an "UNTIL" that is), there will be no peace. Until Israel withdraws and forces the Palestinians to govern themselves and criticize their own officials, then Israel will always be the scapegoat. Until that happens, there will be no peace.
It will be fascinating to watch Hamas. For it fails, who will be left? What movement would arise to carry the hopes and dreams of the Palestinian people? Will they despair and absent from the ballot box? Will there be civil war within the Palestinian territories?
There is hope now. But so much has to fall into place on both sides, with so many hoping to see it disintegrate. And without Sharon--this is the turning point. Israeli politics can not be the same without Sharon and Palestinian life has changed forever. What emerges within the next few months will decide whether a new opening for peace emerges or sadly, the darkest hour yet in this crisis.
God help us.
As Daniel Patrick Moinyhan said, the enduring conservative truth is that culture matters most. The enduring liberal truth is that government can re-shape culture.
It is strange in a way that the conservatives do not comprehend that it is culture that decides the voting in the Middle East. That groups that promote (for their own, if no one else) freedom and healing would also be so religiously righteous, so fixed in their beliefs, so premodern in their outlook. Given that the base of the Republican party is made up of so many who share such similar beliefs.
But then each conservative group believes itself unique, and is too busy proclaiming and advancing its unique agenda that it has no time to realize how common the claim to uniqueness really is.
posted by CJ Smith @ 6:28 AM
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