Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Hamas' stand - Los Angeles Times

The right to exist: I kill, therefore I am
David Seaton's News Links
This article makes an interesting read. By taking control of Gaza, Hamas has gained an international audience for its message. Alexander Haig of unhappy memory had this to say in The Wall Street Journal, "Let us not delude ourselves. The recent Hamas conquest of Gaza is a signal defeat for the United States that goes well beyond the particulars of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We have sought to deny the Islamic terrorists a territorial base in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia and elsewhere. Now they have won one on the Mediterranean."

And Haig neglected the worst part about Hamas... They are strictly Palestinian nationalists and have nothing to do with Al Qaeda and its agenda, an "inconvenient truth" that degrades the neocon, "Islamofascism" narrative. Hamas are converting Gaza into a laboratory for their future role in a Palestinian state and a loudspeaker for their agenda, which, as this article from the Los Angeles Times proves, strikes many sympathetic notes to western ears. DS


Hamas' stand - Los Angeles Times
Abstract: The writings of Israel's "founders" — from Herzl to Jabotinsky to Ben Gurion — make repeated calls for the destruction of Palestine's non-Jewish inhabitants: "We must expel the Arabs and take their places." A number of political parties today control blocs in the Israeli Knesset, while advocating for the expulsion of Arab citizens from Israel and the rest of Palestine, envisioning a single Jewish state from the Jordan to the sea. Yet I hear no clamor in the international community for Israel to repudiate these words as a necessary precondition for any discourse whatsoever. The double standard, as always, is in effect for Palestinians. I, for one, do not trouble myself over "recognizing" Israel's right to exist — this is not, after all, an epistemological problem; Israel does exist, as any Rafah boy in a hospital bed, with IDF shrapnel in his torso, can tell you. This dance of mutual rejection is a mere distraction when so many are dying or have lived as prisoners for two generations in refugee camps. As I write these words, Israeli forays into Gaza have killed another 15 people, including a child. Who but a Jacobin dares to discuss the "rights" of nations in the face of such relentless state violence against an occupied population? I look forward to the day when Israel can say to me, and millions of other Palestinians: "Here, here is your family's house by the sea, here are your lemon trees, the olive grove your father tended: Come home and be whole again." Then we can speak of a future together. READ IT ALL

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