by Brendan James
Maysoon Zayid eviscerates Hamas and stresses that their policies of religious persecution and gender-segregation are not what Palestinians are fighting for:
I’m sick to death of hearing that ignorant mantra, “Hamas was democratically elected.” The operative word is “was.” Their term has been up for four years. They are no longer democratically elected; they are warlords, and the Palestinian Authority has gifted them free rein. … Hamas claims to be fighting for freedom while invoking laws that oppress women and religious minorities. As Palestinians, we are striving for equality, not more oppression.
In 2006, I hung out with The Carter Center as they monitored the Palestinian elections. Nobody thought Hamas would win. Hamas did not think Hamas could win. The lion’s share of folks I spoke to who were voting for them were not actually voting for Hamas but against Fatah. They had gotten sick of the blatant corruption and inaction of the Palestinian Authority. They wanted to teach them a lesson. While Fatah was accused of stealing from the people, Hamas provided impeccable social services to the downtrodden. The idea was to put the fear of God in Fatah so they would straighten up, but instead Hamas won—and so did Israel.
Zayid conveys a larger point often lost in the coverage of this conflict: Hamas is not popular in Palestine. They are has-beens and opportunists. Occasionally they receive a boost in support when Israel strikes or the party leadership scores a release of prisoners, but generally they’re a huge disappointment. (A recent poll of both the West Bank and Gaza shows Hamas with support around 12% with Fatah, hardly beloved, around 36%.) If a national government came together and ushered in fresh elections, Hamas could lose serious clout.
On the other hand, Hussein Ibish warns that recently reconfirmed Hamas leader Khaled Mashal may use any reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah as cover to maneuver his way to the head of the PLO:
[I]t’s important not to underestimate the harm this could cause to the Palestinian national movement. Hamas’ policies are strictly inconsistent with those of the PLO, and contradict its treaty obligations. If Hamas joined the PLO with its current policies unchanged, let alone usurped it, the international standing of the PLO – one of the most important achievements of the Palestinian national movement, the value of which no one really questions – would be placed in dire jeopardy.
Palestinians want and need national unity. But the terms are crucial. If such unity in effect means abandoning the positions that underscore the PLO’s standing at the United Nations and other multilateral institutions, and diplomatic relations with well over 100 countries, the price will be exorbitant and disproportionate.
Time I spent kicking around the West Bank originally convinced me that the US and Israel are simply not doing enough to incentivize the formation of a unity government, whose elections would spit Hamas out of the PA soon after it brought them in. After all, the first incarnation of the Arab Spring that cropped up in Palestine was a wave of protests calling for ‘unity’ between Ramallah and Gaza City (which Hamas chose to handle with billy clubs). What if Palestinians got their national unity? The US could bite the bullet, encourage the merger, let Hamas in, watch them shrink into a minority party, and let Fatah lead and handle future negotiations.
But now, considering Mashal’s scheming and some good counterarguments by Michael Koplow in the aftermath of the latest Gaza mini-war, it’s not so obvious it would be that easy to dethrone Hamas. They have a lot of guns, for one thing. And maybe that’s the only thing that really matters.
(Photo: A Hamas militant takes part in the funeral procession. By Mahmud Hams/AFP/Getty Images)
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