A Question For Hamas
A simple one, really; I think a fair one, as well, and a particularly relevent one as various groups are asking Israel and the West to give Hamas a chance to govern:
Do you still abide by your charter?
The 9,000-word Hamas charter, written in 1988, is explicit about the struggle for Palestine as a religious obligation. It describes the land as a “waqf,” or endowment, saying that Hamas “believes that the land of Palestine has been an Islamic waqf throughout the generations and until the Day of Resurrection, no one can renounce it or part of it, or abandon it or part of it.”
In the charter, Hamas describes itself as “a distinct Palestinian Movement which owes its loyalty to Allah, derives from Islam its way of life and strives to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine.”
It calls for the elimination of Israel and Jews from Islamic holy land and portrays the Jews as evil, citing an anti-Semitic version of history going back to the Crusades. It also includes a reference to the noted czarist forgery of a plan for world domination, “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” and condemnation of supposedly Zionist organizations like the Rotary Club and the Masons.
It describes the struggle against the Jews as a religious obligation for every Muslim, saying, “For our struggle against the Jews is extremely wide-ranging and grave, so much so that it will need all the loyal efforts we can wield, to be followed by further steps and reinforced by successive battalions from the multifarious Arab and Islamic world, until the enemies are defeated and Allah’s victory prevails.”
Oh, that’s just old words on apiece of paper you might say; it doesn’t mean any more than the Republican or Democratic Party Platforms…well, it doesn’t appear that way:
The Hamas election platform concentrated on justifying its decision to run because of the collapse of the Oslo accords, on purifying Palestinian political life and on the need — the first goal mentioned — for “protecting the path of resistance and using the legislative council’s platform to protect it.”
The platform repeated Hamas’s vow to liberate Jerusalem and to fight for the right of all refugees to return to their now-Israeli homes.
“The issue of Palestine,” the platform said, “is the holiest and more important and most dangerous both in the Arabic and Islamic worlds. No power or no person can lead this conflict with the enemy,” it said, except Hamas.
Despite the platform’s relative moderation, a Hamas spokesman, Sami Abu Zuhri, vehemently denied any contradictions with the charter. “The platform refers to details and implementation methods for the next four years, while the charter lays out our permanent strategic views,” he said.
No, this is not a party platform, but a ‘founding document’ like our Declaration of Independence.
Further proof that moderation is not in the cards:
Salah al-Bardawil, a Hamas candidate, said that “had we spoken of eliminating and eradicating Israel within this period, we would have been deceiving our people and repeating false slogans.” Still, he said, Hamas emphasizes “the elimination and nonrecognition of Israel.”
And this:
…[N]o Hamas leader or candidate is on record as sanctioning a permanent recognition of Israel’s right to exist side by side with an independent Palestinian state, which has been the cornerstone assumption of peace negotiations since the Oslo accords in 1993.
As Mr. Zahar also said, “We do not recognize the Israeli enemy, nor his right to be our neighbor, nor to stay, nor his ownership of any inch of land.”
Nor is any Hamas leader on record as expressing a willingness to disarm or to stop attacks on Israel and Israelis, or to make a distinction between Israeli soldiers and civilians, especially settlers living on occupied land, however defined.
And finally, this:
…[T]he [exiled Hamas]leader, Khaled Meshal, also said Hamas would not “submit to pressure to recognize Israel, because the occupation is illegitimate and we will not abandon our rights”…
So, before we deal with Hamas, I repeat, a simple question:
Do you still abide by your charter?
If the answer is yes, then there is less than nothing to say…
Of course they still abide by their charter, since they said nothing has changed and the elimination of Israel is still their priority.
I wonder how the apologists will spin this one? Oh, that’s right – they won’t. They’ll just launch the cliche ad hominem attacks to divert attention away from the truth.
Of course, exactly the same thing could have been (and was) said of the P.L.O.
Of course, negotiating with the P.L.O. got Israel the Intifada.
Of course, that just resulted in the building of the wall, which dramatically reduced the threat of Palestinian suicide bombers.
Of course…
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I would respond the way I had, by pointing to the thin hope, based the comments of certain members of the Hamas leadership, that they might in fact consider changing their charter, or at least changing their mission to work more towards a reinstatement of the 1967 boundaries and a long-standing truce. (For more on the ad hominem charge, Mussolini, see the older thread).
I would also point out that the use of apologist as an epithet and declaring the reasoning of your opponent to be “cliche” both represent ad hominems.
An interesting point: Hamas is counting on the US to continue aid, saying we can’t very well turn our back on a democratic result…it’s definitely their strongest card at the moment…
It’s a strong bargaining point for the U.S., as well. We can definitely insist that they govern; I think that the renewal of aid should be contingent upon their response to the responsibility of government (especially since members of their leadership have hinted at dealing with Israel through third parties). We should focus on whether or not they are being just within their country and maintaining the cease-fire that they’ve maintained for the past year, I think.
I was reading a Post article that pointed out something I hadn’t realized: because Israel is the occupying country, according to international law they are required to provide for the Palestinians. This is another reason they’ve had a vested interest in the success of the Palestinian Authority; if the PA fails to take care of their people, then Israel will be required to do it. It’s an interesting situation (and does a lot to explain Sharon’s take on unilateralism). I think the fact that the interim prime minister recognizes that the creation of a Palestinian state will necessitate a partial pullout from the West Bank makes it more interesting. The strategy is clearly to give the Palestinians enough to make their country their own responsibility, then use the pressure of the electorate to forcibly moderate the government: the “pothole” theory. There’s an interesting article on Slate about the precedents of this approach right now.
The logical counter-argument would be that in Iran, the maintenance of the state didn’t do a lot to moderate that Islamist movement, but I think that Iran is more a testament to how dangerous it is to deny the vote for such a long period of time; I think that putting in the “safe” government of the Shah did a lot more to promote extremism than letting the people vote would have.