The Obama administration has launched a tiny first discussion with Congress over the issue of dealing with Hamas. Administration officials did this, according to this piece in Monday’s LA Times by Paul Richter,by seeking a change in existing legislation that forbids the US from giving aid to any PA government that contains Hamas members.
Richter writes:
- U.S. officials insist that the new proposal doesn’t amount to recognizing or aiding Hamas. Under law, any U.S. aid would require that the Palestinian government meet three long-standing criteria: recognizing Israel, renouncing violence and agreeing to follow past Israeli-Palestinian agreements.
Hamas as an organization doesn’t meet those criteria. However, if the rival Palestinian factions manage to reach a power-sharing deal, the Obama administration wants to be able to provide aid as long as the Hamas-backed members of the government — if not Hamas itself — meet the three criteria.
This tracks, by the way, with other information I have received, that the administration is still sticking exactly to the “three conditions” defined by the US and its allies/satraps in the so-called “Quartet”, immediately after Hamas won the PA elections in 2006.
Richter quotes Nathan Brown, a prof at George Washington University, as describing the administration’s request as “gutsy.” I don’t think it’s gutsy. Gutsy would be to come out and say the US respects the results of the 2006 election and intends to explore all possible ways of working with the duly elected Palestinian government– just as it works with the duly elected government in Israel that contains some extremely rightwing figures and is headed by people who are much more opposed to a two-state solution than is Hamas.
I do think the administration’s move is a tiny and realistic move in the right direction.
Realistic, because without making some move like this the US could pretty rapidly find it has dealt itself out of having any real influence at all in the Palestinian political sphere.
As it is, the portion of US aid that goes into the PA’s budget is already, I think, much smaller than the EU’s aid. (And I see that Chinese foreign minister Yang Jiechi has been in Ramallastan and Israel recently.)
Plus, as I have noted elsewhere, the net effect of all of the US-mobilized aid that’s been poured into Ramallastan in recent years has been to further feed the culture of clientilism and corruption that has become rampant in the Fateh-controlled (Ramallah) wing of the PA, and thus to hasten the internal disintegration of Fateh and its secular allies.
With all that US-mobilized money that has been poured into Ramallah since 2006, Hamas’s popularity in the West Bank has only been rising, and now easily tops that of Fateh!
(Bottom line: It’s not the aid itself that wins influence. Aid when allied to correct policies would have a much better chance of doing so.)
…Anyway, inside Washington, the administration’s move sparked exactly the kind of knee-jerk response you could expect from some heavily AIPAC-influenced members of congress.
Richter reports,
- Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank) said the proposal sounded “completely unworkable,” even if the individual Hamas-backed officials agreed to abide by U.S. conditions.
“You couldn’t have the leadership of a terrorist organization pick the ministers in the government, with the power to appoint and withdraw them, and answering to them,” he said.
What’s notable to me, though, is the absence of any knee-jerk condemnation, up to this point, coming from anyone with any real clout in congress. (Schiff is the congressman from one of the LA Times’ home constituencies, and was quoted for that reason rather than because he has any huge clout in congress.)
Officials in Israel were described in this Haaretz piece as “surprised” by the Obama administration’s move– and also, of course, opposed to it.
The pro-Hamas PIC website somewhat over-interpreted the move.
Regarding the possibility of progress in the long-drawn-out intra-Palestinian reconciliation process, the PIC website has this fairly detailed report, published under the title “Hamas: The fourth dialog round made slight progress and will resume next month.”
It included this:
- [Hamas official] Dr. Ismail Radwan said that the current round of reconciliation talks in Cairo ended with a joint meeting between delegations of Hamas and Fatah in the presence of Egyptian intelligence director Omar Suleiman and it was agreed upon to resume the talks on May 16.
Dr. Radwan underlined that the two parties agreed on the importance of the one package solution either with respect to the referential authority, security, the government or elections.
The Hamas official also pointed out that the two parties agreed on the necessity of the PLC’s work, and the respect of the majority within the council and the mechanism of proxies it approved.
In the same context, Palestinian informed sources told the PIC on Tuesday that during a closed meeting attended by Suleiman, the delegations of Hamas and Fatah agreed on the formation of an interim referential national authority to oversee the rebuilding of the PLO composed of factions, independents and the executive committee.
… In a joint statement issued Tuesday during their meeting, the alliance of Palestinian forces, which are composed of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Al-Sa’ika, the popular front-general command, the popular struggle, the Palestinian liberation front, Fatah-Intifada and the communist party, rejected all calls for the recognition of the Israeli occupation and the international quartet’s terms, or the commitment to the agreements signed with Israel.
Anyway, let’s see what happens between now and May 16.
Obama is timid. Rahm Emanuel is not. Will Emanuel let Obama get away with this? or will he sabotage it from the catbird seat?
recognizing Israel, renouncing violence and agreeing to follow past Israeli-Palestinian agreements.
Hum….then there is no resistance to Israeli occupation, there is no such case for Palestinians!
Why Palestinians should (in full or in fraction) drops there land’s rights, their right to fight to get their demands while Israelis killing them every day and every hour?
Why no one from the congressmen talk about Israelis continues building massive settlements on Palestinian’s occupied land?
Where is your congress member from all of this and others?
Avi Shlaim, a professor of international relations at Oxford University who served in the Israeli army in the mid-1960s. He is the author of numerous books, most notably The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World. His latest book is Lion of Jordan: King Hussein’s Life in War and Peace. Avi Shlaim is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading authorities on the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Did your congressmen know that? But no surprises, as your argument and talk in past post here about Israeli lobby looks your congress not more than Israeli official mouth…
If really there is will to discuss the Palestinians case they should “unconditionally” let each side give their argument and their demands.
It might be not likable for one side or both but at let them got the opportunity to listen to and taken their concerns in account.
I agree that US funds should be kept away from a Hamas gov. I think we all have read the charter of Hamas and should understand that this document is a document of hate.
I think it is time to level the field and keep US funds away from Isreali gov when the actions of the gov meet the same level of hate in actions, like building settlements and responding with undue force.
Let us treat these actions by witholding our dollars!
Not only the Hamas charter is poison but the PA as well. A Palestinian was just sentenced to death for selling land to a Jew. And how the heck can they argue that it is about nationality rather than religion? Netanyahu can rest his case on this basis alone.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1239710821246&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
n the first case of its kind, a Palestinian Authority “military court” on Tuesday sentenced a Palestinian man to death by hanging after finding him guilty of selling land to Jews.
PA President Mahmoud Abbas. [file]
Photo: AP
SLIDESHOW: Israel & Region | World
The verdict came shortly after the PA’s chief Islamic judge, Sheikh Tayseer Tamimi, issued yet another fatwa (religious decree) banning Muslims from selling land or houses to Jews.
The death sentence is seen as an attempt by the PA leadership in Ramallah to deter Palestinians from conducting real estate transactions with Jews. It follows reports according to which Jewish individuals and organizations recently bought land and houses from Arabs in Jerusalem and some areas in the West Bank.
The man sentenced to death is Anwar Brigith, 59, from the village of Bet Umar, north of Hebron.
The three-judge panel found the defendant guilty of violating PA laws that bar Palestinians from selling property to “the enemy.” In its ruling, the court, which convened in Hebron, said that Brigith had acted in violation of a Palestinian “military law” dating back to 1979, which states that it is forbidden for a Palestinian to sell land to Jews.
Were the jews in question citizens of Palestine? Obviously not, since there isn’t even a Palestine. What does israeli law say about selling Israeli land to Palestinians? I’ll be it’ s not allowed. Even Israeli arabs are, it seems, not allowed to marry Palestinian women and bring them back to Israel. The situation is legal poison for both sides. You can’t have two peoples living side by side as neighbors, yet regarding each other as enemies.
What Obama is doing is not only not gutsy, it isn’t realistic, except viewed by the bizarre prism of US politics. Obviously, it will never work to demand that the Palestinians forswear violence while not demanding that Israel do the same. Sooner or later, and better sooner than later, if No Drama Obama is going to live up to the potential his backers claim for him, he is going to have to have a little drama, a little showdown with the pro-Right Wing Israel faction. This is one he can win, IF HE MAKES A CASE. There is a case waiting to be made. If Obama is the answer, then he is the one to make it, a case for fairness.
If not, we need to push him and the rest of the Dems. And maybe we need to make it clear to warmongers like Pelosi and Berman that they may face opposition in 2010, serious opposition, like Joe Lieberman did, only maybe we finish the job this time.
Were the jews in question citizens of Palestine? Obviously not, since there isn’t even a Palestine. What does israeli law say about selling Israeli land to Palestinians? I’ll be it’ s not allowed. Even Israeli arabs are, it seems, not allowed to marry Palestinian women and bring them back to Israel. The situation is legal poison for both sides. You can’t have two peoples living side by side as neighbors, yet regarding each other as enemies.
What Obama is doing is not only not gutsy, it isn’t realistic, except viewed by the bizarre prism of US politics. Obviously, it will never work to demand that the Palestinians forswear violence while not demanding that Israel do the same. Sooner or later, and better sooner than later, if No Drama Obama is going to live up to the potential his backers claim for him, he is going to have to have a little drama, a little showdown with the pro-Right Wing Israel faction. This is one he can win, IF HE MAKES A CASE. There is a case waiting to be made. If Obama is the answer, then he is the one to make it, a case for fairness.
If not, we need to push him and the rest of the Dems. And maybe we need to make it clear to warmongers like Pelosi and Berman that they may face opposition in 2010, serious opposition, like Joe Lieberman did, only maybe we finish the job this time.