For Israel : Hamas is merely a red herring to avoid peace

By Khalid Amayreh in occupied East Jerusalem

[ 03/05/2011 - 10:53 PM ]

Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, have nearly lost their composure over the recently-reached reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas.

Some Israeli officials went as far as warning that Palestinian national unity was an ultimate red line for the racist apartheid entity. Some of the more jingoistic elements within the Netanyahu government, arguably the most hawkish in Israel's history, demanded the immediate "reoccupation" of the West Bank as if the occupied region were free from decades of Israel's colonialist occupation.

Israel's president, Shimon Peres, the "hero" of the Qana massacre in South Lebanon in 1996, said the restoration of Palestinian national unity made the prospects of peace in Palestine more distant. The elderly certified war criminal didn't explain his explicitly mendacious words. However, one doesn't have to be a great authority on the Israeli regime to understand that what Peres really meant was that reconciliation between the two largest political camps on the Palestinian arena would make the Palestinian people more resistant and more immune to Israeli repression and less willing to renounce its inalienable rights usurped by Israel.

In brief, Peres felt that Palestinian reconciliation would strengthen the Palestinian's bargaining position vis-à-vis Israel.

The more irate but equally dishonest Netanyahu called on the international community to reject and denounce the Egyptian-brokered reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas, ignoring the fact that Palestinian national unity is none of the international community's concern.

Ehud Barak, who bears on his dirty, murderous hands tons of spilt innocent blood, warned that Israel wouldn't negotiate with Hamas if the Palestinian Islamic liberation movement didn't stop "terror."

The fornication with words went on and on and on as Zionist leaders threatened to use an "arsenal of reprisals" against the Palestinians to force them to remain divided and disunited in deference to Israel's interests.

In this article, I will try to refute and demolish all Israeli arguments objecting to Palestinian reconciliation, including the possible inclusion of Hamas in a prospective national unity government.

Israel claims that it can't negotiate with Hamas since the latter doesn't recognize the "legitimacy" of Israel.

Well, Hamas whether inside or outside any Palestinian government won't take part in the so-called peace negotiations which are solely the responsibility of the PLO. Hamas is not a member of the PLO. Moreover, Israel has been negotiating with an often pliant PLO for nearly 20 years and the net result has been a gigantic zero as proclaimed by PLO official Ahmed Qrei'.

Hence, one would have to be extremely naïve to buy the Israeli argument that Palestinian reconciliation would significantly impede any genuine resumption of peace negotiations between the Zionist regime and the PLO.

Israel claims that since Hamas indulges in "terror," which is actually none other than a legitimate duty to resist a Nazi-like foreign occupier that is hell-bent on stealing Palestinian land and ethnically cleansing the indigenous Palestinians, Israel can't deal with any Palestinian government comprising, inter alia, Hamas.

This is again a mendacious and dishonest argument. Hamas, it is amply clear, has maintained the Tahdia'a or calm in the Gaza Strip in the face of murderous Israeli provocations and often at the expense of strong active opposition from a number of resistance factions. Hamas is still painstakingly observing calm in the Strip. However, instead of receiving recognition, the Islamic liberation group has been receiving vilification and demonization, in addition, of course, to murderous Israeli provocations.

A third point. Israel which continues to refuse, rather adamantly, to recognize a putative Palestinian state on the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, is demanding that Hamas recognize Israel, even without reciprocity on Israel's part. This is beyond Chutzpah.

The PLO recognized Israel in 1993 as part of the scandalous Oslo accords, even without obtaining a mutual Israeli recognition of a Palestinian state. However, instead of relating to this unconditional recognition of Israel by the PLO as an expression of goodwill, Israel continued to build settlements, demolish Arab homes and steal more and more Palestinian land, rendering the goal of establishing a viable Palestinian state unrealistic and virtually impossible.

In other words, Israel would like to see Hamas make the same blunder which the PLO had committed and cost the Palestinian people dearly.

Furthermore, it is abundantly clear that Israel continues to refuse to define its borders. Hence, one really wonders how under such circumstances any state or quasi-state would be able to recognize an amorphous entity without fixed borders!!

Finally, Israel argues that it would be very difficult to reach peace with a government (a Palestinian government) that includes extremist parties. Well, in making such spurious arguments, Israel actually sees only the supposed speck in Hamas's eyes, but fails to notice the log in her own eyes? After all, the current Israeli governments is, par excellence, a government of extremists, fascists and terrorists, to say the very least. It is not only the most hawkish government in the Zionist state's history; it is also a government of settlers, by the settlers, for the settlers.

This pornographic hypocrisy on the part of the Israeli government must not be allowed to go unnoticed by the international community, especially by those honest and conscientious elements in western governments.

In light, the world should dismiss Israeli ranting about Palestinian reconciliation for what that ranting really is, namely a ludicrous and cynical attempt to invoke the mantra of Hamas in order to avoid and evade real peace in Palestine, a peace that would consign to history Israeli apartheid, fascism and Nazism.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Israel withholds PA tax revenues after Palestinian reconciliation

[ 01/05/2011 - 11:47 AM ]

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- Israel has decided to freeze tax revenues to the Palestinian Authority in response to the reconciliation signed by ruling parties in Palestine.

Israel sees the unity agreement as a threat to the future of its relations with the PA as it has classified Hamas as a terrorist organization, the Israeli daily Ynet said on Sunday.

The occupation country fears that elections could put resistance forces in power.

Practical steps have already been taken to implement the decision to discontinue customs revenues, which constitute 37 percent of the PA's budget.

The talks involve monies collected by Israel through a customs duty imposed on Palestinian goods imported by land, air and sea, according to the Oslo Accords.

Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steints has insructed his staff not to attend a meeting scheduled Sunday with the PA's tax official to decide to transfer NIS 300m (around USD 89m) to the PA.

The position comes as Israeli professor Saul Meshal has predicted that if elections were to be held today they would result in a landslide victory for Hamas.

The expert said that the wave of Arab revolutions paired with the decline of Fatah and Mahmoud Abbas are working in favor of Hamas that currently runs the Gaza Strip.

He said one of the main reasons why Hamas maintains respect in the Gaza Strip is that the funds it receives are not distributed among its leaders but are shared with the needy through salaries, grants, and aid.

He also factored in that security agencies in the West Bank have proven notorious for waging war against freedoms and stopping peaceful protests as well as arresting hundreds of Hamas's men creating a situation of malice and insecurity.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian