Good Morning, Hamas

Interview with Uri Avnery

(Poster's note: This man speaks sense).


(snip)

- Can one reasonably expect the Palestinians to overthrow Hamas themselves?

As long as the occupation goes on, there is no chance of that. An Israeli general said this week that if the Israeli army stopped operating in the West Bank, Hamas would replace Abbas there too.

The administration of Mahmoud Abbas stands on feet of clay - American and Israeli feet. If the Palestinians finally lose what confidence they still have in Abbas, his power would crumble.

- But how can one reach a settlement with an organization that declares that it will never recognize Israel and whose charter calls for the destruction of the Jewish state?

All this matter of “recognition” is nonsense, a pretext for avoiding a dialogue. We do not need “recognition” from anybody. When the United States started a dialogue with Vietnam, it did not demand to be recognized as an Anglo-Saxon, Christian and capitalist state.

If A signs an agreement with B, it means that A recognizes B. All the rest is hogwash.

And in the same matter: The fuss over the Hamas charter is reminiscent of the ruckus about the PLO charter, in its time. That was a quite unimportant document, which was used by our representatives for years as an excuse to refuse to talk with the PLO. Heaven and earth were moved to compel the PLO to annul it. Who remembers that today? The acts of today and tomorrow are important, the papers of yesterday are not.

- What should we speak with Hamas about?

First of all, about a cease-fire. When a wound is bleeding, the blood loss must be stemmed before the wound itself can be treated.

Hamas has many times proposed a cease-fire, Tahidiyeh (”Quiet”) in Arabic. This would mean a stop to all hostilities: Qassams and Grad rockets and mortar shells from Hamas and the other organizations, “targeted liquidations”, military incursions and starvation from Israel.

The negotiations should be conducted by the Egyptians, particularly since they would have to open the border between the Gaza Strip and Sinai. Gaza must get back its freedom of communication with the world by land, sea and air,

If Hamas demands the extension of the cease-fire to the West Bank, too, this should also be discussed. That would necessitate a Hamas-Fatah-Israel trialogue.

- Won’t Hamas exploit the cease-fire to arm itself?

Certainly. And so will Israel. Perhaps we shall succeed, at long last, in finding a defense against short-range rockets.

- If the cease-fire holds, what will be the next step?

An armistice, or Hudnah in Arabic.

Hamas would have a problem in signing a formal agreement with Israel, because Palestine is a Waqf - a religious endowment. (That arose, at the time, for political reasons. When Caliph Omar conquered Palestine, he was afraid that his generals would divide the country among themselves, as they had already done in Syria. So he declared it to be the property of Allah. This resembles the attitude of our own religious people, who maintain that it is a sin to give away any part of the country, because God has expressly promised it to us.)

Hudnah is an alternative to peace. It is a concept deeply embedded in the Islamic tradition. The prophet Muhammad himself agreed a Hudnah with the rulers of Mecca, with whom he was at war after his flight from Mecca to Medina. (By the way, before the Hudnah expired, the inhabitants of Mecca adopted Islam and the prophet entered the town peacefully.) Since it has a religious sanction, its violation by Muslim believers is impossible.

A Hudnah can last for dozens of years and be extended without limit. A long Hudnah is in practice peace, if the relations between the two parties create a reality of peace.

- So a formal peace is impossible?

There is a solution for this, too. Hamas has declared in the past that it does not object to Abbas conducting peace negotiations, on condition that the agreement reached is put to a plebiscite. If the Palestinian people confirm it, Hamas declared that it will accept the people’s decision.

- Why would Hamas accept it?

Like every Palestinian political force, Hamas aspires to power in the Palestinian state that will be set up along the 1967 borders. For that it needs to enjoy the confidence of the majority. There is no doubt whatsoever that the vast majority of the Palestinian people want a state of their own and peace. Hamas knows this well. It will do nothing that would push the majority of the people away.

- And what is the place of Abbas in all this?

He should be pressured to come to an agreement with Hamas, along the lines of the earlier agreement concluded in Mecca. We believe that Israel has a clear interest in negotiating with a Palestinian government that includes the two big movements, so that the agreement reached would be accepted by almost all sections of the Palestinian people.

- Is time working for us?

For many years, Gush Shalom was telling the Israeli public: let’s make peace with the secular leadership of Yasser Arafat, because otherwise the national conflict will turn into a religious conflict. Unfortunately, this prophecy, too, has come true.

Those who did not want the PLO, got Hamas. If we don’t come to terms with Hamas, we shall be faced with more extreme Islamic organizations, like the Taliban in Afghanistan.

http://tonykaron.com/2008/03/02/israel-in-deadly-denial/

they become a pariah state. Nothing new and this ain't between Hamas and Israel any more. Egypt wiped her hands of them and so should we.

and don't forgive those who made it necessary. Every time I see a refugee camp on the evening news (I prefer European reports) I cringe, knowing that generations grow up in those slums to secure UN payments and the right of return. Nothing could be more cruel to the civilian population, but Hamas operates from that territory and Hamas is not enforcing what we would consider civilized behavior. Bomb factories do not belong in crowded apartment buildings, but those are the conditions.

We saw what one person making ricin in a hotel room does ... imagine if the police here turned a blind eye. Would we tolerate such nonsense?

Sorry, but if conditions are to improve for anyone, we're going to have to stop this romantic liberation crap. Franz Fanon didn't liberate Algeria and Arafat didn't leave his people their own state.

Our hands are clean. Deal with their problems, please.

Interesting choice of words. Probably best I am not Christian.

n/t

and actually I don't EVER expect governments' hands to be clean; but I do sometimes expect them to have more sense. What is happening is just an escalation of violence, which benefits no one in the end.

Hamas are a bunch of murdering RW nuts, who don't seem to care much about their own people, let alone anyone else's. The current Israeli government are weak and incompetent, and I can understand the need for defense against rockets, but I think the violence here will *not* be a defense in the long term, but will just breed more violence.

In any case, I fear that unless people are elected on both sides who really want peace AND are in a strong enough position internally to push for it, there will just be more violence and deaths.

I hope the international community will put more pressure on both sides to end the violence and get involved in serious negotiations.

for not enforcing civilized behavior, and putting "resistance" above the welfare of their citizens.

the frequent charge that Israel the only country ever is being asked to take rockets and do nothing, it is the reverse that is true-Palestinians are not asked but expected to be grateful when Israel takes their land(hey at least we left a small town) or ends an incursion after killing hundreds (it could have been thousands) and do nothing, even non violent rallies on Palestinian territory are threatened (no can't have that non-violent stuff catching on)

What Mr Avnery says is sense, it is just the "leaders" will not listen

What's the historical record on land expropriation/confiscation?

For example, in another part of the world, I hear that Chavez is threatening to expropriate farms in Venezuela owned by citizens of Venezuela. Perhaps Chavez needs that land to give Venezuela borders that it can defend against the various countries that have borders with Venezuela and that have done things that are considered to be acts of war?

No, that doesn't make sense. The land is already part of Venezuela. To defend Venezuela, Chavez could temporarily station troops on the land. He doesn't need to expropriate the land from the legal owners.

is legally part of Israel?

confiscation/expropriation so that I will understand the general topic and learn about some important examples that might shed light on the general topic of land confiscation/expropriation.

it depends on the situation, in Venezuela it sounds almost like an "emanate domain" issue, well except that it's Chavez so it will not be called that. In Israel/Palestine it is more complicated because it was land occupied during a war and was not now or ever part of Israel.

that of sovereignty. Venezuela has a right to basically do whatever it wants within its own borders and it doesn't concern the global community... if Chavez wants to take land from peasants, well, he's the government. It isn't a question of foreign relations.

In I/P, the land in question doesn't only not belong to Israel, it doesn't belong to anyone, nation-wise. It never has, it has merely been occupied by various states. The thing is that both Jews and Palestinians have a rightful claim to areas of the land in question, while it is under Israeli occupation (most of it anyway) that doesn't make it all inherently "Palestinian land" by right. Nor Israeli.

The thing with occupation here that often gets confused is a matter of semantics. While rare, this is an example of land that is both occupied and disputed and de facto unclaimed by any state with standing. The sole answer is for negotiations between the two parties who claim rights to the land and work out a feasible arrangement. Most of the areas occupied by settlements are on land that should obviously be part of the Palestinians state. Some though, like areas of east Jerusalem or even Hebron, are far more complex regarding "rightful claim" and don't lend themselves to easy or clearly just solutions.

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