Soccer Dad

The palestinians have spoken

Arlene Kushner starts her analysis of the Hamas victory like this:

The principles of its constitution include the following:

The Israeli existence in Palestine is a Zionist invasion.

The Zionist Movement is racial, colonial, and aggressive in ideology, goals, organization, and method.

Liberating Palestine is a national obligation…

Liberating Palestine and protecting its holy places is an Arab, religious, and human obligation.

Based on these principles, the constitution calls for:

Complete liberation of Palestine, and eradication of Zionist economic, political, military, and cultural existence.

And how is Palestine’s liberation to be achieved?

Armed public revolution is the inevitable method to liberating Palestine.

After which she delivers the punchline:

Absent the strong Islamic religious element, this constitution might well be a document of Hamas. But it is not. It is the constitution of Fatah.

Meryl Yourish noted a historical similarity between a Hamas rally and something else in Terrorists, meet Nuremberg.

And, in fact, when dealing with Palestinian nationalism, Nuremberg is an excellent analogue here. The previous - Fatah dominated - legislature passed a law declaring the sale of land to Jews to be "high treason." While accounts say that Arafat never approved the law nonetheless:

Two Palestinians, suspected among other things of selling land to Jews, were killed in the West Bank under suspicious circumstances. In 1997 PA Justice Minister Freih Abu Middein announced that the death penalty would be imposed on anyone convicted of ceding "one inch" of land to Israel. A Palestinian land ownership law that was passed by the Palestinian Council and is awaiting Arafat's approval forbids Palestinians from brokering or facilitating the sale of Palestinian land to non-Palestinians and provides that such activities be considered "high treason." The PA has arrested and continues to hold several suspected land dealers for violating the Jordanian law in force in the West Bank that prohibits the sale of land to foreigners.

(Don't believe the source? Amnesty International reported the same thing, in disappointingly less detail.)

Ms. Kushner's argument that there is no significant difference between Fatah and Hamas in terms of acceptance of Israel's right to exist is correct. But still ... there's a difference. At least Fatah in certain circumstances played by the rules by mouthing the right words. To be sure it didn't do much more than that. But it always did enough so that the West could avert its collective eyes and pretend that Israel had a partner for peace.

No matter how much one looks away there is no denying what Hamas is. But rather than looking at Hamas, as the Washington Post did in its recent editorial, Hamas's Choice it is worth looking at what the Palestinian people did. Given a chance to continue the charade and to end it, the Palestinians declared "we don't want the peace process we want to be represented a bunch of well spoken terrorist thugs."

So the President's equivocation when asked about what Hamas's election meant is more than a little disappointing:

Q Mr. President, is Mideast peacemaking dead with Hamas' big election victory? And do you rule out dealing with the Palestinians if Hamas is the majority party?

THE PRESIDENT: Peace is never dead, because people want peace. I believe -- and that's why I articulated a two-state solution early in my administration, so that -- as a vision for people to work toward, a solution that recognized that democracy yields peace. And the best hope for peace in the Middle East is two democracies living side-by-side.

So the Palestinians had an election yesterday, and the results of which remind me about the power of democracy. You see, when you give people the vote, you give people a chance to express themselves at the polls -- and if they're unhappy with the status quo, they'll let you know. That's the great thing about democracy, it provides a look into society.

And yesterday the turnout was significant, as I understand it. And there was a peaceful process as people went to the polls, and that's positive. But what was also positive is, is that it's a wake-up call to the leadership. Obviously, people were not happy with the status quo. The people are demanding honest government. The people want services. They want to be able to raise their children in an environment in which they can get a decent education and they can find health care.

And so the elections should open the eyes of the old guard there in the Palestinian territories. I like the competition of ideas. I like people who have to go out and say, vote for me, and here's what I'm going to do. There's something healthy about a system that does that. And so the elections yesterday were very interesting.

On the other hand, I don't see how you can be a partner in peace if you advocate the destruction of a country as part of your platform. And I know you can't be a partner in peace if you have a -- if your party has got an armed wing. The elections just took place. We will watch very carefully about the formation of the government. But I will continue to remind people about what I just said, that if your platform is the destruction of Israel, it means you're not a partner in peace. And we're interested in peace.

I talked to Condi twice this morning. She called President Abbas. She also is going to have a conference call today about the Quartet -- with the Quartet, about how to keep the process on the road to peace.

Yes he's right in what he says in the next to last paragraph. But this was a moment to shake things up.

The President, had he been consistent with the principles he set out nearly four years ago should have said:

Almost four years ago, I called for a Palestinian leadership not compromised by terror. In their legislative elections by choosing a government of Hamas, the Palestinian people have spoken up loudly and clearly. They wish to be represented by a terror group. This is not a choice we can ignore.

As of this moment the United States will no longer fund the Palestinian Authority. Since 1993 the United States has spent nearly $2 billion attempting to create a civil society for the Palestinian people.

The funding will cease until such time that the Palestinian people demonstrate that they are committed to peaceful resolution of their conflict with Israel.

The burden of proof for showing that they are ready for peace now falls on the Palestinian people. If Hamas changes its charter and brings its members into line that will suffice. But we demand, now, real change, not the superficial declarations that have been tolerated in the past.

We will need to see a document that explicitly calls for Israel's right to exist. We will need to see weapons collected, terror cells shut down and the imposition of a single authority responsible not only for the well being of the Palestinians but of the security of Israel.

Until those changes are effected we say to the Palestinian people: We hear you loud and clear. You have rejected the fundamental premises necessary for peace in the Middle East. It is time to commit to peace or to lose this historic opportunity.

That would have taken guts to say. But it would have been the right thing to do. The burden of proof should now be on Hamas and those that elected it to show that they are for peace. For too long the Palestinians have avoided their responsibilities toward Israel only to have their actions excused for some sort of warped expediency. The Palestinian have now clearly said that they want no pretense of peace. Let them deal with the consequences.

Anything less and we'll start to see a political movement excusing this vote as a vote for good government (that seeks to impose taxes on non-Muslims under its jurdisdiction) and arguing that Hamas doesn't really want Israel destroyed. And we'll see the same sort of disaster that befell Israel and the Middle East starting in 1993.

Technorati Tags: Palestinian Authority, Israel, Hamas.

Crossposted on Israpundit and Soccer Dad.