Soccer Dad

Did hamas lose?

Barry Rubin writes in "Hamas' phony victory"

Imagine a very secret meeting held somewhere in the Gaza Strip. Around a table sit various Hamas bigwigs and their leader makes the following speech:

"Ök, here's the plan. We'll wage war on our stronger neighbor, Israel, and lose; destroy our economy; make our people suffer; ensure international sanctions continue against us, and alienate almost all Arab regimes. Then, when things can't seem to get any worse, we'll turn out all the lights and get international sympathy!"

"Brilliant!" is the response as the Hamas leaders leap to their feet and chant: "Just 100 more years of this and Israel will be destroyed!"

Not such a great strategy, you say? Then why should anyone think Hamas won some big public relations' victory by shutting off Gaza's electricity and blowing up the border wall with Egypt? Â True, that's what Hamas's heads think. They are boiling over with pride at having put one over on Israel, as if this is some huge triumph. Some Israelis seem to agree.

Dr. Rubin goes on to explain that every since it took over the Gaza strip, the residents of Gaza have only seen increased misery, Israel is doing well and residents of the eastern section of the PA must be wondering if they want the success that Gazans enjoy.

He concludes:

Even from a radical perspective, Hamas's policy of permanent offensive is a big mistake. It would have been better advised to pretend moderation, make a deal with at least Fatah--or perhaps even Israel--then break it in a bid for total victory. If it opted for quiet, Hamas could end the sanctions, gain some Western support, build up Gaza's economy and social institutions, and train a future generation for all-out war. Â But Hamas also rejects this cleverly cynical extremist approach. Of course, Arafat made that same error.

So while Hamas will never give up it also will never win. To portray its latest antics as some kind of success is simply wrong. It is a disaster for Hamas and the Palestinians. To understand this reality is to comprehend the central blunder plaguing the Palestinian movement's strategy since its inception, ensnaring the PLO, PA, Fatah, and Hamas alike.

But is it a mistake or is the logical conclusion of their ideology? If Palestinian nationalism really is about building a state, then this has been a terrible way to go about it. Prof. Rubin is arguing that it isn't even a good strategy if the goal is the destruction of Israel.

Still this isn't just about Gaza and Israel, there's another player immediately involved: Egypt. Bret Stephens writes in the Gaza Breakout

As Middle Eastern power plays go, Hamas's decision to dismantle the Gaza-Sinai border was a masterstroke. Gaza's economic woes are almost wholly self-inflicted, but they are real. Dynamiting and bulldozing the border of a neighboring country is legally an act of war, but it was made to seem like a humanitarian necessity and a bid for freedom. Flooding that neighbor with hundreds of thousands of desperate people is a massive economic burden on Egypt, but one that it shirks at its political peril.

Above all, Hamas exploited the myth of pan-Arab solidarity with the Palestinians in order to explode it. Having whipped itself into its usual frenzy over Israel's "siege" of Gaza, it was a delicate matter for the state-run Egyptian press to make the government's case for deploying truncheon-wielding police to turn back the Palestinian human tide. It's an equally delicate matter for the Egyptian government to arrest Brotherhood protesters peacefully demonstrating "for Palestine," even if the Brotherhood's real target is Hosni Mubarak's regime and the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty that it supports.

For Palestinians who have spent squalid decades in the refugee camps of Lebanon (which forbids Palestinians from owning property or having any sort of gainful employment), or have been systematically abused as laborers in the Gulf sheikdoms (Kuwait expelled its Palestinian population en masse following its 1991 liberation from Iraq), or have had a country denied to them by a Hashemite regime in Jordan, the lies of the Arab world are well known.

Stephens argues that the border breach engineered by Hamas strengthens Egypt like-minded Muslim brotherhood, potentially damaging the long term viability of a somewhat moderate Egypt. He notes with satisfaction that despite the Qassams, more and more Gaza is becoming an Egyptian, not Israeli, problem.

Presumably Stephens means that a strengthened Muslim Brotherhood would provide a long term boost to Hamas.

So did Hamas win?

Crossposted on Yourish.

israel, hamas, hamas.