How not to win a state
Dec 19th 2006
 From The Economist print edition
The rejectionists of Hamas have brought Palestinians to the edge of 
civil war

IT WAS obvious from the moment they did it, in January 2006, that the 
decision of Palestinian voters to
put the Islamists of Hamas in charge of the legislature of the 
Palestinian Authority was bad news. But the
full extent of the calamity this government has inflicted on the West 
Bank and, especially, the Gaza Strip
is nonetheless astonishing. As the election's anniversary approaches, 
the Palestinians find themselves
poised at the very edge of a civil war. Their elected president, Mahmoud 
Abbas of the chiefly secular
Fatah movement, has called early presidential and legislative elections. 
Ismail Haniyeh, the (Hamas)
prime minister, says that Mr Abbas has no constitutional right to do so. 
Indeed, Hamas accuses Fatah of
trying to assassinate Mr Haniyeh and stage a coup. Palestinians have 
already begun to kill one another. Most Palestinians are anxious to 
avoid a schism that would deflect them from their confrontation with
Israel. So they are still capable of drawing back from a fratricidal 
war. That would be a relief. But it would
not resolve the underlying problem. This is that Hamas has spent its 
year in government clinging
stubbornly to a rejectionist mantra that closes off almost any chance of 
peace with Israel. Mr Haniyeh
has just returned from a visit to Tehran, where he said again that Hamas 
would never recognise Israel,
would not honour any of the existing agreements between Israel and the 
Palestinians and would
"continue the jihad until Jerusalem is liberated".
Many people who sympathise with the Palestinian cause blame Israel or 
the West for the present
miserable stalemate. They have a respectable point. America, Russia and 
the European Union have
clamped a punishing diplomatic and economic embargo on the Palestinian 
government in an effort to
force Hamas to soften its stance. Israel, having evacuated all its 
settlers and soldiers from the Gaza Strip
last August, sent its army back after incessant rocket fire from Gaza 
and an audacious cross-border
Hamas raid in which an Israeli soldier was abducted. If the world had 
played with more finesse, coaxing
Hamas rather than boxing it into a corner, the movement's leaders just 
might have found it easier to be
pragmatic.
But the Palestinians also have to accept responsibility for their own 
actions. And, as Mr Abbas said bluntly
in calling for elections, Hamas itself is to blame for squandering the 
opportunity provided when Israel
pulled its soldiers and settlers out of Gaza. Hopes of foreign 
investment and state-building disappeared
with the pointless rocket fire at Israel.
About sponsorship
AP
Why a deal would be better than an early election
George Bush and Tony Blair are no doubt pleased that the flaccid Mr 
Abbas has at last thrown down the
gauntlet to Hamas. But neither they nor Israel should welcome the 
eruption of a civil war. More killing
and chaos will not bring peace with Israel nearer. Nor are fresh 
elections a panacea. There is the danger
of a boycott by voters, a hung parliament or another Hamas 
victory---especially if Palestinians think that
Mr Abbas is being manipulated by his American and British supporters.
Even a clear Fatah victory might not help. For all its mistakes, Hamas 
commands the loyalty of millions of
Palestinians, so no peace with Israel will hold without its 
acquiescence. Far better than a premature
election would be for Hamas and Fatah to agree to share power in a 
government that did not dedicate
itself to perpetual jihad. It is possible that more inducements and 
flexibility from outsiders might help to
jolly such an agreement along. But there can be no serious progress 
towards broader peace until Hamas,
like Fatah before it, gives up the self-defeating idea that in order for 
the Palestinians to have a state the
Jewish one has to disappear.
Copyright © 2006 The Economist Newspaper and The Economist Group. All 
rights reserved.

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