Posted on 05/09/2008 5:32:03 AM PDT by SJackson
Ever since the Trojans welcomed the Wooden Horse, full of armed Greeks, into their city, rulers and regimes have unintentionally defeated themselves.
But as the last month has made obvious, with the rule of Hamas in Gaza we have something else entirely: not folly, but a strategy designed to inflict self-harm.
The clearest, but by no means the only example of this is the fuel crisis that has brought transportation in Gaza to a virtual standstill.
Even as it harshly condemned the Israeli "siege" of the Gaza Strip, Hamas acted to exacerbate the problem by repeatedly confiscating fuel trucks and carrying out attacks on border crossings.
On April 9, it launched an assault on the fuel terminal at Nahal Oz, which provides gas and fuel to the residents of the Strip. Last week, Hamas militiamen attacked trucks heading toward the Nahal Oz crossing that carried fuel intended for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and hospitals in the Gaza Strip. And the IDF was forced on Sunday to halt deliveries through the Karni crossing after vehicles came under Palestinian mortar fire while attempting to deliver food and fuel to Gazans.
Hamas, of course, does not have a monopoly on such self-harm; in one form or another, the tactic is shared by all terrorist movements, including the intifadas that brought such ruin to the Palestinian population.
How then are we to understand such self-defeating behavior? There are two ways, as political scientist James Q. Wilson has said, of thinking about terrorism. One is to see terrorism as an extreme expression of underlying injustices, and to assume that if the root problem is solved, the symptom will disappear.
The second, and more realistic, is to understand that whatever the underlying injustice, there are terrorists who by their very nature oppose solutions that would remedy that injustice. Any reform or amelioration, short of destroying the state, threatens their raison d'etre.
THIS LESSON must guide Israel's response to Hamas's offer of a truce. Khaled Mashaal, the group's Damascus-based leader, said Monday that his movement would offer Israel a 10-year hudna if it withdrew from all areas it captured in 1967. Gaza-based Hamas representatives Mahmoud Zahar and Saeed Seyam have been in Cairo as part of Egyptian mediation efforts toward a cease-fire.
The problem with such offers is not merely that Hamas would use a truce to rearm and regroup. Mashaal himself, after all, has proclaimed as much. "It is a tactic in conducting the struggle; it is normal for any resistance that operates in its people's interest... to sometimes escalate, other times retreat a bit," he said in a recent interview with Al-Jazeera television. Nor is it merely that the offer is accompanied by further threats of violence. Hamas has warned of an "unprecedented escalation" against Israel if it does not agree soon to the cease-fire offer, the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat reported Sunday. It is also an offer that exploits both Israel's justified fear of further terrorist attacks and our sense of concern vis-à-vis Gaza's growing humanitarian crisis.
The real problem, however, is that here too, Hamas's aim is not to reach a lasting resolution to the conflict, but precisely to exacerbate it - to weaken the Israeli adversary and foster the illusion that the next set of concessions will be the last. "To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill," Sun Tzu said in the 4th century BCE.
IN INTERNATIONAL relations, as in other dimensions of life, the good intentions of others alone cannot aid those who refuse to help themselves. As the US is now learning in Iraq, for instance, democracy cannot be imposed on Arab societies from without. Much as Israel may wish for progressive reforms in Palestinian Arab society and for the concomitant relief of Palestinian suffering, such salvation need come from within.
Civilized nations are in an unenviable position when confronting regimes dedicated to the tragic ethos of self-harm. In the case of Hamas, the best approach remains continued adherence to the Quartet's policy of no contact with Hamas until it accepts the international community's three conditions for engagement: recognizing Israel's right to exist, renouncing terrorism and accepting previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements.
High Volume. Articles on Israel can also be found by clicking on the Topic or Keyword Israel. or WOT [War on Terror]
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“Civilized nations are in an unenviable position when confronting regimes dedicated to the tragic ethos of self-harm. In the case of Hamas, the best approach remains continued adherence to the Quartet’s policy of no contact with Hamas until it accepts the international community’s three conditions for engagement: recognizing Israel’s right to exist, renouncing terrorism and accepting previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements.”
No, the best position is to eradicate the terrorists and then tell the rest of the populace that if they continue to support the terrorists they will be next.
No realpolitik in that assumption.
Israel has Jews,loves America and engages in Capitalism.
These three strikes mean you are out in the eyes of global socialism.
A Hamas terrorist surrounds himself with Palestinian women and children,all volunteers,and then fires an RPG at an IDF Centurian.The round destroys the tank’s left tread thus immobilizing it.Even though the terrorist is in plain view,and in the sights,of the Centurian’s gunner,the tank commander notifies him that an AP camera crew is present and to hold fire.
Soon,several more terrorists arrive with gasoline bombs and encircle the cripples tank with the intent of burning the crew alive.They pause just long enough to allow more women and children volunteers to shield them.
The IDF tank commander finally orders machine gun fire to save his men and in the process some women and children frantically intercept the bullets aimed at the terrorists.
AP Headline:
“IDF TANK MASSACRES PALESTINIANS”
folowed by:
“UN DEMANDS INVESTIGATION INTO TANK SLAUGHTER”
and then:
“OBAMA AND CLINTON DEMAND BUSH DO SOMETHING ABOUT ISRAEL ATROCITIES”
Full story on page none.
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
You could write for Reuters.
Maybe some day the Israelis will realize that no matter what they do they will be painted as the bad guys, so they might as well stop playing to the cameras and clean house.
So if they do all 3 of these things, it's okay to give them half of Jerusalem?
That wouldn't be my opinion. In fact since Israel has gone to the trouble of annexing the Golan, and annexing land around Jerusalem, including offering citizenship to the Arab residents, I don't see why Jerusalem or the Golan should be topics of discussion. Many Mexicans would like the southwest back, we don't sit down and discuss it with them.
If Hamas actually recognized Israel, renounced terrorism, and complied with previous agreements, I'd leave them alone to develop their paradise.
There is a bright side you know.
Being forced by the American and Israeli hating leftist media to wage politically correct wars against evil savages given a pass by the same media has resulted in technological advancements not seen since the Space Race of the 1960s.
Just think,if Reagan had had the munitions,personel,logistics,and inteligence capabilities that Bush now has,the USSR would not only have fallen sooner,but every hostile commie,tin-plated third world dictator and Islamist fanatic would long have been dead or incarcerated.
McCain is a sorry excuse for a Republican and no true conservative,but I feel he will utilize these resources properly and with just vigor.
Obama or Clinton,on the other hand,will only place flowers in the muzzles of M-16s.
To give up even partial sovereignty of Jerusalem would be the end of the Jewish State—even the “reformed” Jews of Israel know this and are thus forced to bargain in poor faith on either it’s partition or surrender in the interests of achieving some form of general peace.
It is written that Mohammed was born in Mecca,died in Medina and then ascended to paradise from Jerusalem.Thus Islamist fundamentalists lay eternal claim to all three cities.2 out of 3 they will have to settle for until Iran starts a nuclear war that makes all 3 radioactive ash heaps full of pilgrim shadows branded on the glassy sands.
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