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CounterPunch
January
18 / 19, 2003
Sharon's Terror Child
How
the Likud Bloc Mid-wifed the Birth of Hamas
By RAY HANANIA
Hamas is considered one of Israel's greatest threats,
but the Islamic terrorist organization found its beginnings in
the misguided Israeli effort to encourage the rise of a religious
alternative that would undermine the popularity of the Palestine
Liberation Organization and Yasir Arafat.
The strategy resulted in the birth of
Hamas which rose from these Islamic roots. Israeli Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon was a member of the government when the policy was
developed in the late 1970s.
Although Sharon and his Likud (formerly
Herut Party) government colleagues could not anticipate that
the Islamic leaders they backed would eventually evolve into
Hamas and suicde bombings, the two have benefited from each other's
extremism over the years.
The Likud strategy to promote an Islamic
alternative evolved in response to Arafat's transformation from
a revolutionary leader to the "sole legitimate representative"
of the Palestinian people. Arafat was anointed as the only person
who could negotiate for the return of the Occupied West Bank,
Gaza Strip and Arab East Jerusalem at the Rabat Arab Summit in
October 1974.
In addition to hoping to turn the Palestinian
masses away from Arafat and the PLO, the Likud leadership believed
they could achieve a workable alliance with Islamic, anti-Arafat
forces that would also extend Israel's control over the occupied
territories. At the time, the Islamicization of the Palestinian
leadership was still very much in its infancy.
But the Islamic Palestinian leaders viewed
the relationship with Israel differently. They were eager to
accept Israel's financial backing and an easing on their activities,
but only because they feared that Arafat would sign away Palestinian
land captured by Israel in 1948.
If Arafat's weakness was the lack of
a long term vision and an inability to resist short term achievements,
his Islamic foes always believed that the struggle to liberate
Palestine was a long term, slow process.
Violence was always a part of that picture.
The Palestinian Islamic groups turned to violence during the
first Intifadah in 1987. The Intifadah (1987- 1993) literally
began as an uncontrolled, unplanned explosion of Palestinian
frustrations and it gave the Islamicists their first opportunity
to attract popular support.
Although Arafat remained the most popular
Palestinian leader, he was still in Tunisia when the first Intifadah
exploded in 1987. As Palestinians fought back against Israel's
occupation, Sheik Yassin decided it was time to launch an armed
wing, Hamas, to seek to lead that armed struggle against Israel's
military.
Eventually, though, Hamas evolved into
a much more extremists movement, not only targeting Israeli military.
Hamas initially turned to the more extreme form of violence,
suicide bombings, as a means of retribution for egregious Israeli
attacks against Palestinians.
The first Hamas suicide bombing occurred
in April 1994 in response to the massacre of 29 Muslims months
earlier who were praying at the Hebron Mosque. The number of
Hamas suicide bombings only steadily increased since, bringing
the Middle East today to its worst crisis in decades.
Later, in the second Intifadah, suicide
bombings became the weapon of choice as more and more Palestinians
turned away from Arafat's secular solution through compromise
with Israel and toward faith-based religious fanaticism.
The failure of the peace process to achieve
a workable compromise, the new Intifada or "Palestinian
rebellion," the increased terrorism and suicide bombings,
and changes in how the world views political violence and terrorism
since Sept. 11th have all given Likud and the Sharon government
a new mandate.
Angered by the suicide bombings, the
Israeli public has given Sharon wide latitude to forcefully respond
to Hamas violence and the intifada. He has eagerly pursued this
mandate as a front to achieve his real political agenda to undermine
Arafat and to prevent Israel from accepting a peace accord that
results in the establishment of an independent Palestinian State.
Ironically, this is Sharon's second try
to destroy Arafat. He led the Israeli army assault on the PLO
in Lebanon and Beirut in 1982, but that ended in embarrassment
for Israel when the army unilaterally retreated. Sharon left
with his reputation tarnished, blamed for the massacre of hundreds
of Palestinian civilians at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps.
As the peace process collapsed and as
Hamas terrorism increased, Sharon's agenda found new life. In
September 2000 Sharon went to the Haram al-Ash Sharif (Temple
Mount). Although events had been set in motion by the collapse
of peace, Sharon;s visit and his declaration that Jerusalem will
forever be the capitol of Israel sealed the fate of the unavoidable
violence that consumes Palestinians and Israelis today.
Likud and Islamicists
make strange bedfellows
In 1977, newly elected prime minister
and Likud (Herut) founder Menachem Begin decided drastic steps
were needed to block Arafat's return.
A year later, seeking to undermine Arafat's
popularity in the Occupied Territories, Begin's government approved
an application from a 42-year old quadriplegic religious leader
in the Gaza Strip, Sheik Ahmad Yassin, to license his humanitarian
organization, the Islamic Association. Later, with the explosion
of the first Intifada, the Islamic Association launched a military
arm called Hamas.
Begin's successor was Yitzhak Shamir.
Both Begin and Shamir were leaders of the first terrorist organizations
that operated in Palestine in the 1940s.
Under Begin and later Shamir, Israel
created, funded and controlled the "Village Leagues,"
a system of local councils managed by Palestinians who were hand-picked
by Israel to run local city and village administrations.
The plan was devised by Sharon, who was
Israel's Defense Minister. Sharon appointed Menahem Milson, a
professor of Arabic literature and former Hebrew University Dean,
as its first Civil Administration leader in November 1981. Less
than one year later, the two broke over Sharon's role in the
Sabra and Shatilla massacres and Milson resigned.
Over the objections of many Palestinian
Islamic leaders including the Commissioner of the Muslim Waqf
in the Gaza Strip, Rafat Abu Shaban, Israel registered the newly
formed "Islamic Association" which Yassin founded.
Yassin was willing to cooperate with
the Likud government because he, too, shared the goal of undermining
Arafat's secular influence over the Palestinians. More importantly,
and in line with Likud policies, he sought to block the creation
of a Palestinian State based on land-for-peace.
Israel's Likud government permitted Yassin
to launch a newspaper and to set up charitable fundraising organizations.
With funding Yassin raised and with Israeli funds directed through
the Village Leagues, the Islamic Association built new mosques,
new schools, hospitals and medical clinics. The group established
social service and humanitarian agencies and even job creation
venues. Despite its later turn to armed struggle and suicide
bombings, Hamas meticulously directed nearly 95 percent of the
funds it raised to these worthy humanitarian projects.
Yassin's followers won significant influence
over the Village Leagues system, another Israeli supported scheme
intended to undermine the PLO's influence and strengthen the
hand of "local leaders" that Likud believed could be
co-opted politically.
Yassin was not initially involved with
violence. Most of the violence was directed either by Arafat's
Al-Fatah organization, based in Lebanon, or by the other PLO
umbrella partners like the Popular Democratic Front for the Liberation
of Palestine. Inside the occupied territories, another Islamic
group called Islamic Jihad was struggling to gain support among
Palestinians living under occupation.
The "Islamic Association,"
was a shadow organization and prodigy of the more radical Moslem
Brotherhood, founded in Egypt in 1928 by Hasan al-Bana. The group
created a Palestinian branch in the 1930s but waged a mainly
rhetorical battle against oppression in the Arab World.
Initially, the Moslem Brotherhood and
Sheik Yassin's Islamic Association were not supportive of armed
struggle against Israel. Yassin adopted the Moslem Brotherhoods
approach toward a slow Islamicization of the region.
In 1984, Shamir was forced into a coalition
government with Labor Party's Shimon Peres. Under a shared-leadership
agreement, Peres held the office for two years until 1986 before
returning it to Shamir. During those two years, the Likud party
leaders saw firsthand the seriousness of behind-the-scenes negotiations
between Labor Party leaders and Arafat, who was exiled in Tunisia.
Yassin and the Islamic Association benefited
from a system of Israeli controlled "Village Leagues,"
sometimes called Village Councils. The Village Leagues where
largely funded by Israel. But the Islamic Association was allowed
to raise tens of millions more each year from supportive Arab
regimes angry with Arafat. The creation of the Village Leagues
was Israel's first effort to encourage an alternative to the
PLO.
Sheik Yassin used the money to operate
a network of schools, medical clinics, social service agencies,
religious institutions and provide direct services to the poverty
stricken Palestinian population.
Israel saw benefits in the leagues which
became a breeding ground for Palestinian collaborators who were
blackmailed or bribed into reporting on the activities of other
Palestinians. Many of them held positions of leadership in the
Village Leagues and were friendly to Israel.
The Israeli military gave the League
members protection and widespread powers. As many as 200 of the
league members were given weapons training by Israel. Israel's
Shin Bet recruited paid informers from this network and Israeli
sources estimated the number of informants were in the thousands.
Israel Military Government employed as
many as 19,000 Palestinians, with 11,000 of them working as teachers,
clerks and administrators.
Always the survivor, Arafat and the PLO
agreed in 1988 to accept the "two state" solution based
on "land for peace" negotiations. While Likud responded
by trying to sell "autonomy" to the Islamicist movement,
the response of the Islamic Association was unexpected. Reacting
angrily to Arafat's decision to recognize Israel, and seeking
to play to Palestinian emotions during the Intifadah, the new
organization, Hamas, openly embraced armed struggle against Israel.
Arafat's first act was to impose controls
on Hamas, while Israel moved to more aggressive policies expelling,
jailing and even assassinating Hamas leaders.
As secret talks with Labor Party leaders
advanced, Arafat ordered his loyalists to force Village League
members to resign in 1988 sparking violence between Hamas and
Arafat's Al-Fatah supporters. The gap between Hamas and Al-Fatah
widened when Al-Fatah commemorated the 20th anniversary of the
March 21, 1968 battle of Karameh.
Karameh was a village in Jordan at the
border with the West Bank that consisted mainly of Palestinian
refugees. There, Arafat and his Al-Fatah faction set up headquarters
and directed their armed struggle against Israel.
Israeli troops invaded Karameh but confronted
fierce resistance from the Arafat-led guerrilla defenders. It
was particularly important because of the humiliation Arabs shared
for the defeat to Israel in June 1967. The battle successes added
to Arafat's growing charisma among Palestinians.
During the commemoration, Palestinian
leaders of the Village Leagues began their mass resignations.
The Palestinian Mayor of Beitunia, Abdallah Rezaq, was the first
to dissolve his municipality's council.
The only thing that stopped Hamas from
growing further was the return of the Labor Party to power in
1992 and the return of Yasir Arafat to the West Bank and Gaza
Strip.
Hamas is born
Strengthened by Village League funding
and a vast network of charitable institutions that were popular
among the Palestinian masses, Yassin authorized the establishment
of a military arm of the Islamic Association in 1987 that he
called Hamas. It launched its first attacks in January 1998,
both against Israeli military targets and even against Arafat's
Fataha loyalists in the Gaza Strip.
The acronym Hamas comes from the Arabic
name, the Islamic Resistance Movement (Harakat al-Muqawama
al-Islamiya). In English, the word Hamas translates into
"zeal." It is appropriate to Yassin's goals. The Moslem
Brotherhood and its sister organizations pursued a policy of
gradual Islamicization of the Arab World and Palestine. It was
a policy that Hamas rejected as being too slow.
There is a real irony in the transformation
of Yassin's organization from a benevolent religious foundation
to a guerrilla movement. Begin and his successor, Yitzhak Shamir,
had both headed the first two terrorist organizations to operate
in Palestine during the 1940s. Shamir had led the Stern Gang
while Begin led the larger Irgun Zvi Leuhmi. The two groups
worked in tandem and were responsible for introduction of terrorist
techniques into Palestine including car bombings, assassinations,
kidnappings, hijackings of military vehicles and the lynching
of British soldiers in the olive groves outside of Jerusalem.
They were responsible for the near destruction of the car-bombed
King David Hotel and for the massacre of civilians at the Palestinian
village of Deir Yassin near Jerusalem.
Begin and Shamir understood exactly what
they had created. Knesset Member Avraham Poraz (Shinui) was among
a litany of Israeli leaders who blamed Likud for Hamas. "The
Likud has got Hamas on its hands because it refused to talk to
the PLO," he said.
Hamas quickly found itself in competition
with another religious group banned by Israel, Islamic Jihad.
Both sought to disrupt the occupation and seize Palestinian leadership
from Arafat.
Islamic Jihad distributed a leaflet claiming
responsibility for the killing of restaurateur, Ya'acov Shalom,
in Jerusalem's Ein Kerem neighborhood on May 20, and a fatal
bomb attack in the Mahane Yehuda market the week before. It
also labeled Jordan's King Hussein, a Hamas backer at the time,
as a "butcher." That was an apparent reference to the
King's suppression of unrest in Palestinian refugee camps following
another attack at Rishon Lezion, an Israeli settlement outside
of Tel Aviv.
But the real rivalry for Hamas was with
Arafat's Fatah loyalist.
During the first Intifadah, Hamas enforced
business closures and boycotts as a means of protesting Israeli
policies and as a way to control the Palestinian population.
Hamas constantly challenged PLO political positions and thwarted
PLO efforts to direct the Intifadah from abroad.
For example, in January 1990, Arafat
deputy Abu Iyad publicly complained that Soviet Jewish immigration
to Israel was undermining the peace process because new immigrants
went directly to settlements, and settlements were created to
accommodate this immigration. In response, Hamas issued an order
closing all businesses in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to protest
Soviet Jewish immigration, not simply to join in the protest
but to also steal the thunder from the distant PLO leaders.
Shamir was surprised by the Islamic violence.
He quickly ordered the arrest of Hamas political leader Dr. Abdel
Aziz Rantisi and then a full scale crackdown on Hamas and the
arrest of Sheikh Yassin. But it was too late. Hamas was now
permanently entrenched among a hard core and growing cadre of
Palestinian religious zealots.
By February 1990, Israeli officials estimated
that Hamas enjoyed solid backing during the Intifadah from 30
percent of the residents of the Gaza Strip where it was based.
This increased popularity only hastened Arafat's decision
to accept a compromise with Israel in the hopes of returning
and taking charge and prompted Shamir's Labor Party successors
to accept an Arafat deal.
Under Labor Party pressure and a "shared
government" arrangement with Likud, Israel agreed to participate
in peace talks with the Palestinians and Jordanians in Cairo.
Still, Shamir tried to reduce the role of the PLO by insisting
on vetoing the appointment of the Faisal al-Husseini, an Arafat
confidant and the PLO's Jerusalem representative, to lead the
the Palestinian delegation.
Arafat immediately tried to control Hamas,
partly to demonstrate his authority and partly to show his Labor
Party partners that he could deliver. But initial offers of compromise
and alliance from PLO officials were consistently rejected and
Hamas remained dedicated to its hardline, Islamicist ideology
which rejected any form of compromise with Israel.
The more the Labor-Arafat peace process
advanced, the more Hamas turned to violence. When Husseini and
other PLO officials denounced the murder of Jewish tourists in
Egypt in February 1990, Hamas countered by sending vehicles with
loudspeakers through the streets of major Palestinian cities
praising the attacks and denouncing the PLO for its criticism.
They argued against peace with Israel and more violence.
The Likud desire to undermine Arafat
remained strong even after Hamas had been declared a "terrorist
organization" and the Labor peace initiative with Arafat
was at its height. In the months after the White House peace
signing, some leaders of the Israel's security forces pursued
contacts with Hamas leaders who were in Israeli jails in the
hopes of getting them to embrace peace at the expense of Arafat's
leadership. The Israelis wanted to use Hamas as a means of pressuring
Arafat into making more concessions.
It didn't work.
Hamas and Likud
benefit from violence
There is a natural affinity that exists
in a limited way between the policies and goals of Hamas and
the political objectives of the Likud Bloc that has brought them
together.
Every time Israeli and Palestinian negotiators
appeared ready to take a major step toward achieving peace, an
act of Hamas terrorism has scuttled the peace process and has
pushed the two sides apart.
The startling ease with which terrorism
has undermined peace is a testament to the fragility of the peace
process and the political weakness of both Israeli and Palestinian
negotiators. Two specific acts of Likud-inspired violence derailed
the momentum of the peace process, too.
Terrorism has been the primary common
denominator that exists in the up and down relationship between
the leadership of Israel's Likud and the Palestinian Hamas movement.
It's not that they are working together, but that their goals
are the same.
Acts of terrorism can be directly associated
with changes in the political leadership of Israel -- influencing
the defeat of Labor Party government and the rise of the Likud.
In the last quarter century, Likud Party
candidates have served as Israel's prime ministers for 17 years,
more than double the eight years served by Labor Party candidates.
Since 1977, four Likud candidates have
served five times as prime minister, while three Labor candidates
served four times. (Likud's Menachem Begin, 77-83; Likud's Yitzhak
Shamir, 83-84; Labor's Shimon Peres, 84-86; Likud's Shamir, 86-92;
Labor's Yitzhak Rabin, 92-95; Labor's Peres, 95-96; Likud's Benjamin
Netanyahu, 96-99; Labor's Ehud Barak, 99-01; Likud's Ariel Sharon,
01-present.)
Efforts to achieve peace between Arafat
and Labor were marred by the violence on both sides with Hamas
attacking Israeli targets and Likud loyalists and members of
the pro-Likud settler movement attacking Palestinians.
One of those likud-inspired settler fanatics
was Dr. Baruch Goldstein. In February 1994, Goldstein strolled
through Israeli security with an automatic weapon and opened
fire on Muslims praying at the Heborn Mosque. He killed 29 Muslims.
Goldstein took a page out of the Likud ideology and hoped the
massacre would derail the peace process with Arafat.
The Goldstein attack so outraged Hamas
leaders that they retaliated in April 1994 with a Hamas bomber
who drove an explosive laden car into a civilian bus in the Israeli
city of Afula. Eight people died and 50 were wounded.
Likud-inspired violence was not reserved
for Palestinian targets. Less than a year later, an Israeli fanatic
inspired by Likud rhetoric assassinated Rabin. Rabin's widow,
Leah Rabin, directly placed the blame for her husband's assassination
on the Likud party and its anti-peace rhetoric. Leah Rabin
declared that the assassin was incited to violence by the vicious
language of Likud's silver-tongued leader, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Rabin's murder undermined the Labor Party's
future and sabotaged the Israeli-Palestinian peace process pushing
all sides back to violence.
In otherwords, violence did for the Likud
what violence had achieved for Hamas in terms of stopping the
peace process.
Politically, Hamas and Israel's Likud
Bloc share several common goals, each for different reasons.
They both oppose the Land-for-Peace formula and object to the
creation of an independent Palestinian State. Hamas seeks to
establish an Islamic State in Palestine while the Likud seeks
the formal expansion of Israel into the occupied West Bank and
Arab East Jerusalem. Likud seeks to annex the territories
providing the Palestinians with administrative autonomy but not
independence or sovereignty.
In contrast, the PLO and the Labor Party
also share several goals and oppose the policies of Likud and
Hamas. Both accepted in formal written agreements in September
1993 at the White House a peace accord that recognized Israel's
right to exist and the Palestinian right to statehood.
While Likud and Labor battle over ideology
and politics, Hamas differs with the PLO on issues of religion
and it rejects compromise.
Hamas views the PLO as an important organization
but much like a "wayward brother." It's stated goal
is the creation of an Islamic State in Palestine, one that subjugates
not only Jews but Christians and other religions, too. The
PLO has recognized Israel and, like the Labor Party, has accepted
the Land-for-Peace principle.
While Hamas views all Israeli politics
as identical, its violence twice helped elect Likud candidates
to the office of Prime Minister.
It is this politics of opposition that
drives Likud and Hamas to share similar goals.
Arab regimes
flipflop on Hamas
As peace moved forward, the Arab World
also shifted from supporting the Islamic militant movement to
opposing it.
The Muslim Brotherhood and later Hamas
enjoyed the backing, for example, of King Hussein of Jordan and
several other Arab government leaders not just during its rise,
but even years later.
In Jan. 1991, the new Jordanian Government
included members of the Moslem Brotherhood, insuring that Jordanian
funds would continue to Hamas.
In a show of how important King Hussein
viewed the religious organization, King Hussein pressured Israel
to release Yassin from his Israeli prison in 1997. It was a price
demanded by the monarch for his freeing of Israeli Mossad agents
who were arrested after bungling the attempted assassination
of a Hamas leader in Jordan.
After his release, Yassin devoted his
energies to repairing damage to Hamas' educational and charitable
institutions inflicted during Israel's sweeping 1996 crackdown.
Hamas' military wing directed attacks from its safe haven in
Amman, Jordan.
Like many Arab leaders who viewed Arafat
as a threat, King Hussein was willing to live with Hamas militancy
as a counter-balance to Arafat. Jordan viewed Hamas as a natural
rival to Arafat's leadership. Despite his public rhetoric, the
Jordanian Monarch could never forgive Arafat for his efforts
to destabilize his government. Half of Jordan's population consisted
of Palestinians, most of them refugees from the 1948 and the
1967 Arab-Israeli wars.
As Hamas stepped up attacks against Israel
and was denounced by Israelis as a terrorist organization, Hamas
enjoyed growing support among the Arab regimes. Ironically, it
was easier to show lipservice to Hamas than to lead their own
wars against Israel.
Arafat's misunderstood support of Iraq
during the Gulf War did much to strengthen Arab support of Hamas.
Hamas received more financial support from Kuwait after Hamas
leaders publicly denounced Saddam Hussein and likened the Iraqi
occupation of Kuwait to the Israeli occupation of Palestine.
Other Arab Gulf countries like Saudi
Arabia continued to channel funds to both the PLO and Hamas,
but favored Hamas' religious militancy and its Islamic charitable
foundations and social service agencies.
Arafat was publicly humiliated by Kuwait
at the 1990 "Baghdad summit" when he demanded to know
why Kuwait had paid less than one-eighth of the money it had
promised the Palestinians. The emir of Kuwait, Sheikh Jabber
al-Ahmed al-Sabah responded by producing data that showed in
fact Kuwait had continued to support the Palestinian cause, but
through Hamas instead of through the PLO.
As the Arab government's slowly supported
the Arafat-Rabin peace accords, support for Hamas began to wane.
Hamas turned elsewhere, to Iran's Islamic government. In August
1999, Jordan closed the group's political bureau, arrested its
leaders and prohibited Hamas from operating out of Jordan.
As the peace process progressed, Hamas
influence continued to fall. Hamas struggled to sustain its network
of charitable and social agency service agencies in the West
Bank (notably Tulkarm) and also in Gaza where they had more support.
Hamas shifted most of its military and political leadership from
Amman, Jordan to a more sympathetic Damascus, Syria.
Still, the network that Shamir and the
Likud helped create for Hamas preserved its funding resources.
Even after breaking with Jordan and other Arab countries, sources
estimated the Hamas budget at between $40-70 million a year.
The peace process
teeters on the brink of Hamas attacks
In early April 1990, Palestine National
Council Chairman Sheikh Abdel Hamid a-Sayeh invited Hamas to
join a committee preparing the next Palestine National Council
meeting. (The PNC was the umbrella group that included representatives
of most Palestinian organizations and mainly the PLO.) Hamas
circulated a memorandum in the territories on April 6, 1990 setting
for the conditions the PLO would have to meet: Hamas would only
join the Palestine National Council if the PLO withdrew its "acceptance
of partition," rejects territorial concessions, and refuses
to recognize Israel. The statement also demanded that Hamas
be given up to 50 percent of the PNC seats, and a modification
of the Palestinian National Covenant "in accordance with
the faith of the Moslem Palestinian people and its glorious
heritage."
Even President Clinton recognized the
ability of Hamas to disrupt the peace process. On January 24,
1995, Clinton signed an Executive Order prohibiting transactions
with Hamas due to their potential for disrupting the Middle East
peace process. This included all of Hamas' subgroups including
the Izzedin Al-Qassem Brigades. Even with the change in attitudes
of the Arab governments, pressure from the Clinton Administration
and a reversal in Israel's policies toward Yassin, the road to
undermining Hamas' extensive funding network was difficult.
Eventually, Hamas was forced to consider,
at least briefly, a possible compromise with Arafat in order
to survive. By 1998, Yassin publicly broke from the Hamas Charter
and participated at a meeting of the PNC. His presence prevented
the PNA from declaring Palestinian statehood, but it brought
a harsh rebuke from the Hamas leadership outside of the territories.
Hamas political head Khaled Meshal and treasurer Musa Abu Marzook,
both in Jordan, and Hamas' Damascus representative Imad Alami
all urged Yassin to resign.
As peace falters
Hamas influence rises
Support for Hamas declines as the peace
process moves ahead and increases as the peace process falters.
Prior to the peace process, support among the Palestinians for
Hamas was estimated by the Israelis at 20-40 percent in the West
Bank and 60-80 percent in the Gaza Strip. This fell to 15-25
percent during the peace process.
And undermining the peace process has
always been the real target of Hamas and has played into the
political ambitions of the Likud. Continued Hamas suicide bombings
and violence has played a significant role in undermining and
bringing the peace process to a grinding halt, and set the stage
for Sharon's election over Labor Party leader Ehud Barak in 2001.
As the peace accords lumbered ahead,
Hamas stepped up its terrorist suicide attacks. About a dozen
suicide bombings were attempted in the months after the PLO-Israel
accord was signed at the White House in September, 1993.
Initially, the peace process persisted
in the face of these heinous terrorist attacks. But it couldn't
stand the pressure of the gut-wrenching images of suicide bomb
attacks. In February and March 1996, Hamas launched a series
of suicide bombings in retaliation for the Israeli assassination
of alleged Hamas bomb-maker Yahya Aiyash the month prior. These
attacks contributed mightily to bringing down the Peres government
and helped return the Likud back to power electing the more hardline
but silver-tongued young Turk, Benjamin Netanyahu.
The wave of deadly Hamas bombings took
60 Israeli lives in eight days, prompting Arafat to clamp down
on Hamas even more - some 1,000 Palestinians were arrested and
Arafat's Palestinian National Authority government, established
under Labor, even ousted Hamas from some of its mosques. The
suicide attacks continued through 1997 giving Netanyahu public
support to halt the peace process and reverse agreements made
by the murdered Rabin.
Netanyahu ignored Arafat's efforts to
crackdown on Hamas and the peace process came to a grinding halt.
Similarly, Hamas suicide bombings during
the Barak administration coupled with the failure to reach a
peace accord on President Clinton's timetable, and Sharon's provocative
incursion to the "Temple Mount" on September 28th,
2000 provoked the second Intifadah.
Although the Israelis insist that second
Intifadah was responsible for a wave of Israeli killings, during
the first week of the conflict, 50 Palestinians had been killed
and five Israelis had died. Among the dead were nine Palestinian
protesters whose deaths sparked the Intifadah's start. The Israeli
response was repressive and heightened Palestinian response.
And, when two Israeli reservists (suspected of being undercover
government assassins) were captured and murdered viciously in
Ramallah on October 12th, 2000, the slide to total Palestinian-Israeli
conflict was already set in stone.
Barak declared his decision to resign
to give himself a 60-day window before elections to controlt
he conflict and authorized secret meetings at Taba where Palestinian
and Israeli negotiators desperately tried to reach an accord.
But, it was too late, Sharon had achieved
his objectives. Sharon did not need a major Hamas suicide bombing
to win his election against Barak. The Sharon inspired Intifadah
and the violence it caused on both sides swung Israeli voters
to the hard right, giving him a landslide victory against Barak
on Feb. 7, 2001.
Clearly recognizing that their violent
strategy was bringing down the Arafat government, halting the
peace process and playing into the emotions of the Palestinians,
Hamas launched another wave of suicide bombings in the week after
Sharon's election. Sharon used these attacks as the pretext to
launch a massive invasion of PNA controlled areas of the West
Bank and decimating Arafat's government infrastructure.
Hamas terrorism played into the rage
and the frustrations of the Palestinian people, who helplessly
watched as the promise of peace evaporated before their eyes.
They had never tasted its fruits but only heard its empty promises.
The were a people on the edge and easy victims for Sharon's political
manipulations.
The conflict continues its escalation.
The number of Palestinian and Israeli dead continues to climb.
The terrorist attacks on September 11th by madman Osama Bin Laden
in the name of Islam only served to further build a barrier that
prevents reasonable people to achieve a peace.
And, once again, the real benefactor
of the violence and conflict is Israel's right wing Likud Bloc
and its new leader, Ariel Sharon, the man that his fanatic supporters
affectionately call "Bulldozer."
Ray Hanania
is a Palestinian American author and veteran award winning journalist.
Based on Chicago, he is a columnist on Middle East affairs for
Creators Syndicate. He can be reached at www.hanania.com
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The Case of the Pompous
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Boston: All that
Effort, But What Did They Get?
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