Batfink's Beep -- 1-26-06

The benefit of clarity

January 26, 2006

By now it is clear that the Palestinians have overwhelmingly chosen Hamas over Fatah, giving to the terrorist group 75-80 seats in their 100-seat parliament. There has been the predictable howling in the civilized world. There have also been the predictable snarky comments that Bush should have been careful in what he wished for when he pushed for Palestinian elections, because he got it.

What is not being commented on, as I see it, though, is that Fatah was also a terrorist organization through and through. This was the 'party', after all, of Yasser Arafat. Because Arafat was such a cunning f***, he had the sense to seem (to people like Jimmy Carter, anyway) to be a guy the west could deal with, but this was always an illusion. Underneath, Arafat's Fatah was doing the same things Hamas does, but with the deniability that goes with a leader and an apparatus that seemed to be interested in negotiating with the west. The only difference between them and Hamas was that Hamas didn't have the sense to seem to play the game, to take advantage of all the UN fools who will seize any opportunity to deal with terrorists if it will avoid the necessity of having to actually do something.

Therefore, 2 things will probably come from the election results, neither a particularly bad thing:

One, Hamas will prove to be no worse than Fatah. Both are terrorist organizations of the first order, both employ murder and mayhem to try to achieve their goals of ultimately destroying Israel. In one important way, it will be better from our standpoint, in that Hamas doesn't have so many people in the west snowed that they are people we can deal with; who are, in some sense, honorable men. They aren't. They will be clearly understood by all rational governments in the west to be a completely rogue government, in a way that Fatah, which ALSO was, was NOT clearly understood to be. Which leads to:

Two, we can finally stop the travesty of sending our tax dollars to the PA. That never should have happened in the first place, and it's time we stopped the folly of making believe that there are elements of the Palestinian leadership, or citizenry, for that matter, that we can rely on to push for a peaceful solution. When a freely voting public picks 75-80% of its representatives from a group like Hamas, it should be clear to everyone that they have not given up on war. They're not our friends, and they are not our co-negotiators. They are a people who want war; against Israel, and by proxy, against us. It's time to deal with them as such, without blinders. And certainly without paying them to fight against us.

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