At least they're honest

Editorial

Palestine is reaping the whirlwind. From the beginning of the Oslo process, Yasser Arafat pretended to be a partner for peace, while simultaneously encouraging the pent-up rage of Palestinians and doing little to nothing to lower the expectations of complete victory over the Zionist enemy.

While it was Arafat's intent to channel the rage outward, toward Israel, observers have noted for years that such a perilous strategy could inevitably implode. The approach, which has been used across the Arab and much of the Islamic world for decades, is to divert the anger that naturally emerges among the oppressed youth who make up a vast portion of the Arab world's population, away from the host of dictatorial Arab leaders and toward the scapegoat that is the Jewish state.

Chief among the proponents of this strategy was the late Arafat, who also pocketed and misallocated development money the international community poured into the Palestinian Authority to help build the nascent state. While this cash, intended for schools, economic infrastructure and hospitals, was squandered rewarding pals, buying off warlords and funding an extravagant lifestyle in Paris for Arafat's wife, Hamas was providing many of the services Palestinians needed.

While it is tempting to see in last week's Hamas election victory a solely anti-Zionist intent, the reality probably has more to do with the years Hamas spent filling the social service gap that the PA, under Arafat's Fatah movement, failed to deliver. When Palestinian voters went to the polls last week, they had a choice between Fatah, which promised peace and delivered little, or Hamas, whose rhetoric is bloody and apocalyptic, but who have delivered desperately needed, if rudimentary, services that the legitimate government of Palestine has not delivered.

Moreover, the dichotomy between Hamas, a terrorist organization, and Fatah, a democratic political movement, is specious. For years, Fatah has straddled a crude line, gaining international support as the representative, elected leadership of the Palestinian people, while encouraging, aiding and funding, covertly and openly, violent attacks on Israeli civilians. Arafat and Fatah learned the empty mantra of recognizing Israel, which kept the foreign cash flowing. Hamas, to its credit, is more open about its intent toward Jews. ("Jews," rather than the euphemistic "Zionists," are the stated enemy of Hamas, which itself is indicative of the group's brutal honesty.)

The election of a Hamas majority last week, which swept out the remnants of Arafat's cronies, was a shock to observers, though perhaps less shocking to those most familiar with the region. It is hard to see a bright side to a Palestinian government backed by Iran's genocidal anti-Semitic theologues, but there may be a silver lining.

For one thing, the international community, notably the European Union, which has overlooked years of Fatah's duplicity and incitement to violence, is now forced to acknowledge the unvarnished reality of Israel-hating Islamism.

In reality, for Israel, little has changed – except that the rabid Jew-hatred that passes for foreign policy, education, sport and entertainment across the Arab world is now out in the open. The world community is unable any longer to hide behind Fatah's empty promise of peace, and is now forced to confront openly the ugly underpinning of Arab anti-Zionism – Jew-hatred and genocidal intent. For Palestinians, of course, much will change. The education of girls, for instance, is no longer assured, and a veil of fundamentalism seems likely about to descend over Palestine.

If nothing else, the election of Hamas should make the international discussion about the Middle East marginally more balanced, because finally the world community may recognize what Zionists have been contending for years – that Israel faces existential threats based not on geopolitical realities, but on base racism and xenophobia.

The greatest hope, of course, is that governance will moderate Hamas, marginalizing the violent extremism that has been its hallmark.

The worst-case scenarios, on the other hand, are truly grim. Iran is now literally at Israel's doorstep. And, if the world community reacts as it should to a PA that refuses to renounce violence and its commitment to the destruction of Israel, those who will be hurt by economic sanctions will be those whose conditions are already wretched – ordinary Palestinians.

While it is tempting to place blame on these ordinary Palestinians, who in great numbers elected Hamas, generous observers will recognize in this sad outcome an expression of true desperation. Palestinians were let down by a Fatah movement that promised bread and peace, but delivered neither. Voting Hamas was a desperate attempt to improve everyday conditions that Fatah was too corrupt to address.

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