With the turn of the new year, Hamas has announced its “truce” with Israel is now over.
Gee, when did it ever begin?
A Hamas official said this week that the Palestinian terrorist organization now declares itself free to resume attacks on Israelis, adding, “The truce has become meaningless.”
This comes as Palestinian parliamentary elections scheduled for late January may be delayed. Looking increasingly weak politically, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is under pressure from elements in his own party to put off elections because of lawlessness in the territories and the likelihood that his Fatah Party will fair poorly in the balloting.
Add to all this Israel’s threat to bar East Jerusalem Arabs from voting should Hamas candidates appear on the ballot, and it looks like 2006 could be a bumpy ride for the region.
Bumpy or not, Israel cannot be expected to ignore anarchy on its borders. The nation will do what it must to protect its citizens. If that includes preventing a terrorist gang such as Hamas from becoming a force in Palestinian politics, so be it.
Which makes this week’s remarks from Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz all the more striking. He said that Israel would consider negotiating with Hamas on three conditions: if it won a majority of seats in the Parliament, if it agreed to lay down its arms and if it struck from its charter language calling for Israel’s destruction.
We’re not holding our breath.
Even with changes for the better in Israeli-Palestinian dialogue since the death of Yasser Arafat, no one could have expected peace and democracy to come easily to Palestinian society.
Still, it has to be discouraging to the world, to Israel and most especially to Palestinian Arabs just how chaotic life has become in the West Bank and Gaza.
This week alone, Palestinian gunmen seized an election office in Gaza. Others smashed a Gaza-Egypt border fence. Most disturbingly, gunmen briefly kidnapped German, British and American citizens, including the parents of Rachel Corrie, the pro-Palestinian activist accidentally killed at an Israeli construction site in 2003. All were released unharmed.
Blaming whatever’s wrong with Palestinian society on Israel, as is usually done, simply doesn’t fly. As one Palestinian politician admitted, “we cannot blame anyone else for what we are seeing in Gaza with these kidnappings.”
Israel has made the hard choices to achieve peace with its Palestinian neighbors. When will the Palestinians do likewise?