As most of you know, the terrorist group Hamas just won control of the Palestinian Parliament in a landslide. Everyone is shocked. Isreal has said they won't talk to the new government. Everyone is basically thinking, "oh shoot, we are going to have total chaos over there!"
However... I would like to offer a different view point.
Terrorism is, by nature, a rebellion against those in power. Terrorists want changes in a system. The difference between terrorism and your local Reform Party or whatever, is that the terrorists viewpoints are in the extreme minority among those in the country. They know they cannot convince enough people to change through political means, so they use fear and violence to attempt to achieve their goals.
Hamas has now won control of the Palestinian State. But something else comes with the control, and that is responsibility. Hamas is now responsible for the operation of the state. People blame the government when anything goes wrong, such as electricity not working, or aid not coming quickly enough or food shortages or whatever. In Palestine, that is no less true. If Hamas cannot keep the electricity on, the water running, and the day to day operation of the state going they will be ousted and hated by the very people who voted them into power. The people want things to go well for them. They may hate Isreal, but they love life and pleasure and food etc. If Hamas becomes too antagonistic to Isreal, and thus to the rest of the world, the Palestinians will be alienated by the world, and that menas that things won't go so well... which means that Hamas will be voted out of power. Democracy works itself out over time because the people choose who has the power.
I predict that Hamas will either become very unpopular, or will moderate it's positions quite a bit to stay in power.
This development does not actually seem to me to be a bad thing. The downside, which is more bombings (potentially) for Isreal, and the derailment of the peace process are really not anything that Isreal wasn't preparing for anyway. And there is the potential that this will derail the peace process right now, but accelerate it later on.
Anyway, just a different take.
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If there are bomings, etc., there will now be an official state which has to take responsibility. Those targeted by Hamas' violence can now respond with official declarations of war or other retaliations against the Palestinian state.
Your analysis is brilliant and my people, the oppresed refugees of Palestine, thank you. However, I feel that you have missed the crucial point, which is that if there is a lack of electricity or water for the oppressed Palestinian peoples, it is because the Zionist conspiracy has seized control of these resources to the detriment of my people. To belive that the problem is a LACK of infrastructure is naive; the true problem is the EXISTENCE of Israel. Hamas is simply removing the root problem, and cannot be blamed for minor inconveniences.
If there is a lack of electricity, water, or anything, the fault is not the existence of Isreal or any "Zionist conspiracy". The fault lies with the Palestinian peoples unwillingness to accept the fact that Isreal exists and that nothing they do will change that, and an unwillingness to attempt to live at peace with Isreal.
The Isreali people have just as much a claim to live in that land as the Palestinians. The land was given to them by the British and the United Nations, and they have fought, and won, to keep it. Whether the British and the UN had the right to give it to them is moot. They took it from the Turks, who took it from the Arabs, who took it from the Christians, who took it from the Arabs, who took it from the Romans, who took it from the Syrian Selucids, who took it from the Greeks, who took it from the...ad nauseum.
Almost every country in existence has a similar story. Most countries are controlled by a people other than those original to the land (for instance, the original people of Britain are the Celts. The British of today are decended from the Saxons or Normans, who are Germanic and French). Your "plight" is not a new one, nor an original one.
If the Palestinian people would stop fighting and learn to negotiate peace, and try to live with the Isrealis, they would find that they could either a.) live in the present Isreali state with out inconvenience or trouble and follow their traditional ways, or b.) be able to negotiate a homeland for themselves. Violence and bombings only strengthens the will of the Isreali people against the Palestinians.
Isreal isn't going anywhere, and no matter what Hamas, Fatah or any other terrorist organization attempts to do, it will stay there. The only answer is to learn to live in peaceful coexistence.
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