I listen to NPR on my way to work. It’s that, one of Clear Channel’s pop torture\/mind warping stations, or AM lunacy. <\/p>\n
Every time I’ve listened to NPR for at least a week now the station has interviewed someone on the fate of Israel due Hamas’ inclusion in the Palestinian elections always with a focus of worry over Israel’s right to exist. The Palestinian’s right to exist has never once been discussed.<\/p>\n
NPR and all other mainstream outfits in America that haven’t the time or inclination to examine Hamas’ evolving<\/a> role<\/a> in the political and societal landscape of Palestine have forever been stripped of their favourite stalking horse<\/a>. Why is it that not once in the past week since this article was published did they bother to acknowledge it?<\/p>\n Hello all,<\/p>\n Close to two decades behind the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), with which talks were previously outlawed by former Israeli legislatures, the fundamentalist Palestinian Hamas organization has now dropped destruction of the state of Israel from its manifesto. This article by Chris McGreal, provides both an overview of and responses to this potentially significant step, as the planned date of general elections in Palestine draws near. <\/p>\n McGreal reports that Palestinian cabinet minister Ghassan Khatib, of the secular Palestinian People’s party, believes Hamas has had to face reality and will have to embrace a negotiated settlement with Israel. He welcomes Hamas’ entry into the electoral system as “a positive development whereby they [will] have to abide by the rules of the majority and respect the arguments of the administration they are part of, which includes a state built on 1967 borders. It will take time but Hamas will no longer have their own militia. It will be solely a political force.”<\/p>\n The article quotes Gazi Hamad, a Hamas candidate in the Gaza Strip, as stating that, “The policy is to maintain the armed struggle but it is not our first priority. We know that first of all we have to put more effort into resolving the internal problems, dealing with corruption, blackmail, chaos.”<\/p>\n True to the pattern adopted by Israel’s parliaments and governments in the seventies and eighties, when contacts with the PLO were declared illegal and prosecuted, Israel’s current government has meanwhile banned Hamas candidates from running and declared its refusal to recognize the results of elections should they include such candidates. <\/p>\n The article was forwarded to me by Racheli Gai who pointed out its importance and suggested it be posted.<\/p>\n Rela Hamas has dropped its call for the destruction of Israel from its manifesto for the Palestinian parliamentary election in a fortnight, a move that brings the group closer to the mainstream Palestinian position of building a state within the boundaries of the occupied territories. The Islamist faction, responsible for a long campaign of suicide bombings and other attacks on Israelis, still calls for the maintenance of the armed struggle against occupation. But it steps back from Hamas’s 1988 charter demanding Israel’s eradication and the establishment of a Palestinian state in its place.<\/p>\n The manifesto makes no mention of the destruction of the Jewish state and instead takes a more ambiguous position by saying that Hamas had decided to compete in the elections because it would contribute to “the establishment of an independent state whose capital is Jerusalem”.<\/p>\n The shift in emphasis comes as Hamas finds itself under pressure from the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, and from foreign governments to accept Israel’s right to exist and to end its violence if it wants to be accepted as a political partner in a future administration.<\/p>\n The group is expected to emerge as the second largest party after Mr Abbas’s Fatah in the next Palestinian parliament. Opinion polls give it more than a third of the popular vote, built on a campaign against Fatah’s endemic corruption and mismanagement and failure to contain growing criminality, and by claiming credit for driving the Israeli army and settlers out of Gaza.<\/p>\n But the manifesto continues to emphasise the armed struggle. “Our nation is at a stage of national liberation, and it has the right to act to regain its rights and end the occupation by using all means, including armed resistance,” it says.<\/p>\n Gazi Hamad, a Hamas candidate in the Gaza Strip, yesterday said the manifesto reflected the group’s position of accepting an interim state based on 1967 borders but leaving a final decision on whether to recognise Israel to future generations.<\/p>\n “Hamas is talking about the end of the occupation as the basis for a state, but at the same time Hamas is still not ready to recognise the right of Israel to exist,” he said. “We cannot give up the right of the armed struggle because our territory is occupied in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. That is the territory we are fighting to liberate.”<\/p>\n But Mr Hamad said the armed resistance was no longer Hamas’s primary strategy. “The policy is to maintain the armed struggle but it is not our first priority. We know that first of all we have to put more effort into resolving the internal problems, dealing with corruption, blackmail, chaos. This is our priority because if we change the situation for the Palestinians it will make our cause stronger.<\/p>\n “Hamas is looking to establish a new political strategy in which all Palestinian groups will participate, not just dominated by Fatah. We will discuss the negotiation strategy, how can we run the conflict with Israel but by different means.”<\/p>\n Ghassan Khatib, a Palestinian cabinet minister and member of the secular Palestinian People’s party, said he believed Hamas was being forced to face reality as it prepared to sit in parliament, and that it would have to embrace a negotiated settlement with Israel: “Having Hamas inside the system is a positive development whereby they have to abide by the rules of the majority and respect the arguments of the administration they are part of, which includes a state built on 1967 borders. It will take time but Hamas will no longer have their own militia. It will be solely a political force.”<\/p>\n But Israel’s security establishment predicts that if Hamas does as well as expected in the election it will damage the Palestinian Authority and further undermine the prospects for an agreement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I listen to NPR on my way to work. It’s that, one of Clear Channel’s pop torture\/mind warping stations, or AM lunacy. Every time I’ve listened to NPR for at least a week now the station has interviewed someone on … Continue reading
\n(from my e-mail<\/a><\/em>)
\n<\/center><\/p>\n
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\nHamas drops call for destruction of Israel from manifesto<\/strong>
\nBy Chris McGreal in Jerusalem<\/strong>
\nThe Guardian<\/em>
\n12 January 2006<\/a><\/p>\n