Who Lost Gaza?
Jul. 2nd, 2007 11:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
malenkiyscotWho Lost Gaza?
By the Editors of The New Republic
A great debate has already begun on the subject of who lost Gaza. Increasingly, one hears that the Israelis did, or the Americans did; that the disaster is the consequence of Israeli policies or American policies, of Israeli harshness and American indifference. It is necessary to insist, therefore, that the primary responsibility for Palestinian actions falls on Palestinians. To believe the opposite is to hold a condescending imperialist view of the Palestinians as the passive objects of others; as nothing but the wretched playthings of power, of circumstances over which they have no control; as people in some way unqualified for history. If the Hamas revolution is anything, however, it is historical action. The Palestinians in Gaza are not only suffering their history; they are also making it, and ruining it.
Hamas, like Hezbollah, and like Al Qaeda, is a phenomenon with deep social, cultural, psychological, and philosophical roots in its own universe. The internal factors are more decisive than the external factors. The authority of the Koran preceded, and precedes Israel; just as it preceded, and precedes, America; just as it preceded, and precedes, modernity. The political theology of Hamas is not, as outraged commentators like to say, an expression of nihilism; it is an expression of a grandiose and particular and radical worldview--of a belief in certain metaphysical and moral propositions that cannot be dismissed as simply desperate reactions to political misfortunes. If Hamas were not so genuinely indigenous, it would not be so genuinely terrifying. Could Israel and the United States have alleviated some of the hardships that the Palestinians have endured in recent years? Certainly. (Set aside, for the moment, the significant question of whether Israel and the United States should have recognized, and engaged with, Hamas.) Could any Israeli and American alleviations have preempted the civil war in Palestine and robbed the clerics and the gunmen of Hamas of their prestige in Palestinian society? You must be kidding.
Now return to the question of Hamas and diplomacy. It is an odd question, of course, since diplomacy is precisely what Hamas repudiates. But the more violent Hamas gets, the more one hears that it is time for diplomacy. About what, exactly? A Palestinian state, comes the answer. But the only Palestinian state that Hamas will discuss, insofar as it discusses, is the one that will erase Israel from the map. Is this the proper subject of negotiations? Yes, Hamas was democratically elected in Palestine; but democracy is not all that one needs to know about the legitimacy of a government. The legitimacy of a government does not guarantee the legitimacy of a government's actions. Those missiles that Hamas has been firing into Israel from Gaza are not attacks by a movement, they are attacks by a government.
So this leaves the West Bank, and the "West Bank first" option. Israel and the United States must indeed do whatever they can to strengthen the hand of Mahmoud Abbas, as a matter of the most elementary prudence; but we must all be very sober about the implications of "Hamas-stan" for the prospects for peace. Those prospects in the near term are, in a word, null. Nothing should be done by Israel that would further foreclose the possibility of peace, but neither should Israeli policy be premised on the imminence of reconciliation. There is violence all around it. And the West Bank is not exactly calm. Hamas flourishes there, too; and so does the secular version of "the armed struggle." The government appointed by Abbas--in defiance of democratic procedure, bless him--includes many modernizers and liberalizers, most especially Salam Fayyad, the new prime minister, but they are not the uncontested heroes of their people. They are fighting the good fight, and they deserve help. But the outcome of the fight is far from clear. And the outcome will not be determined by anybody except the Palestinians themselves. For many decades, the world has clamored for Palestinian self-determination. Well, the clamor can now cease. Palestinian self-determination is here for all the world to see. So is self-determination good news or bad news? It all depends on what is determined.
By the Editors of The New Republic
A great debate has already begun on the subject of who lost Gaza. Increasingly, one hears that the Israelis did, or the Americans did; that the disaster is the consequence of Israeli policies or American policies, of Israeli harshness and American indifference. It is necessary to insist, therefore, that the primary responsibility for Palestinian actions falls on Palestinians. To believe the opposite is to hold a condescending imperialist view of the Palestinians as the passive objects of others; as nothing but the wretched playthings of power, of circumstances over which they have no control; as people in some way unqualified for history. If the Hamas revolution is anything, however, it is historical action. The Palestinians in Gaza are not only suffering their history; they are also making it, and ruining it.
Hamas, like Hezbollah, and like Al Qaeda, is a phenomenon with deep social, cultural, psychological, and philosophical roots in its own universe. The internal factors are more decisive than the external factors. The authority of the Koran preceded, and precedes Israel; just as it preceded, and precedes, America; just as it preceded, and precedes, modernity. The political theology of Hamas is not, as outraged commentators like to say, an expression of nihilism; it is an expression of a grandiose and particular and radical worldview--of a belief in certain metaphysical and moral propositions that cannot be dismissed as simply desperate reactions to political misfortunes. If Hamas were not so genuinely indigenous, it would not be so genuinely terrifying. Could Israel and the United States have alleviated some of the hardships that the Palestinians have endured in recent years? Certainly. (Set aside, for the moment, the significant question of whether Israel and the United States should have recognized, and engaged with, Hamas.) Could any Israeli and American alleviations have preempted the civil war in Palestine and robbed the clerics and the gunmen of Hamas of their prestige in Palestinian society? You must be kidding.
Now return to the question of Hamas and diplomacy. It is an odd question, of course, since diplomacy is precisely what Hamas repudiates. But the more violent Hamas gets, the more one hears that it is time for diplomacy. About what, exactly? A Palestinian state, comes the answer. But the only Palestinian state that Hamas will discuss, insofar as it discusses, is the one that will erase Israel from the map. Is this the proper subject of negotiations? Yes, Hamas was democratically elected in Palestine; but democracy is not all that one needs to know about the legitimacy of a government. The legitimacy of a government does not guarantee the legitimacy of a government's actions. Those missiles that Hamas has been firing into Israel from Gaza are not attacks by a movement, they are attacks by a government.
So this leaves the West Bank, and the "West Bank first" option. Israel and the United States must indeed do whatever they can to strengthen the hand of Mahmoud Abbas, as a matter of the most elementary prudence; but we must all be very sober about the implications of "Hamas-stan" for the prospects for peace. Those prospects in the near term are, in a word, null. Nothing should be done by Israel that would further foreclose the possibility of peace, but neither should Israeli policy be premised on the imminence of reconciliation. There is violence all around it. And the West Bank is not exactly calm. Hamas flourishes there, too; and so does the secular version of "the armed struggle." The government appointed by Abbas--in defiance of democratic procedure, bless him--includes many modernizers and liberalizers, most especially Salam Fayyad, the new prime minister, but they are not the uncontested heroes of their people. They are fighting the good fight, and they deserve help. But the outcome of the fight is far from clear. And the outcome will not be determined by anybody except the Palestinians themselves. For many decades, the world has clamored for Palestinian self-determination. Well, the clamor can now cease. Palestinian self-determination is here for all the world to see. So is self-determination good news or bad news? It all depends on what is determined.
