gaza easing up is a disaster

By BARRY RUBIN
06/21/2010 22:38

‘Easing’ the Gaza blockade will create a revolutionary, Iran-backed, genocidal and anti-Semitic Islamist statelet on the Mediterranean.

Talkbacks (15)

What does Israel give up? The entire strategy of trying to reduce Gaza’s economy and the rewards that Hamas can give its supporters. In other words, while Hamas’s military capacity is kept as low as possible, it can stay in power for decades. While this represents a considerable “retreat,” it is not so meaningful in practice since – as noted above – nobody is going to allow Israel to overthrow the regime in Gaza.

So this is the future: A revolutionary Islamist statelet, a long-term outpost of Iran, a base for spreading terrorism and subversion, a source for genocidal anti-Semitic propaganda has been established on the shores of the Mediterranean. For all practical purposes, one could have made this declaration two or four years ago. Now it is clear.

Some people might find the above paragraph controversial. But it is all obvious.

Hamas will be in power in the Gaza Strip for a long time. Who is going to remove it? It is a client of Iran. Certainly it is under embargo for arms, but it functions a lot like an independent state for practical purposes. It will return to war against Israel at the first opportunity. It teaches its people to kill Jews and to be terrorists.

That doesn’t mean all Gazans support it, but those who don’t can do nothing about it.

Moreover, the Hamas regime receives indirect aid because the Palestinian Authority pays much of its civil service, and Western projects are designed to help its people.

Yes, of course there are limits on what it can do, given its size and the pressure still put on by Egypt and Israel. But this is an accurate description. Putting it bluntly sounds harsh, but the reality is harsh.

And what could be more ironic than the fact that Western governments, frantic for an Israeli-Palestinian peace, have just helped put one more gigantic roadblock in the way? Even without Hamas ruling almost half of those under Palestinian rule, the PA probably wouldn’t be able to make peace. The consolidation of a Hamas state makes that inability a certainty.