(Dobbs) Who Put Hamas In Charge?
Arguably, its comparatively more moderate rival, the outgrowth of the PLO.
Almost two weeks ago, thanks to a negotiated ceasefire, the temperature in Israel after the 11-day war wasn’t so hot any more, but I decided to write about Hamas anyway because it’s not going away. Not the organization, not the rancor, not the attacks. Just because a conflict falls from the headlines doesn’t mean a small spark won’t light the sky again.
Here’s how the column began:
The rockets aren’t flying any more into Israel. The bombs aren’t falling any more on Gaza.
At least not for now.
But everyone caught in last month’s conflict knows from experience that the best we can say about the present pause is, at least not for now.
I didn’t get much further. My wife and I were leaving a few hours later on a 12-day road trip and preparations took precedence. I just got back and lo-and-behold, “at least not for now” already is history.
Twice this week, as it has in the past, Hamas sent helium balloons into the sky above Israel, armed with explosives and set on fire.
Twice this week, Israeli aircraft responded, hitting what Israel says were military targets in Gaza, including launch sites for the incendiary balloons.
If this is taking sides, it’s taking sides, but from the wars I’ve covered, I’ve long believed that just because you kick me in the shin, I don’t have to confine my response to kicking you back the same way. Israel will probably catch hell for its “disproportionate” counterattacks but I don’t buy the idea that even if you’re more powerful than your enemy, you can’t hit back harder than your enemy hit you. The point of war is winning.
The ceasefire of course could get traction again. We should never take that hope off the table. But with so much death and destruction from the war in May, piled on top of an unyielding history of hate dating back generations, eventually any ceasefire can be breached and that spark can ignite another round of catastrophic combat.
It has always been thus. Because nothing in the Mideast is simple. Nothing. Especially when you’re dealing with a group like Hamas. And that’s what I set out two weeks ago to write about: what is Hamas? And who put Hamas in charge?
It goes back decades. Funds from international donors to help the Palestinian people with food and fuel, health care and child care and education, began to disappear. Which meant towns and villages in the Palestinian Territories— the West Bank and the Gaza Strip— began to get desperate. It’s not that the oil-rich Arab states and the European Union and the United States had stopped sending money. It’s that the money stopped reaching the people.
Simply put, it was siphoned off by the Palestinian leadership. This wasn’t benign neglect, it was corrupt neglect.
In the Mukata, the headquarters in Ramallah of the Palestinian government, I used to see more fancy German cars parked inside the compound than I ever saw in most parking lots in Germany. Anyone could do the math. The funds weren’t flowing where they were meant to flow. Especially when it came to Gaza, which was isolated and easier to ignore.
The official Palestinian government, an outgrowth of the Palestine Liberation Organization known as the Palestinian Authority, stopped making good on its promises. That created a vacuum and you know what they say about a vacuum: something is going to fill it. In Gaza, that something was Hamas.
As best as I could ever tell, ideologically Hamas was not everyone’s cup of tea. The Palestinian Authority periodically was negotiating with the Jewish state to create an independent Palestinian state and for everyday Palestinians, that was the holy grail. Hamas, however, wasn’t into negotiating. Its unbending ideological aim was to drive the Jews into the sea.
But when you’re poor, and someone offers to put food on the table and milk in your children’s tummies, it’s no contest. That someone was Hamas. Survival trumps ideology every time.
What’s more, instability is a breeding ground for terrorists. The despair and destitution in Gaza feeds on itself and makes Hamas stronger.
As do its dark donors. Thanks to funding from Israel’s adversaries, Hamas puts young men on the payroll. Like terrorist groups the world over, it gives recruits something they want: not just food and clothing and shelter, but family, community.
And, power. Twice over the years in that part of the world— once in Beirut, once in Tehran— I had teenagers put machine-guns to my temple. Think of how that felt for them. They held a man’s life in their trigger fingers. It must have been the best day of their lives.
Think of how it feels for those militants in Hamas, who hitherto made little mark on the world and were noticeable to nobody. Putting a rocket in the air against Israel— or even a balloon— has to be the best day of their lives.
A calcified Palestinian Authority theoretically governs the Palestinian people, but for years it has been losing supremacy and support to Hamas, which won more disciples— and probably more trigger fingers for the next fight— by waging last month’s war. Not just in beleaguered Gaza but in the West Bank too. Because it doesn’t just fill a vacuum for services people need. It fills another vacuum, something they’ve long lived without: pride. However selfishly, however ineffectively, however recklessly, Hamas tells its people that it is fighting back, fighting against an enemy they’ve been raised to loathe.
By most accounts, they’re buying it. By most accounts, they will abide their suffering if the enemy suffers too. By most accounts, they feel pride in the attacks Hamas wages against Israel.
The incendiary balloons are back in the air. Can the rockets be far behind?
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For almost five decades Greg Dobbs has been a correspondent for two television networks, a political columnist for The Denver Post, a moderator on Rocky Mountain PBS, and author of “Life in the Wrong Lane.” He has covered presidencies at home and international crises around the globe. He won three Emmys, and the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Professional Journalists. Some of his essays also are published— with images— on a website he co-founded, BoomerCafe.com.
Thank you for your insight, Greg. I really appreciate this piece of yours, especially your perspective as a former boots-on-the-ground journalist.
There is much talk about the "Poor Palestinians" and the "Evil Israelis" in our media and in our red v. blue political discourse these days. There is not enough talk about the corruption of Palestinian politics, a modern-day foundational pillar of the overall conflict. Thanks, friend! CB
This is really an excellent history of the Hamas takeover of the Palestinian government. I hadn't put all of those pieces together yet, I too wondered where the government was in this dog fight, it sounds like they're on the sidelines watching. I fear that this is just another chapter in the centuries long hostility, according to James Michener in The Source, this has been going on for at least a couple of thousand years, same people different names, if my memory serves me correctly. The ceasefires are just a bad joke in this travesty of people not being willing to try to cooperate with each other. Thanks for another great piece Greg.
P.S. Guess we in the U.S. haven't been very successful in the cooperation process with each other either.
K. David Dillingham