As the new Hamas government is sworn into power in the Palestinian Authority, we might ask: What would bring a people, the most secular of Arab populations with little history of religious fundamentalism, to vote Hamas? Mere protest at Fatah ineffectualness in negotiations and internal corruption doesn’t go far enough. While warning Hamas that their vote did not constitute a mandate for imposing an Iran-like theocracy on
To hell with the international community that closed off Palestinians’ appeal to international law and human rights conventions. Had only the Fourth Geneva Convention been applied, could never have constructed its Occupation in the first place. International law defines an occupation as a temporary military situation that can only be resolved through negotiations. Therefore an Occupying Power such as is prohibited from taking any unilateral action that makes its control permanent. Besides its military bases, every single element of Israel’s Occupation is patently illegal: settlements and the construction of a massive system of Israel-only highways that link the West Bank settlements to Israel proper; the extension of Israel’s legal and planning system into occupied Palestinian areas; the plunder of Palestinian water and other resources for Israeli use; house demolitions and the expropriation of Palestinian lands; the intentional impoverishment of the local population; military attacks on civilian populations — to name but a few. Even when ’s construction of the "Separation Barrier" was ruled illegal by the International Court of Justice in
To hell with the United States that closed off negotiations as an avenue for redressing Palestinian rights and for enabling Israel to make its Occupation permanent. At the very start of the
To hell with
And to hell with Fatah that, in addition to enabling corruption, did not effectively pursue the Palestinians’ national agenda of self-determination. The Palestinian Authority ran its affairs removed from the people, failing to provide material and moral support to victims of Israeli attacks and policies of house demolitions. Most Palestinians did not vote Hamas (only 44% did), so the door was not closed on Fatah which, most Palestinians seem to hope, will learn its lesson from this setback.
Indeed, the vote for Hamas was not a closing of the door at all, but a rational, intentional and powerful statement of non-cooperation in a political process that is only leading to Palestinian imprisonment. Hamas, if anything, stands for steadfastness, sumud, the refusal to submit. This conflict is too destabilizing to the entire global system to let fester, the Palestinians are saying. You can all impose upon us an apartheid system, blame us for the violence while ignoring Israeli State Terror, pursue your programs of American Empire or your notions of a “clash of civilizations,” we the Palestinians will not submit. We will not cooperate. We will not play your rigged game. In the end, for all your power, you will come to us to sue for peace. And then we will be ready for a just peace that respects the rights of all the peoples of the region, including the Israelis. But you will not beat us.
As an Israeli Jew who sees how the Occupation has eroded the moral foundations of my society and, indeed, my entire people, and as a resident of Israel-Palestine who knows that my fate is intricately intertwined with that of the Palestinians, I pray that such an end will come sooner rather than later.
Jeff Halper is the Coordinator of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD). He can be reached at jeff@icahd.org