Desperate Serbwife

Welcome to the big leagues boys

I have been reading a lot about the recent election in the Palestinian territories. And while many are quite worried about what this means for Israel, and the region, I see this as either the end of Hamas, or their major turning point. You see, it is a lot harder to lead a country than to be a terrorist that does a bit of charity work on the side. The mundane, yet vitally important tasks, such as paying civil servants' salaries, managing an education system and repairing a crumbling infrastructure, cannot be fixed simply by blaming Israel. So, Hamas is either going to have to get out from behind their guns and actually govern or they too will fall - ahhh, democracy, it really is a great thing.

And, as we all know too well from our pathetic attempts to "rebuild" Iraq, the mundane process of running of a country is much harder than it looks - and if done poorly, will quickly turn the population against you. To run an economically successful country, it takes diplomacy, forward thinking and charm - three things that do not appear on Hamas' resume.

At this point it is almost laughable that an organization that has excelled at weakening its own government has now been chosen to run it. It would be laughable, if it wasn't so scary. There are millions of Palestinian people that will most likely suffer because of their choice of leaders - but then again, who is America to pass judgement on the selection of short-sighted, incompetent leaders who have been entrusted with an entire government because of voters' interest in only one issue (abortion, gay marriage, guns...or in Hamas' case, the destruction of Israel). The only difference is that most American citizens are on solid economic footing and don't need a competent government (or they think they don't) to get them out of the desperate economic state that most of the Palestinian people live in.

If Hamas wants a chance in hell of improving the lives of the Palestinian poeple, it had better stop screaming about Israel for a long enough to realize that it takes real work to run a country. The Palestinian government is bankrupt at the moment (see article linked on the right for more information) and the Western world that has been providing millions of dollars in aid will not continue to support an organization that seeks to destroy an ally. This basically means that the government will have no income and there is barely any investment or income-generating businesss in the Palestinian territories - and yet Hamas' only plan to solve any of these major problems is to destroy Israel. Perhaps the rest of the Middle East could prop them up in the short-term, but they will not continue to send millions of dollars for too long.

Hamas now has some tough choices to make. They can either renounce their "destroy Israel" rehetoric and get some help, and possibily even foreign investment in their terroritories, or they can organize every single person in their land to fight Israel. Judging by the size of Israel's military, that is not a pleasant, nor likely successful, alternative.

No matter which path they choose, I think this election has just spelled the end of Hamas as we have known it. What Hamas wanted was power, what they have gotten is responsibility. Welcome to the big leagues, boys!

posted by Brooke @ 8:42 AM