Norman doesn’t want Israel to negotiate with the enemy she has but to wait till she has the enemy she wants.
Sir Jeremy Greenstock is entitled to think, and to argue, that Hamas should not be treated as ‘beyond the pale’ when it comes to ceasefire and peace talks. As an experienced diplomat, however, he should seek to explain himself better than he does:
Hamas as a movement covers quite a range of views, some of them unacceptably angry and violent. Rockets from Gaza aimed at Israeli towns are pointless and must stop: no vehement protest, even over brutal occupation, should kill civilians on the other side.
But the more thoughtful strand of thinking in Hamas recognises the need for a political process and is ready to engage in the search for a durable solution to the conflict with Israel. It was open to further encouragement when Hamas was keeping the peace on its side in 2006 and 2008. Hamas, which in fact has no deep-rooted argument with the west or Christianity, no political alliance with Tehran or Hezbollah, no respect for al-Qaida and no “charter” for the destruction of Israel in its political programme, just wants the Israeli occupation to end.
What I’m interested in is ‘no “charter” for the destruction of Israel in its political programme’. So how to deal with the fact that the Hamas Charter, with its reference to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, not only talks about killing Jews ‘until [they] hide behind rocks and trees’, but goes so far as to say:
Israel will rise and will remain erect until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated its predecessors.
In addition, ‘pointless’ wouldn’t be the word I’d choose for the rockets from Gaza ‘aimed at Israeli towns’, but that’s by the way.
Sir Jeremy Greenstock is being a little disingenuous when he says that Hamas has no “charter” for the destruction of Israel. He is referring to the 2006 election manifesto as well as recent statements from Hamas leaders and not to The Charter.
So does Hamas promise to destroy Israel in its charter? Yes. Do clerics in Hamas-controlled Gaza call for horrible things done on Israel and the Jews? Yes they do. But looking at Israel and her own record when it comes to charters, statements and actions she is no better.
Take, for instance, the Likud charter which expressly rejects the idea of a Palestinian state.
The Likud will continue to strengthen and develop these communities [i.e. settlements in Judea and Samaria] and will prevent their uprooting. (…)
The Government of Israel flatly rejects the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state west of the Jordan river.
The Palestinians can run their lives freely in the framework of self-rule, but not as an independent and sovereign state. Thus, for example, in matters of foreign affairs, security, immigration and ecology, their activity shall be limited in accordance with imperatives of Israel’s existence, security and national needs.
Claims sovereignty over the whole Land of Israel which includes the territory occupied in 1967 (East Jerusalem, The West Bank and Gaza) and calls for:
Preserving the right of the Jewish Nation to the Land of Israel as an eternal, inalienable right; perseverance in the settlement and development of all parts of the Land of Israel; implementation of the State’s sovereignty on them.
MK Uzi Landau confirmed this when he declared:
I am against the establishment of a Palestinian state and everything must be done to prevent it.
Joining the verbal warfare are Likud politicians such as Moshe Feiglin, currently running for the Knesset on the party’s ticket:
Why should non-Jews have a say in the policy of a Jewish state? (…) For two thousand years, Jews dreamed of a Jewish state, not a democratic state. Democracy should serve the values of the state, not destroy them. You can’t teach a monkey to speak and you can’t teach an Arab to be democratic. You’re dealing with a culture of thieves and robbers. Muhammad, their prophet, was a robber and a killer and a liar. The Arab destroys everything he touches.
As for Israeli clerics, they have advocated a genocide in Gaza in response to the rockets:
“If they don’t stop after we kill 100, then we must kill a thousand,” said Shmuel Eliyahu. “And if they do not stop after 1,000 then we must kill 10,000. If they still don’t stop we must kill 100,000, even a million. Whatever it takes to make them stop.”
And indoctrinated troops with rather dubious “literature”:
One such flyer is attributed to “the pupils of Rabbi Yitzhak Ginsburg” – the former rabbi at Joseph’s Tomb and author of the article “Baruch the Man,” which praises Baruch Goldstein, who massacred unarmed Palestinians in Hebron. It calls on “soldiers of Israel to spare your lives and the lives of your friends and not to show concern for a population that surrounds us and harms us. We call on you … to function according to the law ‘kill the one who comes to kill you.’ As for the population, it is not innocent … We call on you to ignore any strange doctrines and orders that confuse the logical way of fighting the enemy.”
There’s also the graffiti left by the Israeli “Defense” Force in Gaza and by the settlers in the West Bank: “Arabs need 2 die”, “Die you all”, “Make war not peace”, “1 is down, 999,999 to go”, “Die Arab Sand-niggers”, “Exterminate The Muslims” and “Arabs To The Gas Chambers”.
And last but not least, there’s the illegal settlements in the West Bank. Their growth has been expanding year on year for decades no matter who’s been in charge at the Knesset. According to Peace Now, an Israeli Human Rights organisation, 1,257 new structures were built in settlements during 2008, compared to 800 in 2007, an increase of 57 percent. At this rate, there will be nowhere left for an independent and viable Palestinian state.
For the Israelis or indeed our Norman to claim that The Hamas Charter is an obstacle to negotiations and that they have no partner for peace to accept their generous offer without being entirely honest about their own position is just a case of pot calling kettle black. As an aside, it’s worth remembering that the PLO Charter as amended in 1968 also called for the destruction of Israel and that wasn’t officially changed until 1998. This was not seen as an obstacle to the negotiation of The Oslo Accords in 1993.
[h/t The Hasbara Buster for digging up the dirt on Likud]
