Hamas recognition agreement

Hamas today agreed to recognise the fact that they are stubborn, childish and out of touch with their populace. The majority of Palestinians want to recognise Israel’s right to exist and agree on a two state system, but Hamas will not.

In support of their statement, they used inescapable logic: if China doesn’t recognise Taiwan, then why should Hamas recognise Israel? Great: point to the world’s other great intractable and volatile situational fuck-up as a reason why you should continue to be intransigent, thus ensuring your people remain the world’s number one fuck-up.

The problem with Hamas is that they have (at least) two factions, the more technocratic faction led by Ismail Haniya, who’s actually in Gaza, and the more militant faction, safely led from a distance in Syria by Khalid Meshal. The more Haniya gives on acknowledging that there will in the future be both an Israel and a Palestine, the more Meshal can gain influence among those who dream of a day when they can take their parents/grandparents’ old house keys back to their houses in Haifa and Tel Aviv.

What needs to happen is for an alternative political force, with Hamas’ clean hands but without Hamas’ religious jihad, to develop in Palestine. It won’t be Fatah, because they’re seen as corrupted to the core.

I guess a Hamas split might work. There does appear to be a part of their group that wants to be more moderate, if only so that they can enjoy power and influence. There’s a pretty big carrot for any of them that decided to break away, as they could claim legitimacy and actually get Palestine as a functioning state with proper funding. The stick, however, would be the potentially unpleasant recriminations such a split would incur. I doubt that the less moderate members of Hamas would be happy about a split, especially if their half ended up without power.